CHAPTER 3: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY
3.3 Research Approach / Paradigm
In this research I followed a critical systems perspective to address the issues of leadership dynamics in a church branch. The paradigm of research was from a social point of view and looking at a church branch as a social system, thus qualitative research approach was sought.
One may be tempted to define a church as a simple, homogenous and identifiable organisation, however, this is not the case regardless of the fact that the church members participate in a similar pattern in the church. People go to church for different reasons, as some expect spiritual connection, some for motivation, some to make connections and some people have nothing better to do. The starting point was to capture the worldviews that existed within the church by using systems thinking and producing a model for the system in study. The questionnaires and open ended interview questions were designed to expose the worldviews that exist in the church, whilst also categorising people according to the age groups.
A church, by design, is a complex plural environment, I have demonstrated the complexity context of the church by the notion that even though the participants have different worldviews and expectations form the church, they are generally united by one ultimate goal. Pluralism comes from the fact that the ethical context of the church is commonly understood by participants, namely participants are working towards a better life as their destiny in the church.
PARTICIPANTS
UNITARY PLURALIST COERCIVE
SIMPLE Simple Unitary
Simple Pluralist
Simple Coercive
SYSTEM COMPLEX
Complex
Unitary
Complex
Pluralism
Complex
Coercive
Figure 3. 1: Complexity Grid of Problem Context.
Source: Adapted from Jackson (2000) figure 10.1, page 359, Jackson’s Extended Version of Jackson and Keys’s Grid of Problem Context.
I adopted an open mind when it came to choosing the paradigm position for this research, I adopted an interpretivist approach as well as a critical systems approach. The interpretive
Church by Design
Church in Conflict
approach looked at the church culture by exposing the relationships as well as the worldviews that existed and the critical systems approach looked at the boundary judgement and improvement. Girod-Seville (1999) states that there are some authors dating from the 1979 work of Burrell and Morgan who advocate isolationism as they say a researcher is limited to one paradigm and should not mix or interplay between paradigms as they are incommensurable and other authors believe a researcher needs to fix a paradigm first before any research is conducted.
He further states that some authors tend to see an opportunity when working with different paradigms as this may lead to dialogue between paradigms. I analysed the interpretivist paradigm as if it is encapsulated inside the critical systems approach for the purposes of this research.
This research was performed as a case study, not only with the intention to identify a specific oppressed group in the church or to interpret relationships in the church. The research was also meant to attempt to look at the worldviews of all age groups in the church and then identify pending threats that are related to the destiny of each group within the church. The example of this approach assumed a rationale that some age groups may be the victims of oppression in one aspect and be the benefactors in another aspect. If this was the case with the branch in question, the interpretive systems approach would have sufficed.
Interpretive systems approach may prove very limiting in cases like the church branch in question, as for example Soft Systems Methodology (SSM) is arguably based on consensus worldview. The biggest challenge is that interpretive systems are interested in driving change, however this change will always be dependent on the power and hierarchical imbalances. Thus the change will tend to favour the ones in power, thus the emergence of alternatives would be grossly paralysed. The issue of power allocation appeared to be a pivotal point of this research, thus there would be enough basis to assume that the findings of this research would be inclined to take this point into consideration.
This brings a different paradigm as it is possible that there exists a different understanding in the church that is deeply rooted and has been cultivated in people over the years. The issue of conflict may be underpinned by lack of consensus on what needs to be improved. The interpretation of what needs improvement may now be at the mercy of the powerful, thus a high level debate or unconstrained discussion on interpretation of reality may be sought. This may be the core characteristic of this organisation that makes it prone to age related conflicts, as I mentioned in chapter 2 that the characteristics of a church would grossly influence its proneness to conflicts.
As much as the church is a plural environment, there is enough basis for defining the age related conflicts in the church as a coercive situation. Jackson (2000) defines a coercive situation as when there is a fundamental conflict between participants and typical resolutions are mainly achieved through the exercise of power and others being oppressed. This then outlined the need for emancipation commitment in the approach being used to intervene.
An approach that would first question the status quo or the social order of this organisation is sought, as this situation is suspect. Emancipatory Systems approaches as stated in Jackson (2000) would be needed that would seek to radically transform the status quo by ensuring that the oppressed and the dominated people are emancipated. The emancipatory systems would need to emancipate the age group that is dominated with an attempt to correct the social order of the church. The emancipatory systems would seek to correct the church image as the conflicts would regard it as a "psychic prison" or as an "instrument of domination" based on the metaphors used by Jackson (2000).
The only possibility for radical change in this environment would be for the church leadership to first appreciate the need for the change before any emancipatory systems are sought. This would then mean that leadership would have to shift from their original solitary paradigm of protecting the legacy of the church founders. Thus it would require deeply entrenched leadership dynamics that would include some contemporary leadership styles that would be targeting to implement and drive the change. The scope of this research would end at offering this advice on the leadership as well as on membership where warranted.
(The Holy Bible) states that the main purpose of Jesus Christ coming to earth was to “save”
people from the imminent eternal death and introduce them to eternal life as per the epistle of John chapter 3 verse 16. However, Jesus had a methodology to first emancipate people from the religious structures of Pharisees, priests and Sadducees and also to reinstate the hierarchal order in the church as stated in the epistle of Luke chapter 11verses 43 to 46 that:
“42. But woe unto you, Pharisees! for ye tithe mint and rue and all manner of herbs, and pass over judgment and the love of God: these ought ye to have done, and not to leave the other undone.43. Woe unto you, Pharisees! for ye love the uppermost seats in the synagogues, and greetings in the markets. 44. Woe unto
you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye are as graves which appear not, and the men that walk over them are not aware of them. 45 Then answered one of the lawyers, and said unto him, Master, thus saying thou reproachest us also. 46. And he said, Woe unto you also, ye lawyers! for ye lade men with burdens grievous to be borne, and ye yourselves touch not the burdens with one of your fingers.”
In this research I followed a qualitative approach as it was seen to be very applicable in a church system as it is a complex and plural system, richness in the picture was not lost as qualitative methods are more applicable in complex and plural environments like social systems. In this research I was mainly interested in looking at relationships as well as the effects of human interactions within the church, with specific focus on the age related relationships and not neglecting the effect of hierarchy. These relationship issues played a pivotal role into this research as I was working on the hypothesis that there are evident worldview trends that are common with people of similar age group, these trends were further outlined by the social as well as organisational exposures amongst church members.
These differing worldviews were arguably exhibiting organisational challenges from a theoretical point of view, as there also appeared to be oppression issues that ended up affecting boundary judgements. This situation ended up creating a new culture of the church, thus the status quo ended up being multiple worldviews. This research went further and analysed the emergent properties of this new culture and made a value judgement on whether these new properties best defined the current structure of the church.
I was faced with paradigm incommensurability issues in this research as it was evident that this research extended beyond diversity of worldviews to a point where people were operating at different platforms in terms of understanding the purpose and the goal of a church as an organisation. It was also my intention to unearth the underpinning structures for such gross divisions in one social system. For the purposes of this research I reduced the multiple paradigm situation into multiple worldviews operating in one paradigm as the SSM methodology works in one paradigm as stated in Brocklesby (1996).