Mixed methods and the study of American franchises

Mixed methods in migration/immigration research has grown in practice in recent years. Employing a “mixed” approach is seen as a research strategy in contemporary social theory that signifies a relativist position while integrating quantitative and qualitative data as interwoven discourses and interactional meaning making. While three main frameworks (critical realism, dialectical approaches, and pragmatism) underscore the rationales of most approaches, pragmatism is most commonly used, providing both a philosophy of orientation and a scientific strategy. This paper discusses thematic findings from a unique collaboration of independent research projects on immigrant business owners and the American franchise industry. A pragmatist mixed methods approach in which research is guided by the question itself, provided the tools necessary to resolve a methodological quandary in existing theory. In so doing, it enabled an understanding of how subjugation, exploitation, and mobility are not incompatible in the immigrant experience in the context of the neoliberal economy.