Qualitative Restudies: Research Designs for Retheorizing

Abstract

Qualitative research methods are deemed best suited to exploring novel phenomena and generating new concepts. Their potential to reevaluate existing theorizing, however, is underestimated. Qualitative restudies that return to the data and settings on which the original theories were built are a well-established tradition in other disciplines (e.g., history, sociology, and anthropology), but have received little recognition in management and organization studies. We introduce qualitative restudies as a powerful means to improve theorizing by revising or challenging theories that have become outdated or obsolete and establishing transferability and longevity of findings and interpretations. We provide a typology of qualitative restudy designs drawing on an integrative review of literature in management, strategy, and the social sciences and humanities. We highlight the main design and ethical considerations for researchers in undertaking a restudy. We argue for the strengths of restudies as lying in their possibilities for retheorizing, above and beyond verifying or updating prior studies. Restudies draw on the strengths of in-depth qualitative work to uncover how interpretations and theorizing are shaped by methodological traditions, historical contexts, existing societal structures, and researcher backgrounds.