The Application of Critical Realism in Assessment of Social Impact of Developmental Plans

This paper deliberates on how the results from assessments of social impacts should be applied for analyzing studies. On the other words, The question is that how a researcher should comprehend different but related impacts in a systematic way. And which methodological paradigm should be chose on this systematic framework in designing social researches? Inspired by Pawson and tilly (1997), the article tries to add critical realism implications to the research design of social impact assessment studies. The critical realism paradigm by emphasizing on the organic links between different levels of reality and the way in which causal consequences appear, could be a useful theoretical and methodological framework for guiding social impact assessment studies.