Action Science

What Is Action Science?

Action Science is based on an understanding of people as practical inquirers who attempt to achieve their goals by building and testing tacit theories of action. It engages people in inquiry into their own behaviour so that they can become aware of the implicit theories that drive their behaviour and the consequences of these theories. This process of critical reflection expands the range of choices people can make about their behaviour, the relationships they form and the behavioural world they create. Action Science proceeds in conjunction with educating practitioners and intervening in systems to change the prevailing norms of interaction that routinely limit inquiry and learning in organizations.

The term Action Science was first used by William Torbert, who envisioned a science useful to actors at the moment of action. Argyris provided a rationale for Action Science by critiquing normal behavioural science as beset by inner contradictions that limit its ability to create knowledge that people can use as they interact. For example, the researcher typically conceals the real purpose of an experiment in order to avoid biasing how subjects respond. This produces knowledge that can be applied effectively only when the user similarly conceals the purpose of the action. But in the context of ongoing relationships, such deception can produce mistrust and protective countermeasures. Argyris outlined the beginnings of an Action Science that could be used to create what he called liberating alternatives to the world as it exists.

Schön contributed an epistemology of practice that upends the traditional model of professional knowledge. Rather than seeing knowledge as something discovered by basic researchers, made practical by applied researchers and then taught to practitioners, who put it to use, Schön argued that knowledge for action, especially for messy, divergent situations that defy ‘by-the-book’ technical solutions, is to be found in the skilful performances of expert practitioners. He suggested that an Action Science would engage practitioners in reflecting on their knowing-in-action and develop themes they could use in on-the-spot experimentation. Building on these ideas, a framework for Action Science was set forth by Argyris, Robert Putnam and Diana McLain Smith, placing it in the context of the philosophy of science, comparing it with normal social science and offering research on how people learn to improve their practice as interventionists.

The name Action Science announces an intention to be assessed by the features of rational deliberation in science. These include explicit reasoning, acknowledgement that one could be wrong and a commitment to testing knowledge claims in a community of inquiry, which is constituted by two or more people who systematically reflect on practice for the purpose of generating new knowledge. The radical claim is that these features can be realized among human agents in the action context. Doing so requires particular methods and skill at intervening in human systems.

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