"This book explores the history, ideology and implications of methodology or 'ways of knowing' in the social and natural sciences. It extends arguments developed in the author's previous work that divisions between 'quantitative' and 'qualitative' methods are unhelpful in the pursuit of useful knowledge, and that a major challenge facing scientists, academics and the public today is the need to scrutinize the claims professionals of all kinds make to possess effective expertise.

The rejection of 'quantitative' and experimental methods, in particular, prevents us from understanding both the parameters of social inequality and the effects of professional interventions in people's lives and obstructs the development of a critical and emancipatory social science."--BOOK JACKET.