Case-study method

The case-study method is the user manual for learning from practice cases: every case is a sample of one, so the question is never only what happened, but what generalises. The assessment framework enforces that discipline with fixed questions: what is the evidence base behind the story, which alternative explanations exist, is survivorship bias at play, and which mechanism should also work elsewhere? Cases are thus indispensable and dangerous at once: indispensable because they make mechanisms tangible, dangerous because a well-told story crowds out evidence. Applying the framework means reading cases as hypotheses rather than recipes.

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