This paper is a section of research methods as social sciences, research methods as historical sciences, and research and practice. In the development, the method of marketing history research was considered, and the following four claims were made. (1) Regarding the characterization of scientific knowledge, the position of critical rationalism is the most persuasive so far. Therefore, if the illusion of induction is abandoned and marketing research is science, then empirical research should also shift from positivism to falsificationism and focus more on theory building.

　(2) In the social sciences that target human behavior phenomena, there is no choice but to construct a theory centered on the principle of rationality. For that purpose, it is appropriate to adopt the theory-building method proposed by Popper, which is the logic of situation, the zero method, and the institutionalism.

　(3) Historical research is interested in drawing various aspects of individual facts using the theory created in this way, and there are six types of historical research.

　(4) The six types of historical research play a role in connecting theoretical research and practice.

　This paper sheds light on the philosophical and methodological foundations of Qualitative Comparative Analysis (QCA), a relatively new approach to causal inference. It compares and contrasts the worldview and set-theoretic/Boolean algebraic background of QCA vis-à-vis the statistics-based mainstream method in social science research. Furthermore, this will highlight the assumptions that demarcate QCA from the mainstream statistical causal inference methods, such as multiple regression analysis (MRA). These are namely (1) conjunctural causation, (2) equifinality, (3) sufficiency and necessity, and (4) causal asymmetry. In a broader sense, the domain of marketing is one of the disciplines in which various usage of QCA prevails due partly to the complex nature of the phenomenon that researchers tackle. The latter half of the paper focuses on introducing the standard procedures of the research employing a variant of QCA. A summary of a theory-testing fsQCA study facilitates hands-on knowledge on the interpretation of solution terms via QCA and its presentations in various forms. At the end of the paper will be discussed the potential of QCA in distribution and marketing research. It will attempt to provide suggestions for appropriately selecting and matching research topics and methods.

　In the social sciences, materials are collected through direct interviews with the concerned parties. The interview survey method may be a question-and-answer or a format in which the subject is asked to describe a wide range of situations related to a particular event. The latter method of approaching specific phenomena using the storytelling of the experiences of the people involved is conceptualized as a narrative in the social sciences and positioned as one of the qualitative research methods. In this research, the author first mentions the conflict between quantitative analysis and qualitative research in the next section. In section 3, the author summarizes the characteristics of narrative study and provides an overview of oral history research and life history research, which are the areas of narrative analysis. In Section 4, the author addresses the problems of narratives and, in conclusion, discusses the applicability of these methods to historical research in marketing.

　Using the latest marketing perspective, S-D logic, this paper addresses the micro-macro link theme of how collective phenomena emerge from individual actions and how individuals are regulated, which has been an issue in marketing since Alderson (1965). Firstly, the history of the emergence of SES (service ecosystem) is summarized in terms of academic history: SES is a multi-level aggregational structure, and its theoretical development can be viewed as an extension from micro to meso, macro level. Secondly, to elucidate how aggregation levels were linked, this paper proposed a “the emergence process of SES” framework by examining the relationships among three terms: “emergence” and “shared intentionality” in philosophy, and “embeddedness” in economic sociology.

Hitoshi Aoki, Theory and History of Establishment of Retail Formats, Tokyo: Dobunkan, 2020. （Reviewer：Tatsuro TOBA）

Katsunori Kaminuma, Marketing as a Science: The Logic and Methodology of Marketing Science, Tokyo: Dobunkan, 2020. （Reviewer：Hiroshi KOBAYASHI）

Tomoaki Tanaka,The History of the Piano in Japan: Formation of the Musical Instrument Industry and the Consumer Market, Nagoya: The University of Nagoya Press, 2021. （Reviewer：Kazuo USUI）

Shigeo Mitsuzawa, Emergence of Marketing in Japan, Kyoto: Koyo Shobo, 2021. Reviewer：Mitsuhiro JINBO）

Toshiyuki Yahagi, The Rise and Fall of the Retail Industry in Japan: Commercial Ethics, Distribution Revolution and Digital Disruption, Tokyo: Nikkei Business Publications, Inc., 2021. （Reviewer：Takashi SEKINE）