1 Citation for published chapter: Rule, P. & Yazan, B. (2024) Knowledge and knowing in case study research: Towards a relational epistemology. In P. Rule & V. John (Eds.) Handbook of case study research in the social sciences. Cheltenham: Edward Elgar Publishing (pp. 31-50). Knowledge and knowing in case study research: Towards a relational epistemology Peter Rule and Bedrettin Yazan Introduction What can we know from case study research? What kinds of knowledge, if any, does it generate? Can the findings from one case study be useful for understanding other cases? If so, in what ways and with what limitations? This chapter focuses on knowledge and knowing in case study research in the social sciences. Its focus is thus epistemological in the sense that it draws on various theories of what knowledge is, where knowledge comes from and what counts as knowledge in exploring the epistemology of case study. Neuman (2016, p. 95) usefully defines epistemology as “an area of philosophy concerned with the creation of knowledge” which “focuses on how we know what we know or what are the most valid ways to reach truth.” There are a number of works in the literature that provide an overview of the development of case study research and of philosophical orientations which inform the work (David 2006, Brown 2008, Thomas and Myers 2015, Harrison, Birks, Franklin and Mills 2017) and some that focus on the seminal case study methodologists, Robert Yin, Sharan Merriam and Robert E. Stake and their paradigmatic locations (Brown 2008, Harrison et al 2017, Yazan 2017). However, there is not much work focusing specifically on the epistemology of case study research and relational epistemology in particular. This chapter thus makes a contribution in bringing a focus to knowledge and knowing in case study research in the social sciences and in developing the dialogue between relational epistemology and case study. While the notion of epistemology may seem somewhat esoteric to case study researchers of a practical bent, how we understand knowledge and its creation is central to what we do as case study researchers. As Yazan (2015, p. 136) argues, a researcher’s epistemology “permeates every step of the entire investigation process, from selection of the phenomenon of interest that is put under scrutiny to the way the ultimate report is composed.” It is important therefore to interrogate researchers’ conceptions of knowledge and how they shape their assumptions about case study research. This can help case study researchers to adopt a well-informed and coherent epistemological position for their own research. There is no single definitive answer to the question, what is knowledge? It is a question that has exercised philosophers since antiquity and evoked a variety of responses. It is complicated by the use of the word ‘knowledge’ to refer to different conditions of knowing: knowing-that (propositional knowledge); knowing-how to (competence); and ‘direct’ knowledge by acquaintance (e.g. knowing someone). One view is that knowledge is “justified true belief” (JTB). But who or what justifies belief as true and so transforms it into knowledge? In many traditions the justification comes from the authority from which it emanates: God or the gods, the prophets, the ancestors, the elders, and (more recently perhaps) the scientific experts. This is reflected in the etymology of the word: early