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Between selecting and not selecting policy, there are other selections. The history of Fuzzy logic and fuzzy method do not go very beyond. But the implementation of fuzzy and its logic in different disciplines are getting increased. This paper aims to study the notion of fuzzy and policy and importance of fuzzy in today's chaotic environment for policy makers in national and international era. Also there are a lot of books and papers published on the methods on fuzzy but this paper is somehow different with them because has non-mathematical look on fuzzy and it just makes familiar the policy makers with the notion of non-mathematical fuzzy.

AbstractThe primary aim of this paper is to explore theoretical and practical aspects of the soft system methodology (SSM) and simulation combination as a multi‐paradigm multi‐methodology approach through action research. The important theoretical findings from a systematic literature review show that previously published researches have mainly applied SSM to structure contents of messy problems and for model building. We identified two types of combination designs: (i) simulation enhancement and (ii) mixed methods. To further investigate the practical aspects of combined methodologies, we apply SSM in the conception phase of agent‐based modelling to an Iranian upstream oil and gas company. We show that a combined model offers the following advantages: It (i) improves our understanding of the problem, (ii) reflects upon the modelling process, (iii) provides learning for interveners and (iv) enables the proposition of technically sound, systematically feasible and culturally desirable agreed solutions for improving the situation.

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to apply a philosophical framework in order to come to a life‐world oriented understanding of an enterprise resource planning (ERP) system for evaluating system success. To do so, according to Dooyeweerd's theory of aspects, a multi‐aspectual understanding is derived based on end‐user's everyday experience of the system.Design/methodology/approachThrough a qualitative case study, data are gathered based on 17 semi‐structured interviews. The company within which this study was conducted is an Iranian manufacturer which fully implemented a SAP R/3 system about four years ago. In order to analyze text data, an interpretive text analysis is conducted.FindingsAccording to the results, among all 15 aspects and from end users' point of view, the qualifying aspects are analytical, pistic, economic and formative, which means that the other aspects are ignored or repressed throughout the organization. All these qualifying aspects include both positive and negative norms but for three of them (analytical, economic and formative) the positive norms are dominant. Regarding the pistic aspect, even though it includes strong positive norms, they are not dominant compared to negative norms. Synthesizing results show that according to "Meeting objectives", "User satisfaction" and "Emancipation" as general norms, ERP success, in order to be completely realized, requires each general norm to be considered as a multi‐aspectual criterion.Practical implicationsFirst, the management team has to concentrate not only on economic and formative objectives but also on the other aspectual objectives which are more qualitative and intangible. Each aspectual objective requires its own specific methods and data to be measured, therefore the management team must provide supportive conditions so that multiple measurement systems are allowed to be implemented. Second, through new long‐term plans, budgets and training courses, already ignored aspects such as psychic, lingual, social, aesthetic, juridical and ethical must be more focused in order to bring to them more visibility and recognition throughout the organization. Third, In order to increase the positive norms for all aspects, holding periodical workshops and training courses is helpful. In addition, implementing reward systems can be a complementary action in order to improve positive norms.Originality/valueThe paper shows that evaluating ERP success according to end users' point of view brings more visibility to some issues which are usually ignored or missed by quantitative or uni‐aspectual approaches. Furthermore, utilizing Dooyeweerd's framework as a life‐oriented philosophy for evaluating ERP success is a novel work, which may lead to a kind of development and enrichment in the ERP success literature.

Evaluation is a broad and multifaceted area of study for researchers that requires the use of a combination of research methods—subsequently providing a challenging agenda for policy-makers. The multifaceted nature of the field indicates an urgent need for a comprehensive framework that includes guidelines for researchers and practitioners. There are several important factors in the selection of method(s) for evaluations including an evaluation's paradigm, approach and purpose; this article aims to address each of these and propose a new perspective for evaluations using a mixed-methods approach. Specifically, the article aims to inform a framework to help evaluators select appropriate methods, with special emphasis on the structural components of the working methodologies. Given the significance of the theoretical background of evaluation, a literature review was carried out with the purpose of informing the development of a new perspective for mixed-methods evaluations using a meta-synthesis approach. All related literature including books and papers published in peer-reviewed journals was extracted, studied and analysed via open coding. Thus, the new perspective presented in this article is based on rich and reliable literature and is helpful for evaluators who are interested in using a mixed-methods approach.