Wendy Olsen – författare

Classical and radical economists have marginalised the role of money, most particularly the role of credit, in driving the machinery of accumulation and exclusion. Although critiques of capitalism from Marxist, feminist and ecological perspectives abound, The Politics of Money is unique in gathering the strengths of these differing critiques into a coherent whole. The book reviews the role of money in current society through an overview of the history of money creation and a critique of the main theoretical developments in economic thought. Alternative perspectives on money are then presented through a review of a number of radical perspectives but focusing mainly on the work of Marx, Veblen and the social credit perspective of Douglas and the guild socialists.The authors have drawn upon their varied expertise in economics and the social sciences to produce the foundations of a new political economy that will enable communities to reconstruct their socio-economic fabric through social and political control of money systems.

Realism is an approach to humanity which recognizes the real existence of social objects as well as physical objects. Thus realism does involve being realistic. But more importantly, it asserts that the things we are studying in social research have some prior existence and would continue to exist even if our knowledge of them was limited. Indeed, sometimes our knowledge is quite wrong, and realists assert that the real world will tend to constrain science so that wrong claims get challenged. Volume One: Practical Realist Ontology covers the nature of the world, the role of the person, the need for social theory, the nature of language, open systems theorizing, and the avoidance of the fallacies of upward and downward conflation. Volume Two: Realist Methods takes up the triangulation debate in some detail as well as querying the nature of quantitative data and of qualitative data. Volume Three: Knowledge and Meta-knowledge in Realism explores the concept of epistemology and the social basis of human knowledge. Volume Four: Realist Empirical Research runs through lessons to be learned from research that has been conducted under explicit realist assumptions in many disciplines in many different countries.

This innovative book provides students and researchers alike with an indispensible introduction to the key theoretical issues and practical methods needed for data collection.

It uses clear definitions, relevant interdisciplinary examples from around the world and up-to-date suggestions for further reading to demonstrate how to usefully gather and use qualitative, quantitative, and mixed data sets.

The book is divided into seven critical parts:

• Data Collection: An Introduction to Research Practices

• Collecting Qualitative Data

• Observation and Informed Methods

• Experimental and Systematic Data Collection

• Survey Methods for Data Collection

• The Case Study Method of Data Collection

• Concluding Suggestions for Data Collection Groups

A stimulating, practical guide which can be read as individual concepts or as a whole this will be an important resource for students and research professionals.

Wendy Olsen is Senior Lecturer at Manchester University, Institute for Development Policy & Management and Cathie Marsh Centre for Census & Survey Research