I'm not indicting the whole field, but all too often these studies get picked-up, used, and broadcast by bigots - of one variety or another - to feed their paranoia, neuroses, or Domination Fixation.
By the by, I largely owe my sensitivity to normal-normative sleight o' hand to one reading, if you can believe it, of Shelby Hunt, Foundations of Marketing Theory. Let me see... marginalia ... ah:
Is the positive/normative dichotomy unnecessary? Do normative statements play a role in scientific explanation? To evaluate these questions, we must refer to the meaning of positive statements versus normative statements. Recall that the positive/normative dichotomy provides categories based on whether the focus of the analysis is primarily descriptive or prescriptive. Positive marketing [read, distribution or logistical system] adopts the perspective of attempting to describe, explain, predict, and understand the marketing activities, process, and phenomena [read, metaphysical] that actually exist. This perspective examines what is. In contrast, normative marketing adopts the perspective of attempting to prescribe [read, remediate] what marketing organizations and individuals ought to do or what kinds of marketing systems a society ought to have. That is, this perspective examines what ought to be and what organizations and individuals ought to do Thus, one signal (but not the only one) of a normative statement is the extence of an ought or should or some similar term.
The telelogical certainty of these remarks left a profound impression on my comprehension of the possibilities and limitations (calculus) of organizational strategy. Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.
