Crisis as Opportunity: Local Context, Adaptive Agents and the Possibilities of Rural Development

The discussion outlines the ways in which crisis emasculates traditional methodology as used in economics by making the core assumptions of this type of analysis (temporarily) untenable. Our critique of traditional methodology is limited to its inability to address this critical subset of social problems. It is important to note that our critique does not extend to 'realist deficiencies' of the mainstream science. Rather, support for an instrumental-pragmatic methodology is derived from positive arguments found in the 'evolutionary synthesis'; specifically, requirements of a world view that sees social problems as inherently complex (an ontology of complexity) by virtue of being 'overdetermined'.