The basic structure of the study involves building on the author’s strong professional interest in the topic. A general research strategy was developed that included identifying resources and issues. The research topics were carefully defined, questions were developed, theories were reviewed, and rationales were delineated. Then the collection and organization of additional information was begun, with the process including periodic evaluation of the research questions, methodologies, and data collected. Additional information was organized and evaluated, and interpretive theories were revised. Finally, the results were interpreted and the findings prepared.55
This study used a hermeneutic approach in that laws, cases, writings, and policies were interpreted and meanings transcribed. The focus was on understanding the issues and the context that gave them meaning. The textual meaning was considered to be an interaction between the views that meaning was independent from the interpreter and that it was dependent on the interpreter. The source materials were analyzed within a historical context
53 Daniel J. Solove, The Digital Person: Technology and Privacy in the Information Age, (New York University Press ed. 2004).
54 Anita L Allen, Privacy as Data Control: Conceptual, Practical, and Moral Limits of the Paradigm, 32 Connecticut Law Review 3, 861 (2000); Anita L. Allen, Privacy in American Law, in Privacies: Philosophical Evaluations (Beate Rossler ed., Stanford University Press 2004).
55 See R. Murray Thomas & Dale L. Brubaker, Theses and Dissertations: A Guide to Planning, Research, and Writing, (Bergin & Garvey ed. 2000).
but applied to current problems. Martin Packer56 argued that “The difference between a rationalist or empiricist explanation and a hermeneutic interpretation was like the difference between a map of a city and an account of that city by someone who lives in it and walks its streets.” This study used both perspectives.
The focus of the research was on generating knowledge rather than accumulating information. The expressed purpose was to present alternatives and action for legal analysis and change.57
The research approach involved an integration of key components of the major social science and legal research approaches and methodologies.
Questions were developed based on education, training, and experiences.
Data were obtained by a systematic use of primary, secondary, and theoretical sources. The focus was on providing perspectives for evaluating alternative decisions and policies.
Historical approaches were used to accurately and objectively reconstruct key issues and principles as much as possible. The areas of concern were approached from a descriptive methodology to accurately, factually, and systematically describe the DPSIP legal issues and trends. The shift from the industrial economy to an information economy was evaluated from a developmental perspective to identify the changes, patterns, and sequences over time. Causal-comparative or ex post facto approaches were used to observe possible and plausible casual privacy invasion factors. The approach ended with an action orientation to identify approaches to address the information age-related legal challenges as a catalyst for a rational exploration of fundamental DPSIP law principles.58 The integrated research design was
56 Martin J. Packer, Hermeneutic Inquiry in the Study of Human Conduct, 40 American Psychologist 10, 1081 (1985).
57 Davydd J. Greenwood & Morten Levin, Introduction to Action Research: Social Research for Social Change, (Sage ed. 1998).
58 Stephen Isacc & William B. Michael, Handbook in Research and Evaluation: A Collection of Principles, Methods, and Strategies Useful in the Planning, Design, and Evaluation
necessary because of the complexity and importance of the DPSIP legal issues in the current age.59
Given that the design depended on historic information written and observed by others, such information was analyzed to determine the accuracy, authenticity, and significance of the materials. The design required a demanding, disciplined, exhaustive, rigorous, and systematic approach so as to collect appropriate, reliable, and unbiased information. Thus, the design required the author to constantly monitor biases, motives, and information that might filter out possible distortions or exaggerations or permit key data to be overlooked. The steps included defining the problem, stating the research objectives, collecting the data, evaluating the information, and reporting the findings. There were sufficient primary and secondary balanced data available for examination of the issues. Attempts were taken to adequately evaluate the historical data. Personal biases were monitored so as to not negatively influence the process. The data were integrated and synthesized in order to reach meaningful conclusions.60
This comparison of the international legal, regulatory, and enforcement mechanism of the AU, CA, SA, the UK, and US approaches to DPSIP law or developments was essentially a case study design. A focus included the developing DPSIP privacy law in SA. A case study approach was appropriate for this thesis because it was a “strategy for doing research which involves an empirical investigation of a particular contemporary
of Studies in Education and the Behavioral Sciences, (Edits/ Educational and Industrial Testing Services 3rd ed. 1995).
59 Id. at 48–59. The descriptions include Action: develop new skills or new approaches and to solve problems with direct application to the world setting Causal-comparative:
investigate possible cause-and-effect relationships by observing some existing consequence and searching back through the data for plausible causal factors. This was in contrast to the experimental method which collects its data under controlled conditions in the present. Descriptive: describe systematically the facts and characteristics of a given … area of interest, factually and accurately.
Developmental: investigate patterns and sequences of growth and/or changes as a function of time. Historical: reconstruct the past systematically and objectively by collecting, evaluating, verifying, and synthesizing evidence to establish facts and reach defensible conclusions often in relation to particular hypotheses.
60 Ibid.
phenomenon within its real life context using multiple sources of evidence.”61 Yin and Campbell declared that “in general, case studies are the preferred strategy when ‘how’ or ‘why’ questions are being posed.”62
The design required describing events, situations, policies, treaties, legal principles, laws, and court decisions. The accumulated efforts resulted in a detailed database, which was used to explain relationships, formulate implications, make predictions, identify meaningful patterns, and test hypotheses. The patterns of the variables were examined to determine their development, growth, and regressions. Interrelated factors and sequences were tracked. A look at the developmental patterns globally and within selected nations avoided possible attribution errors and biases.63
The design involved looking at areas of interest that had already occurred.
The effort included analyzing “causes, relationships, and their meanings.”64 Classic experimental methods were considered to be inappropriate to the topics. Such methods were also not possible because dependent and independent factors could not be reliably selected, controlled, or manipulated in a non-artificial or realistic manner. However, the design did provide reliable data about the DPSIP legal issues in the information economy.
The design provides practical and relevant information for lawyers, judges, legal scholars, legislatures, business executives, and policy makers. The effort provides a structural model for problem solving, guidelines, and principles for evaluating new developments. In addition, the thesis design provides for a means to avoid fragmentary, impressionistic, short-term, and ill-advised decisions.
61 Colin Robson, Real World Research: A Resource for Social Scientists and Practitioner-Researchers, (Blackwell 2nd ed. 2002).
62 Robert K. Yin, Case Study Research: Design and Methods, (Sage Publications 4th ed.
2009).
63Isacc & Michael, supra note 53.
64 Id.at 54.