Alternative Uses of Paradigms in Mixed Methods Research

While the community of scholars using mixed methods attempts to move away from the so-called Paradigm War, a binary (quantitative vs. qualitative research) perspective on paradigms remains dominant in the mixed methods field and in the social sciences at large. With this proposal, we aim to discuss viable alternatives to traditional uses of paradigms, in an effort to overcome the typical duality of their use in sociology. We build on two main concepts – paradigms as heuristics (Abbott, 2004) and as toolkits (Maxwell, 2011) – to deconstruct the idea of paradigms as monolithic systems of ontological, epistemological, methodological and axiological beliefs that are consistent with one another. By focusing on alternative uses of paradigms, we introduce a reflection on creative ways of adopting tools from ontology and epistemology for methodological purposes, as we refuse to adhere to traditional concepts of paradigms or to join the Paradigm War.