Notes – Research Methods in Political Science 2023
Lecture 01: 07/02/2023
Introduction to Research Methods
Scientific research
- Goal: to explain something (events, decisions, actions)
1. The cause of something (Why?)
2. The process of something (How?)
3. The outcomes of something (What?)
- Theory: Why? How? -> Explanations and predictions
- Method: Evidence? Data? -> Procedures and methods
- Analysis: Description and theory/ hypothesis testing
Naïve science Scientific method
insufficient/ incomplete data
-> either no or biased inquiry
Personal experience A systematic and cyclical process
Intuition Falsifiable theories
Authority Replication
Appeals to tradition, custom, and faith Reflective and self-critical approach
Magic, superstition, mysticism Cumulative and self-correcting process
Scientific research process
Question/ puzzle -> Conceptualisation -> Operationalisation -> Research design -> Observation -> Data analysis ->
Interpretation
Why research methods?
- From naïve science (intuition and anecdotes) to systematic evidence
- Question- and problem-driven
- Research methods are helpful tools, provide transparency and replicability
- Methodological pluralism and diversity
- Methods as opportunities (provides valuable and reliable data that can bring meaningful conclusions) and
constraints (since you abide to follow systematic rules)
,Notes – Research Methods in Political Science 2023
Lecture 02: 10/02/2023
Philosophy of Social Science
Ontology Epistemology Methodology
What exists? What is the What sort of knowledge of it is What strategies can we use to
nature of the social world? possible? How can we know about it? gain that knowledge?
Positivism
Positivism offers one approach to offering credible answers to questions: it maintains that researchers can arrive
at factual, reliable, and objective answers to questions about the social world by employing the methods used in
the natural sciences. Positivism emerged in the 1950s, during the "Behavioural Revolution" of the social sciences.
The critical tenant is that only observable behaviour may be studied. The "Post-Behavioural" revolution shifted
Positivism to the rational choice theory.
The term positivism was established by the French philosopher Auguste Comte (1798-1857). Comte argued that
the truth could be described through a systematic collection of observable facts.
The four tenants of Classical Positivism:
- Naturalism
There are no fundamental differences between the natural and the social sciences. There exists a world, a
mind-independent, objective reality that exists independently of our knowledge of it.
- Empiricism
What we know about the world is limited to what can be observed. Knowledge is only that which
originates in sensory experience: there is no priori knowledge, no knowledge acquired prior.
- Laws
Law-like generalisations have the same status as natural scientific laws.
Induction reasoning: Observation -> theory.
Cause-and-effect relationship (David Hume): The conclusions reached are based not on the knowledge of
causal mechanisms and the generative properties of things but only on observing how certain events are
followed repeatedly by a particular event.
- Possibility to distinguish between facts and values
Science is objective and value-free (in the pursuit of knowledge of the social world through the
application of the scientific methods used in the natural sciences, it is possible to distinguish between
facts and values and to treat facts as independent of the observer and their values).
Logical Positivism
Logical Positivism maintains that social inquiry should combine induction (based on empiricism) and deduction (in
the form of logic) as methods of reasoning. Deductive reasoning begins with broad generalisations or theoretical
propositions and then moves to specific observations. The verification principle was also introduced by logical
Positivism to establish truth claims.
Induction Observation -> theory
Deduction Theory -> observation
Retroduction Observation <-> theory
Retroduction describes the interaction of induction and deduction in an evolving, dynamic process of discovery
and hypothesis formation.
,Notes – Research Methods in Political Science 2023
Karl Popper's (1902-1994) critique of Positivism:
- Rejection of induction
No matter how many observations confirm a theory, it only takes one counter-observation to falsify it:
only one black swan is needed to repudiate the theory that all swans are white. This is why empirical
observation alone cannot generate laws. That is why deductive theory testing is crucial.
- Rejection of verifiability
Scientists should not try to verify or prove a theory but should attempt to disprove it. Anything non-
falsifiable is outside of science. If nothing might disconfirm a theory, then it is not a theory but a set of
self-verifying statements – an ideology. Deduction should be the sole basis for explanation.
Carl Gustav Hempel (1905-1997)
- Deductive-Nomological Model
An observed phenomenon is explained if it can be deduced from a universal law-like generalisation.
- Hypothetico-Deductive Model
Testability of law to predict events (Law -> Hypothesis -> Explicit Predictions)
Prediction correct: Hypothesis corroborated/ supported.
Prediction incorrect: Hypothesis falsified.
Scientific realism
Scientific realism accepts Positivism's naturalist ontology which assumes that the social world is not different from
the natural world. However, it does not accept empiricism. Scientific realism assumes that objectively real
consists of what we can observe and unobservable elements. Unobservable elements (e.g. structural
relationships) of social life are crucial to an understanding and explanation of what goes on in the world. We
know that unobservable elements exist because we can see the consequences. Scientific realism argues that
causal mechanisms are essential instead of law-like generalisations. The best theory is the one that explains
phenomena the "best", as there can be plausible alternative mechanisms.
James Coleman's Bathtub (1986)
- How do macro-social mechanisms produce social outcomes?
- Both micro- and macro-level matter and can interact with each other.
- Individuals act within macro-entities as micro-actors (decision-makers in democracies influence policy).
- To understand macro-level outcomes, one needs to move to the micro-level for understanding.
The Structure-Agency Debate
Ontological question Which has prior or primary ontological status (which was first): agents or
structures? Do social structures exist independently from individuals?
Methodological question What is the proper focus of social scientific explanation? Should explanations of
social phenomena be expressed in terms of individuals and relations between
them, or can they also invoke social phenomena like institutions and cultures?
, Notes – Research Methods in Political Science 2023
Individualism (micro-level) Holism (macro-level)
Ontology The basic units of society are The whole of something is distinct from and not directly
individuals, and social phenomena explicable in terms of its parts. Social facts have social
are the combined results of causes that are irreducible to facts about individuals.
individual actors.
Methodology Explanations of social phenomena The properties of its components alone cannot deduce
(classes, power, nations, etc.) must the properties of a system as a whole. The system
be reducible to the characteristics determines how the parts behave. Each social entity
of individuals. (group, society) has a different totality.
Methodological individualism argues that social explanations should give primacy to individuals.
Methodological holism argues that social explanations should give primacy to social structures and institution.
Reification describes seeing macro-social structural entities as if they had a concrete, material existence and
treating them as analytically independent of their constituent element: human agency.
Interpretivism
Interpretivism maintains that the social world is fundamentally different from the world of natural phenomena
and that one cannot gain knowledge of it by employing the methods of natural sciences. Social phenomena are
subjectively created: they are socially or discursively constructed. Hermeneutical approaches assume that human
behaviour is the product of the meanings and intentions actors employ. Their goal is to interpret social
phenomena by developing an understanding of the meanings that actors give to their actions.
Hermeneutics was initially referred to as a method to interpret theological and legal texts. Today, hermeneutics
refers to theories and methods used to interpret texts of all kinds. Texts are any object or practice that can be
treated as text.
Interpretivism maintains that we cannot understand, explain, or predict patterns of human behaviour unless we
understand the meanings and intentions that concrete agents attribute to their environment, the values and
goals they possess, the choices they perceive, and the way they interpret other individuals' social actions.
Critical Theory approaches, include constructivism, feminism, post-structuralism, and post-colonialism. All of
these approaches are concerned with illuminating the many ways in which social inquiry is not value-free.
Normative and empirical theory in political research
The division between normative and empirical theory is predicated on the assumption that it is possible to
separate questions about what is (empirical) from what should or ought to be (normative). Positivists insist that
only hypotheses about what is are constitutive of the domain of value-free empirical theory. The normative
theory is often associated with questions that address moral issues in politics. Critics like Robert Cox argue that no
theory can avoid normative assumptions.
Values, the researcher, and the research process
Max Weber argued that it is possible to be objective in the social sciences. He assumed that there is a distinction
between facts and values because knowing the facts of something is not the same thing as knowing its value.
However, researchers cannot remain neutral, as they inevitably bring their presuppositions into their research. If
researchers are transparent (self-disclosure), social science can provide a factual and objective assessment.
