Reification and Realism in Marketing: In Defense of Reason

Abstract

Recent Journal of Macromarketing articles by Monieson (1988) and Dholakia (1988) attack "positivism" and "positivistic social science" which, they contend, dominate contemporary marketing and social science. Although their articles constructively extend marketing's "Xcrisis literature" on several dimensions, numerous aspects of their articles are problematical and a historical. This article reviews and evaluates three major themes that emerge in the articles by Monieson and Dholakia: (1) the law-like generalizations issue, (2) the rigor/relevance issue, and (3) the reification/realism issue.