Complete thesis - Murdoch University

meaning and a shared sense of participation (Crowley, 1982). Scenario techniques also addressthe issue of incorporating tacit knowledge and expertise and organisational experience.For the ‘softest’ of the positivists, Loucopoulos and Karakostas (1995) Requirements Engineeringis aboutestablishing the “connection” between the need for some change within an organisationalframework and the technology that could bring about that change. Inother words, requirements engineering can be considered as a way of managingchange(Loucopoulos and Karakostas, 1995, p 5).While Loucopoulos and Karakostas (1995)’s definition of RE reflects the view that requirementsspecification involves the interplay of concerns between representation, social andcognitive aspects (Pohl, 1994), and is itself a reflective process (Loucopoulos and Karakostas,1995) it is still firmly rooted in a positivist tradition. The skills needed to address theseconcerns emanate from disciplines other than computer science and engineering, but are tobe applied within those disciplines.The positivist conceptualisation of the development process is also exemplified by the processmodels adopted. These, in the main, assume that the requirements of the system are alreadyestablished, and hence only need to be collated and documented, as noted above (see Downeset al (1988)) for a critique of the SSADM). Newer models, (eg the Win-Win Spiral model(Boehm et al, 1995)) accept the need for accommodation, but view the organisation asachieving predetermined goals via rational decision making. Goals are expressed as specifictargets to be achieved at a particular time, with lower level goals deriving from those at higherlevel. Organisational performance requirements relate to ‘critical success factors’ – thosewhich have to go right if defined business goals are to be achieved. While this teleologicalview acknowledges the need to start from organisational processes, any deep exploration ofmeaning and purpose in context is not allowed for. Contrast this with the non-positivistsystems approach briefly described above.The views of Iivari (1991), that an orthodoxy based on a positivism epistemology may beidentified within the majority of software development schools of thought is supported inthe textbook literature. This perspective has major influence, not only on the ‘world’ inwhich the system is to be developed, but also on the underlying knowledge structures, skills(physical and cognitive) and techniques the Requirements Engineer has recourse to in orderto achieve a successful RE task.54