Partisan Research: A Critique

Abstract

David Berliner presents a compelling argument for the engagement of educational psychologists in policy research, analysis, argumentation, and commentary. He sees this activity as a professional obligation of senior educational psychologists. Providing examples of educational psychology constructs and research that could contribute to policy debates, he suggests that there are warranted truths to be told to policy makers that could affect educational policies and eventually impact the education of our students. Of course, he also states that warranted truths ("is data" rather than "ought data") may not necessarily have much of an impact on policy. Thus it is worth looking closely at what Berliner is asking of senior educational psychologists. 

Throughout the paper, Berliner calls for the following activities: policy analysis, speaking the truth to power, using or creating data that will help to clarify an issue, developing arguments to clarify an issue, entering policy debates and challenging proposed (or existing) policies, publicly professing, and conducting studies with policy implications. As I understand his view on this topic, he sees most educational psychologists as engaging in what they consider to be value-free, objective research, whereas he is calling for what he labels "partisan research". While he feels that partisan research can be reasonably objective, it is not value free. We can think of this characterization of educational psychological research as lying along a continuum from perceived-as-value-free and objective research to value-laden partisan research. He is asking that more effort be devoted towards partisan research. In the next sections of this response, I will address 1) values in research, 2) a friendly critique of partisan research, and 3) a suggestion for the development of guidelines for good partisan research.