Mechanisms and Philosophy of Action

It is almost twenty years since Pawson and Tilley’s seminal work on realistic evaluation required evaluators to think seriously about mechanisms – the hidden and subjective factors fired in a particular context that... [ view full abstract ]

It is almost twenty years since Pawson and Tilley’s seminal work on realistic evaluation required evaluators to think seriously about mechanisms – the hidden and subjective factors fired in a particular context that brings about change in behaviour. There is an explanatory typology of five types of mechanism; reasoning in response to a resource, a force, an interaction, a power and / or a process, but in both theory and practice the boundaries between these remain problematic .

Many of the difficulties found in evaluation were described by Hollis writing around the same time as Pawson and Tilley but, like the shrieking neighbours observed by Boswel l, he was arguing from different premises. His thought evaluation conjectured on the mechanisms that led three neighbours to comply with, ignore or partially accede to water restriction orders respectively, during a drought. His own reasoning derived from the philosophy of action literature that traces its origin back to Aristotle .

Merle , writing in the same year as Pawson and Tilley, defines philosophy of action as two central questions, firstly what are actions and secondly how are actions to be explained? More enigmatically, Wittgenstein posed the problem as “what is left over if I subtract the fact that my arm goes up, from the fact that I raise my arm” . In short, the precursors of actions are the very definition of the philosophical debate.

Philosophy of action debates such issues as intentionality, action and event, causality, reasoning and sufficient reasoning, action and individuation, will and free will, decision and choice and so on. There are even contributors to the debate arguing for a realist approach to social and symbolic capital as significant mechanisms

This paper is an early discussion of some central ideas from the philosophy of action debates, and how they might be usefully considered. It is to regarded as a debate rather than a polished argument since the authors do not share premises either.

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