Chapter 1: Doing Comparative Politics
(1.5) What are 3 main disadvantages to using qualitative research?
1. It can produce a causal relationship for only the cases being compared, approaching the problem of generalizing from the specific. 2. This type of research can get bogged down in un-important details which can distract the researcher from what really matters. 3. It is hard to judge validity as it is impossible to "check" a scholar's findings. (This also occurs in Quantitative data)
(1.4) What is Causation?
A process or event the produces and observable effect.
(1.1) What do political scientists (created by Harold Laswell) search for when describing political behavior & events?
"Who gets what, when, and how"
(1.1) What are the 4 subfields of political science?
1. American Politics 2. Political Theory 3. International Relations 4. Comparative Politics
(1.3) What are the 2 methods used to assess the degree to which the hypothesis can be falsified? And what do they mean exactly?
1. Method of Agreement - Compares & contrasts cases with different attributes but with different outcomes. The attribute that all of the cases share is the cause (SAME ENDING) 2. Method of Difference - Compares & contrasts cases with the same attributes but different endings. This method finds an attribute that occurs when the outcome occurs, but is absent when the outcome DOES NOT OCCUR (DIFFERENT ENDINGS).
(1.2) Most recently, what have been the topics being discussed in the forms of political questions?
1. The expanding role of women in politics. 2. The growing influence of religion. 3. The impact of globalization on domestic and international politics.
(1.3) What are the two most important characteristics of hypotheses?
1. They are causal 2. They are testable
(1.1) How many subfields is political science divided up into?
4
(1.4) What is Correlation?
A measure of observed association between two variables.
(1.2) AT IT'S ESSENCE, what is Comparative Politics?
An argument for the existence of patterns and for undertaking a systematic effort to understand why different outcomes occur in similar places, or similar outcomes in different places.
(1.3) What is a hypothesis?
An argument that links cause to effect.
(1.2) Who may have very become the first political scientist and how?
Aristotle (384-322 BC) when he asked "What sort of constitution best combines political stability & good government?"
(1.2) How does the manner in which Aristotle and his students determined his answer to his question relate to today?
Aristotle took to evidence to answer his question (researching the political systems of different countries) - something that is crucial in having today to prove hypotheses and theories.
(1.3) When building arguments, what do comparitivists stay away from?
Basing the argument exclusively on the particulars of a single case.
(1.2) What sparked revolutions in Russia and China?
Communism (Extreme left-wing)
(1.1) How does Comparative Politics differ from International Relations?
Comparative Politics focuses on politics WITHIN different countries around the world, where International Relations studies the interaction BETWEEN the countries. Within vs. Between
(1.4) What is the only true way to isolate causality from everything else?
Controlling all conditions of the experiment.
(1.2) What was a major theme in the 1990's?
Dozens of dictatorships around the world adopted democracy.
(1.2) What inspired the regimes that started World War II?
Fascism (Extreme right wing)
(1.2) How did the Industrial Revolution play a role in politics?
It caused massive socioeconomic change, especially in Western Europe.
(1.5) What is qualitative research?
It focuses on the in-depth understanding on the phenomena of attributes & outcomes. Privileges depth over breadth.
(1.5) Why is mixed methods research such a great research method to use?
It helps eliminate the disadvantages found in only using quantitative or qualitative research.
(1.3) What does the degree to which a hypothesis stands up to the attempts of falsification mean?
It is a measure of its strength.
(1.5) What is quantitative research?
It is a type of research that values the statistical relationships that are found between attributes and outcomes, where it analyzes it using computers. It emphasizes breadth over depth.
(1.3) What is the Comparative Method?
It is a way to examine patterns of facts or events to narrow down what is important in terms of building a convincing comparative politics argument.
(1.3) What is the "Comparative Approach"?
It is an approach that looks at a set of cases with different characteristics that experiences similar political outcomes.
(1.3) What is a "reliable" hypothesis?
It is tested across more than one case (not based off of one case)
(1.3) What does it mean if a hypothesis is falsifiable?
It means that the hypothesized relationship can be shown, through observation, to be incorrect.
(1.5) What does quantitative research sacrifice for the "breadth" part of it?
It sacrifices the depth of understanding of what is going on politically.
(1.5) What are the benefits to conducting quantitative research?
It seeks larger samples to reduce the likelihood that any patterns in the data are random, and to reduce the likelihood that the sample gathered is biased.
(1.5) What is mixed methods research?
It uses both quantitative & qualitative methods in an effort to build convincing claims about the relationships between attributes & outcomes.
(1.2) Prior to the 1700's, what was politics mainly rooted in?
Moral and religious principles.
(1.4) Does correlation imply causality?
NO! There may be a relation, but NO CAUSATION!
(1.2) What was blamed for igniting World War I?
Nationalism (country pride)
(1.2) What happened during the Age of Enlightenment (What impact did it have on political science?) ?
New scientific discoveries justified a logical and empirical approach to studying the natural and social world, rather than continuing to take the moral and religious routes for justification.
(1.4) Can theories be used to identify causality?
No, only evidence from the real-world can.
(1.4) Did The Spirit of the Laws have causality within it?
No, there is not enough information in it to prove causality. However, correlation is certainly present.
(1.1) What is Political Theory?
Philosophical questions on the nature and purposes of politics.
(1.1) What would one say that political science is the study of?
Politics
(1.2) What kind of questions did philosophers of the 1700's constantly consider in regards to politics?
Politics in secular (non-religious) matters.
(1.4) How does the research of natural scientists versus social scientists differ?
Social scientists cannot "control" or "isolate" factors to determine causality as chemist might be able to in a lab, nor can they conduct additional experiments to obtain more data. They MUST use what the world gives them.
(1.2) Which countries, known as the "Asian Tigers", invalidated the idea of scholars that poor nations were doomed to the perpetual exploitation of wealthier nations.
Taiwan, South Korea, and Singapore.
(1.4) What was the name of Montesquieu's book on climates and governments?
The Spirit of the Laws?
(1.2) What inspired new questions in the 1960's and 1970's?
The emergence of so many new nations in the aftermath of European Decolonization
(1.2) What did the questioning of separation between government and religion eventually lead to?
The foundations for the U.S. Declaration of Independence and the Constitution.
(1.1) What is American Politics?
The politics of the U.S.A.
(1.1) What is Politics?
The process of making & contesting of authoritative public decisions about the distribution of rights, responsibilities, wealth, and power.
(1.2) What kinds of questions emerged in the late 1800's to early 1900's?
The sources and consequences of Nationalism (country pride) and forms of political ideology such as fascism and communism.
(1.1) What is International Relations?
The studies of politics between countries.
(1.1) What is Comparative Politics?
The systematic search for answers to political questions about how people around the world make & contest authoritative public choices.
(1.2) What questions did Karl Marx and Max Weber consider during the Industrial Revolution in regards to politics?
They considered the political impact of the people shifting from rural, agrarian (agricultural) land to urban, industrial land.
(1.2) What do the systematic efforts put forth in Comparative Politics often result in?
They help us make sense of and simplify the complex patterns, offering simpler yet convincing answers to can apply to real-world situations.
(1.1) What is the Comparative Method?
Used to separate fact from opinion, but more directly used to use comparisons & contrasts to help generate hypotheses that provide convincing answers to what politics is all about. (Asking questions, developing hypotheses, testing hypotheses).
(1.4) Why is causality hard to identify?
With all of the factors being present in a case, it is hard to determine which ones are only correlated versus which ones are through causality.
(1.5) Can qualitative data be transformed in quantitative?
Yes! Ex. If 1,000 dead people = a country is in a civil war, a #1 can indicate war for a country, where a #0 can indicate it is not at war.
(1.3) Can some hypotheses not be falsifiable? If so, how?
Yes, if the evidence backing cannot be proven. For example: "This civil war was inspired by God's will". No matter how hard we try, there is no way for us to determine what God really meant.
