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This contribution is a reply on the article 'De waarde van kwalitatieve strategieën voor het praktijkgericht onderzoek', written by Piet J.M. Verschuren. Using the concepts of framing, indolence, dialogue and polyphonic causality Kuiper and Houweling aim at enriching the discourse of causality perceptions in qualitative research presented by Verschuren.

Power as the central concept for the analysis of causality in social life: A conceptual-analytical elaboration
Reinoud Bosch
This article provides a description of a conceptual analysis of 'power'. Defining 'power' as 'the relative ability to affect or receive', a method for conceptual analysis is posited and examples are provided of the conceptual analysis of power. An overview is provided of the resulting categories and subcategories of the concept, and possibilities for the use of the concept as a sensitizing concept in the analysis of causality in social life are indicated.
In their replies Fred Wester and Harrie Jansen discuss some aspects of causality and power that need further attention. In his reaction Reinoud Bosch further elaborates on his perspective on the power concept.

A SECONDARY ANALYSIS OF SURVEY DATA COLLECTED BY THE NEDERLANDS INSTIT VOOR PUBLIEKE OPINIE EN HET MARKTONDERZOEK (NIPO) IN CONNECTION WITH THE NATIONAL COMMISSION FOR DEVELOPMENT STRATEGY 1970-1980, STUDIES THE ATTITUDES TOWARD & THE KNOWLEDGE ABOUT DEVELOPMENT COOPERATION IN THE NETHERLANDS. OPERATIONALIZATION OF THIS PROBLEM SHOULD INCLUDE AN EXAMINATION OF THE AIMS OF DEVELOPMENT COOPERATION STRATEGY (IN THIS CASE THE AIMS OF RESOLUTION 2626 (XXV), ACCEPTED AT THE 25TH GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF THE UN). IT SHOULD INCLUDE A STUDY OF CONCRETE POLICY OR SOME ALTERNATIVE FOR ACHIEVING THESE ENDS. IN SUCH A WAY WE MIGHT EXAMINE KNOWLEDGE ABOUT & ATTITUDES TOWARD CONCRETE ITEMS OF DEVELOPMENT POLICY. 2 CLUSTERS OF ATTITUDES TOWARD DEVELOPMENT COOPERATION WERE FOUND: A COSMOPOLITAN ORIENTATION & A CHARITABLE ONE; THE FORMER PROVED POSITIVELY RELATED WITH KNOWLEDGE. THIS POSITIVE RELATION IS ONLY A STOCHASTIC ONE & INDICATES A PROBABILITY, NOT A CAUSALITY. OTHER BACKGROUND VARIABLES WERE EXAMINED TO ILLUMINATE THE REMAINING NECESSARY CONDITIONS WHICH MAKE FOR A COSMOPOLITAN ORIENTATION. 16 TABLES, 1 FIGURE. HA.

The enactment of the FCPA and the formation of the OECD Anti-Bribery Convention created two historical events for theoretical analysis: because the FCPA unprecedentedly criminalized transnational bribery in 1977, its wisdom was initially questioned. Then, since the Convention endorsed the FCPA approach in 1997, academic focus was shifted to the practical effect of the Convention in controlling transnational bribery-—which is also the topic of this study. ; This study develops argument based on an awareness of the limitation of a popular methodology in current literature-—the problem-solving paradigm. This paradigm is grounded in the rational-choice tradition, assumes signatories' enforcement of the Convention as resulting from their self-serving purposes, labels the current level of Convention enforcement as "ineffective-enforcement", and borrows solutions from conventional collective action theories to prescribe. This paradigm well explains why most signatories have brought few enforcement actions. Yet its excessive commitment to orthodoxies prevents scholars from grasping the uniqueness of the collaboration and prescribing successful solutions. Besides, it avoids explaining why some signatories have indeed enforced the Convention. A historical approach that draws causality from a process's historicity is thus proposed as a supplementary methodology. ; This study analyzes signatories' compliance with the Convention by four steps: First, it explains a seemingly outdated but unexplained question—the dynamic of the institutionalization of the OECD anti-bribery collaboration, and finds that the central institutions did not result from signatories' trading off conflicting values and interests, but from their attempts to coordinate demands of different stakeholders within given institutional contexts. ; Second, this study explains why most signatories tend to defect rather than faithfully enforce the Convention, following the logic of the problem-solving paradigm: destabilizing factors in the indigenous collaboration ...