Clifford Shearing (Griffith Institute of Criminology; University of Cape Town (UCT); School of Criminology; Regulatory Institutions Network (RegNet)) has posted How to Make Theories Untestable: A Guide to Theorists (The American Sociologist, 8(7): 33-37) on SSRN. Here is the abstract:
A cursory glance at the development of sociological theory should indicate to any in dependent observer that any theorist who seeks sociological fame must ensure that his theories are essentially untestable. Despite this, to my knowledge, all writers who have addressed themselves to the question of theory building and this is, surprisingly, particularly true in explicitly pedagogical texts – have inexplicably concerned themselves exclusively with the question of how to construct testable theories. It is hoped that this paper may held redirect attention to what is clearly the more sensible question: how does one construct untestable theories?