I advocate for a distinction existing between stratified and interpreted realities, located independently from Self (Egholm 2014, 25). It would thus be insufficient for the Critical Realist to argue that underlying class structures, regardless of their observability, exist as the sole form of explanation for social inequality, or poverty in this instance. On the contrary, a classical Marxist critique of my claim by somebody such as Rosa Luxemburg would disagree with this contention. In her Social Reform or Revolution critique of Eduard Bernstein on electoral reform, Luxemburg adopts an interprevist approach, citing that any act of conciliation with capitalist electoral institutions through reform (rather than vanguard revolution) would however contribute counter-intuitively, to its capitalism’s very empowerment rather than divergence from it (Luxemburg, 2004, 129 & 131). In all her assertions’ merit, Luxemburg’s conception of reality (concerning overarching capitalist-institutions such as free markets), contradicts the Critical Realist ontological approach, as it suggests class relations and struggle conform to one single reality with that of the unobservable structural relations of capitalist institutions, that may, or may not, contribute to socio-political inequality.

Nonetheless, in light of Luxemburg’s assertions I, the Critical Realist, acknowledge the existence of overarching unobservable but existing class relations in our society, however can apply a consequences-based ontological approach to the outcomes of the reality (that being socio-political inequality) (Marsh, Ercan & Furlong, 2018, 184 & 185). By doing so, I find great utility in the Critical Realist’s capacity to apply this method to the claims at hand, whether or not socio-political inequality is sponsored by capitalist-empowered institutions, and if so, what set of quantitative or qualitative indicators can be used to form the basis of my findings (Marsh, Ercan & Furlong, 2018, 194).  I think this notion holds greater value than either the positivist or interprevist approach as it diverges away from definitive explanatory depictions of phenomena such as socio-political inequality (interprevist), and mere representations of numerical data that either refute or affirm hypothesise because elements of both can be combined to produce more informative analysis.

On one hand, constructivist understandings concerning how well-being status contributes to poorer economic outcomes of that person can be combined in the Critical Realist approach to “humanise” subjective and varying lived experiences while emphasising diversity in responses. On the other, quantitative associations between numerical indicators can be used to reinforce this causal relationship (Wright, 2024). This is evident in, Treasurer of Australia, Jim Chalmers’ “well-being budget” analogy, for traditional “macroeconomic indicators” (positivist variables) alone fail to provide a “holistic view” of the budget and its implications on the person (Wright, 2024).