POL S 6 Lecture 2: Lecture 2 Intro to Comparative Politics
CH 1: What is Comparative Politics? (Pgs. 2-23)
A study that tries to understand questions about types of regimes and how
some countries interact (due to their history, why some countries are richer
than others, why some countries are unstable, etc.)
•
According to political scientists outside of the United States (like Europe), there
are three subfields in political science
Political theory: deals with normative and theoretical questions
○
Comparative politics: empirical questions and interactions within political
systems
○
International relations: interactions between political systems
○
•
But according to Americans in political science, there is a fourth subfield and
that would be U.S. Politics
•
Comparative politics vs. International Relations (very similar but distinctive)
Comparative politics (CP): The study and comparison of domestic politics
across countries
Focus on domestic issues, topics, and institutions of multiple
countries/systems
§
Topics include: regimes, elections, culture, economic development
§
Three core concepts
Politics: the struggle in any group for power that will give one
or more persons the ability to make decisions for the larger
group
□
Power: the ability to influence others or impose one's will on
them
□
Institutions: organizations or activities that are self-
perpetuating and valued for their own sake
also known as "the rules of the game" (the conventions
and ways in our society that we do things; rules put in
place to shape activity and behavior)
®
i.e. rules for voting
®
□
§
The Comparative Method
Comparative Method: The means by which social scientists
make comparisons across cases
□
If you wanted to discover why democracy develops in some
countries but not in others, which country do you think would
be best to study? Why? What are the advantages and
disadvantages of each? (no right or wrong answer)
United Kingdom -- oldest democracy
®
India -- world's most populous democracy and highest
voting rates
®
Tunisia -- brand new (and struggling) democracy
®
Egypt -- a nondemocracy
®
□
Two separate elements
It is a subject of study: comparing the nature of politics
and the political process across different political
systems
®
It is a method of study: how and why we make such
comparisons
®
□
§
Common Comparative Approaches
Qualitative method: a type of study that uses in-depth
investigation of a limited number of cases
□
Quantitative method: type of study that uses statistical data
from many cases
Better for when someone is conducting a wider range
of research
®
□
Game theory: an approach that emphasizes how actors or
organizations behave in their goal to influence others
This is built upon theoretical assumptions of rational
choice
Rational choice: an approach that assumes that
individuals weigh the costs and benefits and make
choices to maximize their benefits
◊
®
□
§
7 Major Challenges in Comparative Research
Difficulty controlling variables in cases
Each case is different, hard to come to an exact
comparison
®
1)
Multicausality: when variables are interconnected and
interact together to produce particular outcomes
EX: variations in things like countries' gun control laws
or whether they are a democracy tend to be produced
by multiple, interrelated factors rather than one simple
explanation
®
Not ever going to be a single factor that explains
whatever you are looking at
®
2)
Endogeneity: the issue that cause and effect are not often
clear, in that variables may be both cause and effect in
relationship to one another
Variables act as both the cause and effect in
relationship to one another (can cause something and
also affect something else)
®
3)
Data-gathering limitations
Limits in gathering data and the information accessible
in the first place
®
Comparativists face challenges simply in gathering the
data (examples below)
Too few cases to study
◊
Language barriers
◊
Inability to legally access information
◊
®
Alleviated by area studies
Comparative researchers may seek to control
extraneous variables and improve their data-
gathering focus by engaging in area studies. This
means they focus on studying a region of the
world rather than studying parts of the world (or
individual countries) where similar variables are
clustered
◊
®
4)
Limits to accessing data (similar to above)
Too few cases
®
People not willing to participate
®
5)
Studies limited to a singular geographic region6)
Selection bias: a focus on effects rather than causes, which
can lead to inaccurate conclusions about correlation or
causation
Scholars must be careful to select cases that do not bias
their studies
®
Selection bias can lead to inaccurate conclusions about
correlation and causation
®
This is not a question of political bias, but of HOW cases
are selected in the first place (hard to randomize case
selection)
®
The overreliance on European case studies may lead to
making assumptions about how things work that makes
sense in Europe, but won't translate well to Latin
America, Africa, or Asia
®
Revolutions -- only looking at actual revolutions will
miss the cases where there was poverty without
revolution
®
7)
§
○
International relations (IR): the study of relations between countries in
the international arena
Not comparative, but focusing on how countries are interacting
with one another
§
Topics include: foreign policy, war, trade, foreign aid, foreign affairs
§
Relationships between nations in the global space
§
○
How are they related and where do they overlap?
Dealing with more than one country
§
Similar topics: Revolution, political economy, environmental politics
§
○
•
Evidence and Theories: how might we study causal relationships and test
theory?
Inductive reasoning: research that works from case studies in order to
generate hypotheses
Cases ---> generate hypotheses
§
Studying a case to make inferences by looking at all of the
information you have received
§
Because you know *this*, you can explain *this*
§
○
Deductive reasoning: research that works from a hypothesis that is then
tested against data
Beginning with a hypothesis and then testing with cases
§
May look for correlations or apparent relationships between cases
based on the existing hypothesis
§
○
Correlation: an apparent relationship between two or more variables
○
Causal relationship: cause and effect; when a change in one variable
causes a change in another variable
○
•
SIMPLIFIED: 7 Major Challenges of Comparative Research
Difficulty controlling a large number of variables1)
Multicausality: difficulty in controlling the interaction of variables2)
Limited number of cases to research3)
Limited access to information from cases4)
Uneven research across cases and regions5)
Selection bias: cases selected on the basis of effect and not cause6)
Endogeneity: variables may be either cause or effect7)
•
Lecture 2: Intro to Comparative Politics
Thursday, April 5, 2018
3:36 PM
CH 1: What is Comparative Politics? (Pgs. 2-23)
A study that tries to understand questions about types of regimes and how
some countries interact (due to their history, why some countries are richer
than others, why some countries are unstable, etc.)
•
According to political scientists outside of the United States (like Europe), there
are three subfields in political science
Political theory: deals with normative and theoretical questions
○
Comparative politics: empirical questions and interactions within political
systems
○
International relations: interactions between political systems
○
•
But according to Americans in political science, there is a fourth subfield and
that would be U.S. Politics
•
Comparative politics vs. International Relations (very similar but distinctive)
Comparative politics (CP): The study and comparison of domestic politics
across countries
Focus on domestic issues, topics, and institutions of multiple
countries/systems
§
Topics include: regimes, elections, culture, economic development
§
Three core concepts
Politics: the struggle in any group for power that will give one
or more persons the ability to make decisions for the larger
group
□
Power: the ability to influence others or impose one's will on
them
□
Institutions: organizations or activities that are self-
perpetuating and valued for their own sake
also known as "the rules of the game" (the conventions
and ways in our society that we do things; rules put in
place to shape activity and behavior)
®
i.e. rules for voting
®
□
§
The Comparative Method
Comparative Method: The means by which social scientists
make comparisons across cases
□
If you wanted to discover why democracy develops in some
countries but not in others, which country do you think would
be best to study? Why? What are the advantages and
disadvantages of each? (no right or wrong answer)
United Kingdom -- oldest democracy
®
India -- world's most populous democracy and highest
voting rates
®
Tunisia -- brand new (and struggling) democracy
®
Egypt -- a nondemocracy
®
□
Two separate elements
It is a subject of study: comparing the nature of politics
and the political process across different political
systems
®
It is a method of study: how and why we make such
comparisons
®
□
§
Common Comparative Approaches
Qualitative method: a type of study that uses in-depth
investigation of a limited number of cases
□
Quantitative method: type of study that uses statistical data
from many cases
Better for when someone is conducting a wider range
of research
®
□
Game theory: an approach that emphasizes how actors or
organizations behave in their goal to influence others
This is built upon theoretical assumptions of rational
choice
Rational choice: an approach that assumes that
individuals weigh the costs and benefits and make
choices to maximize their benefits
◊
®
□
§
7 Major Challenges in Comparative Research
Difficulty controlling variables in cases
Each case is different, hard to come to an exact
comparison
®
1)
Multicausality: when variables are interconnected and
interact together to produce particular outcomes
EX: variations in things like countries' gun control laws
or whether they are a democracy tend to be produced
by multiple, interrelated factors rather than one simple
explanation
®
Not ever going to be a single factor that explains
whatever you are looking at
®
2)
Endogeneity: the issue that cause and effect are not often
clear, in that variables may be both cause and effect in
relationship to one another
Variables act as both the cause and effect in
relationship to one another (can cause something and
also affect something else)
®
3)
Data-gathering limitations
Limits in gathering data and the information accessible
in the first place
®
Comparativists face challenges simply in gathering the
data (examples below)
Too few cases to study
◊
Language barriers
◊
Inability to legally access information
◊
®
Alleviated by area studies
Comparative researchers may seek to control
extraneous variables and improve their data-
gathering focus by engaging in area studies. This
means they focus on studying a region of the
world rather than studying parts of the world (or
individual countries) where similar variables are
clustered
◊
®
4)
Limits to accessing data (similar to above)
Too few cases
®
People not willing to participate
®
5)
Studies limited to a singular geographic region6)
Selection bias: a focus on effects rather than causes, which
can lead to inaccurate conclusions about correlation or
causation
Scholars must be careful to select cases that do not bias
their studies
®
Selection bias can lead to inaccurate conclusions about
correlation and causation
®
This is not a question of political bias, but of HOW cases
are selected in the first place (hard to randomize case
selection)
®
The overreliance on European case studies may lead to
making assumptions about how things work that makes
sense in Europe, but won't translate well to Latin
America, Africa, or Asia
®
Revolutions -- only looking at actual revolutions will
miss the cases where there was poverty without
revolution
®
7)
§
○
International relations (IR): the study of relations between countries in
the international arena
Not comparative, but focusing on how countries are interacting
with one another
§
Topics include: foreign policy, war, trade, foreign aid, foreign affairs
§
Relationships between nations in the global space
§
○
How are they related and where do they overlap?
Dealing with more than one country
§
Similar topics: Revolution, political economy, environmental politics
§
○
•
Evidence and Theories: how might we study causal relationships and test
theory?
Inductive reasoning: research that works from case studies in order to
generate hypotheses
Cases ---> generate hypotheses
§
Studying a case to make inferences by looking at all of the
information you have received
§
Because you know *this*, you can explain *this*
§
○
Deductive reasoning: research that works from a hypothesis that is then
tested against data
Beginning with a hypothesis and then testing with cases
§
May look for correlations or apparent relationships between cases
based on the existing hypothesis
§
○
Correlation: an apparent relationship between two or more variables
○
Causal relationship: cause and effect; when a change in one variable
causes a change in another variable
○
•
SIMPLIFIED: 7 Major Challenges of Comparative Research
Difficulty controlling a large number of variables1)
Multicausality: difficulty in controlling the interaction of variables2)
Limited number of cases to research3)
Limited access to information from cases4)
Uneven research across cases and regions5)
Selection bias: cases selected on the basis of effect and not cause6)
Endogeneity: variables may be either cause or effect7)
•
Lecture 2: Intro to Comparative Politics
Thursday, April 5, 2018 3:36 PM
Document Summary
A study that tries to understand questions about types of regimes and how some countries interact (due to their history, why some countries are richer than others, why some countries are unstable, etc. ) According to political scientists outside of the united states (like europe), there are three subfields in political science. Political theory: deals with normative and theoretical questions. Comparative politics: empirical questions and interactions within political systems. But according to americans in political science, there is a fourth subfield and that would be u. s. Comparative politics vs. international relations (very similar but distinctive) Comparative politics (cp): the study and comparison of domestic politics across countries. Focus on domestic issues, topics, and institutions of multiple countries/systems. Politics: the struggle in any group for power that will give one or more persons the ability to make decisions for the larger group. Power: the ability to influence others or impose one"s will on them. Comparative method: the means by which social scientists.
