Aplicar una distinción. Un programa sistémico-constructivista para la investigación social cualitativa

At least since the XVIII century, the ‘problem of induction’, that is, how to justify the abstractions derived from any empirical observation, has been at the core of a fiery debate both within the philosophy of science, and the praxis of social sciences. Refuting the allegation of ‘empirical closure’ raised against Niklas Luhmann’s Social Systems Theory, we claim that it delivers a privileged epistemological and theoretical platform to face such a dilemma, since it highlights the necessary conditions to produce an ‘abductive’ reasoning. By way of discussing, on the one hand, Luhmann’s understanding of knowledge and science, and on the other, diverse attempts to apply empirically the systemic approach and integrate it with other analytical tools, the paper offers a general model to understand the role and relationships of the principles of theoretical plausibility and empirical grounding within social science research. Based on that, the article identifies the criteria of ‘isomorphism’, ‘perspectivism’, transparency’ and ‘iterability’ as indicators of scientific acceptability of a systemic-constructivist research, and offers orientations for the design of such a research.