How to Compare Countries

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How to Compare Countries

• Michaelmas Term 2004
• Dr. David Rueda

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What is this Course About?

• It is not about statistics, you have other
  courses for that.
• It is about the logic of comparison.
• Why comparison?
• It is impossible not to compare And what should
  they know of England who only England know?
  Rudyard Kipling, The English Flag.
• Everything is a comparison in Political Science
• Cause and effect, explanation and outcome. How
  would we know without a comparison?
• We need a positive and a negative outcome, the
  existence or absence of an effect. Example?
• Case studies? Also comparison.
• One datum counterfactual.
• We will talk about theory-related issues that are
  essential in your thinking about a dissertation
  (or an article) and will keep emerging as
  questions about your research.

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What is this Courses Conclusion?

• Let me anticipate the conclusions.
• Making theory-based methodological choices.
• Theory drives methodology.
• Connecting theoretical claims and methodological
  choices.
• Is the evidence related to the claims?
• All methods have advantages and disadvantages.
• Understanding the costs and benefits will help
  you choose method.
• There is no absolute best method.
• All methods have common goals and approach
  inherent limitations in similar ways.
• Best method will depend on question you ask.

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The Format of the Lectures

• I will lecture for a bit more than an hour.
• Feel free to interrupt at any time questions,
  problems, comments.
• Ill open the floor to questions and a discussion
  after the lectures.
• Some of the things I have to say during this
  course will be old hat to you. Some of the
  things (practical and theoretical) you will want
  to think about.
• I will have a reading list available for
  downloading in my website (http//users.ox.ac.uk/
  polf0050) in the next couple of days. I will
  also post the lecture outlines.

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An Outline for the Lectures

• Today Introduction, why compare, comparative
  method, advantages and disadvantages of different
  methods.
• Week 6 Millian and Boolean methods, method of
  agreement, method of difference. Historical
  development of comparative politics (1).
• Week 7 Historical development of comparative
  politics (2). Problems of comparative research
  designs.
• Week 8 New approaches. Triangulation of
  methods. Summary.

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Today

• Assumptions.
• Comparative Politics and Different Approaches.
• Different Methods
• Experimental and Non-Experimental.
• Statistical and Non-Statistical.
• Small N Analyses.
• Why Should We Compare?
• Next?

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Assumptions.

• It is only fair to explain at the outset what
  this course does.
• Truth in Advertising this is Social Science.
• Positivism there is a reality out there, we can
  understand and analyze it.
• Social science research should lead general
  statements about social phenomena (Przeworski and
  Teune 1970).
• Constructivism?
• We develop theoretical claims. We look at
  evidence to prove or disprove our claims.
• We can advance our knowledge of politics by
  building better theories.
• We can compare theories and conclude which ones
  are better are explaining political phenomena.

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Comparative Politics and Different Approaches

• Comparative Politics is defined by a method
  rather than a substantive interest.
• The focus is the comparison, any topic will do.
• The term indicates the how of the analysis, but
  not the what (Lijphart 1971).
• Two different kinds of approach
• Nomothetic seeks to establish general
  (scientific) laws (political science).
• Idiographic focuses on the individual
  observation, describes, emphasizes context
  (history?).
• Political science can do both. But evidence is
  used to test theories.

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Different Methods
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Different Methods Experimental and
Non-Experimental (1).

• Experimental Method
• Natural Science method.
• Advantages we can control for non-related
  variables, we can manipulate the explanatory
  variables, we can systematically measure the
  result.
• How do we control for non-related variables?
  Randomization.
• The experimental research design eliminates the
  exogenous interference by using identical groups
  (or groups with random differences that therefore
  cannot be associated with the variables of
  interest) and exposing only some of the groups to
  the stimulus whose effect the researcher is
  interested in investigating.
• Disadvantages?

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Different Methods Experimental and
Non-Experimental (2).

• Experimental Method in Social Science
• Not possible in some cases can you randomize
  countries?
• Possible in some cases, increasingly popular in
  economics.
• Why?
• Advantages in Social Science.
• Disadvantages in Social Science? Reproducing the
  natural context.

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Different Methods Statistical and
Non-Statistical (1).

• All methods share the same goals, they attempt to
  solve the same problems in different ways
• The desire to establish general empirical
  propositions requires all theoretically relevant
  approaches to first establish a general
  relationship among the variables and then control
  for the effects of other factors that may distort
  the analysis (Lijphart 1971).
• More statistically oriented and more
  qualitatively oriented comparative research
  designs try to approximate the ideal control of
  exogenous variables accomplished by the
  experimental method.
• Statistical Method
• Researchers control the effects of exogenous
  variables through the mathematical manipulation
  of the data. The factors that cannot be
  controlled experimentally are taken into
  consideration by the assessment of partial
  correlations at the different levels of the
  control variable.

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Different Methods Statistical and
Non-Statistical (2).

• Advantages of Statistical Method
• Clear theoretical goals.
• Systematic comparison.
• Theoretical generality.
• Public procedure, easy (or possible)
  reproduction.
• Most similar to experimental method? Second best?
• Lijphart 1971, King, Keohane and Verba 1994.
• Disadvantages of Statistical Method
• Depth of knowledge?
• Dialogue between data and theory?
• There are questions that cannot be approached
  this way.
• Correlation is not causality.

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Small N Analysis (1)

• We will spend most of our time analyzing small N
  analyses.
• Why? You have other courses that emphasize
  statistical analyses.
• Should a distinction be made between small N
  analyses and case studies?
• No A case study is a small n analysis.
• Is there ever an n1 analysis?
• No There is always comparison (in time, within
  regions) or a counterfactual.
• Small N analyses as natural experiments
• We did not perform an experiment but others did
  (politicians, institutions, individuals). We are
  presented with a diverse reality (some cases
  exhibit an outcome, others do not).

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Small N Analysis (2)

• Advantages
• Depth of knowledge
• Extensive dialogue between data and theory.
• Ability for theory corroboration or theory
  rejection?
• Good for theory building?
• Causality and process tracing.
• The need for thick description winking versus
  twitching (Geertz, The Interpretation of
  Cultures).
• Some topics can only be analyzed with small N
  analysis.
• Example Analysis of everyday forms of peasant
  resistance (James Scotts Weapons of the Weak).

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Small N Analysis (3)

• Disadvantages
• Clear theoretical goals?
• Systematic comparison?
• Theoretical generality?
• Public procedure, easy (or possible)
  reproduction?
• The dialogue of ideas and evidence becomes more
  and more a monologue carried on between the
  investigator and the data that have been
  constructed and often reconstructed according
  to the investigators pre-existing ideas and
  theories (Ragin 1991 2)
• Selection bias.
• Selection bias occurs when the nonrandom
  selection of cases results in inferences that are
  not statistically representative of the actual
  population (Collier 1995).
• Examples Economic growth in NICs (Chalmers
  Johnson), Social Revolutions in Soviet Union,
  China, etc (Theda Skocpol).

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Why Should We Compare?

• To identify questions and problems.
• Example the pathologies Fritz Scharpf identified
  in German federalism under the label of the joint
  decision trap could perhaps fruitfully be
  transferred to other federal systems.
• To see things we cannot see if we do not compare.
• Example Supporters of the idea of
  Scandinavian-type welfare states may have
  revelations about what affect social policy by
  analyzing the UK or the US.
• To theorize, explain and control (like all other
  methods).
• To have the advantages of qualitative designs.
• Can we eliminate the disadvantages?
  Triangulating methods.

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Next?

• Week 6 Millian and Boolean methods, method of
  agreement, method of difference. Historical
  development of comparative politics (1).
• Week 7 Historical development of comparative
  politics (2). Problems of comparative research
  designs.
• Week 8 New approaches. Triangulation of
  methods. Summary.