RUTGERS UNIVERSITY NEW BRUNSWICK

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1 RUTGERS UNIVERSITY NEW BRUNSWICK Political Science Leech, Licklider, Schochet Research Design in Political Science This unusual (!) course is taught by three faculty over the academic year. We keep changing the sequence of materials to respond to student comments and the academic calendar. In the fall this year the first four weeks will be taught by Licklider and the remainder by Leech. In the spring the first five weeks will be taught by Licklider and the remaining by Schochet. It is fair to ask why this somewhat bizarre sequence is the only course required of all graduate students in the department. It reflects our judgement that graduate students, as opposed to undergraduates, should focus on research, on contributing to the ongoing debates of the discipline and evaluating the contributions of others, and that this process needs to start early rather than late in graduate education. It also reflects our hope that a focus on research design, on how empirical research is and should be conducted, will encourage students to actively enter these debates. We give particular attention to quantitative methods, not because they are necessarily better than others, but because they are very important in contemporary political science but unfamiliar to many of our students. Thus, after two introductory classes, the remainder of the semester will be devoted to quantitative methods, starting with discussions of their strengths and weaknesses and our first research design, followed by learning about various statistical research techniques. At the beginning of the second semester we will take up small-n analysis and formal theory, followed by more systematic discussions of philosophy of science and epistemology. Because of the unusual nature of the course, faculty will assign grade for their own sections; they will be combined, weighted by the number of classes taught each semester. Thus for the first semester it will be Licklider 1/3 and Leech 2/3; for the second semester it will be Licklider 1/3 and Schochet 2/3. Because of the large amount of material to be covered, there will be required reading before the first day of class for both semesters, as noted below.

2 ALTERNATIVE RESEARCH STRATEGIES, PART I (FALL) Roy Licklider, licklide@rci.rutgers.edu, This section of the course is designed to evaluate three general approaches to empirical research, (a) quantitative or large-n analysis, (b) case studies or small-n analysis, and (c) formal theory. Our goal is to sharpen our understanding of the strengths and weaknesses of each so we can make more informed choices about using them in our own research and judging their use by others. We will begin with a brief discussion of experimentation as an example of a particular approach. At the same time each student will be asked to select an issue in political science which interests them. We will then spend two weeks on each of the main methods. The first week will be a discussion of the major arguments about the utility of each of the three methods and an intensive discussion of some examples of its use taken from the current literature. It is particularly important that you read the example with great care. For the second week of discussion of each method students will prepare short research designs showing how this particular method could usefully be applied to their own issue; these will be presented and discussed in class. A similar approach will be used for qualitative methods and modeling in the second semester. The section will conclude with a discussion of ethical issues in research in the second semester. The research designs are clearly central to this part of the course. They require you to show how you would apply each method to a single problem within political science with which you are familiar. This problem should be a general, theoretical issue (not a methodological one) on which there is serious dispute within the field. Normally this will have produced at least two conflicting explanations for the same phenomenon. Examples might be the impact of mass media and party membership on elections, the relationship between democracy, wealth, and interstate war, whether a social movement will have more impact by working within one political party or developing a third party in the U.S., or whether legislative votes are driven more by personal ideologies or party loyalties. Pick an issue whose theoretical literature you know fairly well, perhaps something from a previous course. Feel free to discuss it with me. Unfortunately, since I am on leave this year (don t ask why I m still teaching) and live in New York, I am not often in Hickman; my address and home telephone number are given above. Note that you will use the same topic when doing research designs with different methods in the spring. At the second class meeting, please submit a first draft of a statement of such a problem. I will comment on them and return them to your mailboxes; we should then talk about each one as necessary. At the third class meeting, submit a one to two page revised problem statement which includes (1) a written summary of the dispute (a few sentences), (2) a brief presentation of the different positions within the discipline (a short bibliography is recommended but optional), and (3) a hypothesis (a general, empirical, testable, comparative statement) which, if tested, would help reduce the disagreement between the two sides. Do this by converting the empirical question into a causal statement--a is more likely to occur when B is true than when B is not true. Make your hypothesis as precise as possible. Remember that hypotheses about the future cannot be tested, since we have no

3 data about the future, so they cannot be used. Therefore hypotheses should be written using the past or present tense. (4) Explain briefly how knowing the truth or falsity of this hypothesis would help reduce the disagreement. This material (or a revised version of it) will become the introduction for all three research designs which you will submit. On the days that the papers are due, students will summarize their work in fiveminute oral presentations, and the class will discuss each separately. Papers may be rewritten for credit; the grade of the last version will be the grade for that paper. Students must talk to me before rewriting them. REQUIRED BOOKS: (abbreviated by their titles in the syllabus; all paperback and available at the Douglass Bookstore): Kenneth Hoover and Todd Donovan, The Elements of Social Scientific Thinking, 8th edition Stephen Van Evera, Guide to Methods for Students of Political Science Because of the nature of the course, most assigned material is not included in the books. Copies of other required materials will be available in the Graduate Reserve Room at Alexander Library and also on electronic reserve; as a backup full citations are given in the syllabus to allow you to get them from the university libraries. It is your responsibility to obtain and read all assigned items before class and come prepared to discuss them; this is not a lecture course. Items listed under optional additional readings will not be on reserve but should be readily available from the library; if not, please see me. A PHILOSOPHY OF SCIENCE: "INSTRUMENTAL POSITIVISM" 9/5: Roy Licklider, "How Do We Know What We Know?" The Elements of Social Scientific Thinking, chapters 1-2 Guide to Methods for Students of Political Science, Introduction and chapters 1 and 3 Gary King, Robert Keohane, and Sidney Verba, Designing Social Inquiry: Scientific Inference in Qualitative Research, pp Donald Puchala, "Woe to the Orphans of the Scientific Revolution" in Robert Rothstein, The Evolution of Theory in International Relations, pp Andrew Bennett, Aharon Barth, and Kenneth Rutherford, Do We Practice What We Preach? A Survey of Methods in Political Science Journals and Curricula, P.S.: Political Science and Politics, 36:3 (July 2003), pp OPTIONAL ADDITIONAL READINGS: W. Phillips Shively, The Craft of Political Research, chapters 1-4 and 6 Charles Ragin, The Comparative Method, chapters 1-2 James N. Rosenau, The Dramas of Political Life, first edition, pp. 3-7 and

4 Jack Levy, Explaining Events and Developing Theories: History, Political Science, and the Analysis of International Relations in Colin Elman and Mirian Fendius Elman, Bridges and Boundaries: Historians, Political Scientists, and the Study of International Relations, pp Harold D. Lasswell, The Normative Impact of the Behavioral Sciences, Ethics, 67, 3, 2 (1975), pp Jack Snyder, Is and Ought : Evaluating Empirical Aspects of Normative Research, in Colin Elman and Miriam Fendius Elman, Progress in International Relations Theory, pp Pauline Rosenau, Post-Modernism and the Social Sciences, esp. chapters 7 & 9 CAUSATION AND EXPERIMENTS 9/12: FIRST DRAFT OF PROBLEM STATEMENTS DUE (see discussion above) Gary King, Robert Keohane, and Sidney Verba, Designing Social Inquiry: Scientific Inference in Qualitative Research, pp and The Elements of Social Science Thinking, chapter 3 Russell Jones, Research Methods in the Social and Behavioral Sciences, chapter 7 Kathleen McGraw and Valerie Hoekstra, "Experimentation in Political Science: Historical and Future Directions" in Michael X. Delli Carpini, Leonie Huddy, and Robert Shapiro, Research in Micropolitics: New Directions in Political Psychology, pp S. Iyengar, M. Peters, and D. Kinder, "Experimental Demonstration of the 'Not-So- Minimal' Consequences of Television News Programs," American Political Science Review, 76 (1982), Guide to Methods for Students of Political Science, chapters 4-6 OPTIONAL READINGS: Donald R. Kinder and Thomas R. Palfrey, Experimental Foundations of Political Science LARGE-N STUDIES (STATISTICAL OR CORRELATIONAL ANALYSIS) 9/19: FULL PROBLEM STATEMENT DUE The Elements of Social Science Thinking, chapters 4-5 and appendices A & B Alan Wolfe, "Up From Scientism," New Republic (December 23, 1996), pp OPTIONAL ADDITIONAL READINGS: Donald Campbell, "The Connecticut Crackdown on Speeding," Law and Society, 1968, pp Detlef F. Sprinz and Yael Wolinsky-Nahmias, Models, Numbers, and Cases: Methods for Studying International Relations, chapter 6 Stuart Bremer, et. al., The Scientific Study of War, parts I-IV Charles Ragin, The Comparative Method, chapters 4-5 and 9

5 Thomas W. Pogge and Sanjay G. Reddy, Unknown: The Extent, Distribution, and Trend of Global Income Poverty, Martin Ravallion, How Not to Count the Poor? A Reply to Reddy and Pogge, and Sanjay Reddy and Thomas Pogge, How Not to Count the Poor! A Reply to Ravallion, 2003, (suggested by Kate Bedford) John Vasquez, "The Steps to War: Toward a Scientific Explanation of Correlates of War Findings," World Politics, 40 (October, 1987), pp ADDITIONAL READING USING PARTICULAR SIMPLE STATISTICS (source: with some additions by me): CROSSTABS: Hochschild, Jennifer L Facing up to the American Dream: Race, Class, and the Soul of the Nation. Princeton, NJ : Princeton University Press chapters 3-4 Hood, M.V. and G.W. Neeley Packin' in the hood?: Examining assumptions of concealed-handgun research. Social Science Quarterly 81 (2, June): Mann, Thomas and Raymond Wolfinger "Candidates and Parties in Congressional Elections." American Political Science Review 74 (3, September): CHI-SQUARE: Atkins, Burton M. and William Zavoina "Judicial Leadership on Court of Appeals - Probability Analysis of Panel Assignment in Race Relations Cases on Fifth Circuit." American Journal of Political Science, 18 (4, November): Bennett, Stephen Earl, and David Resnick "The Implications of Nonvoting for Democracy in the United States." American Journal of Political Science 34 (3, August): Licklider, Roy The Consequences of Negotiated Settlements in Civil Wars, American Political Science Review 89 (3, September): DIFFERENCE OF MEANS TEST: Matland, Richard E "Putting Scandinavian Equality to the Test - an Experimental Evaluation of Gender Stereotyping of Political Candidates in a Sample of Norwegian Voters." British Journal of Political Science 24: Wood, Sandra L, Linda Camp Keith, Drew Noble Lanier, and Ayo Ogundele Acclimation Effects' for Supreme Court Justices: A Cross-Validation, " American Journal of Political Science 42: STANDARD DEVIATIONS: Beck, Paul Allen Party Politics in America. Eighth edition. New York: Longman. CORRELATIONS: Hokenmaier, Karl G "Social Security vs. Educational Opportunity in Advanced Industrial Societies: Is There a Trade-Off?" American Journal of Political Science, 42:

6 Segal, Jeffrey A. and Albert D. Cover "Ideological Values and the Votes of United States Supreme Court Justices. American Political Science Review 83 (2, June): BIVARIATE REGRESSIONS: Dougherty, Keith L "Public Goods and Private Interests: An explanation for state compliance with federal requisitions, ," in Jac Heckelman et. al. (eds.) Public Choice Interpretations of American Economic History. Dordrecht, The Netherlands: Kluwer Academic Publishing Hurwitz, Jon and Mark Peffley "Public Perceptions of Race and Crime: The Role of Racial Stereotypes." American Journal of Political Science 41 (2, April): Gibson, James L Truth, Justice, and Reconciliation: Judging the Fairness of Amnesty in South Africa, American Journal of Political Science. 46 (3, July): /26: PAPER #1: Create a large-n research design which would help test your hypothesis. Focus on (a) a statement of the theoretical problem, (b) why a large-n study would be useful in confronting this issue, (c) identification of independent, dependent, and control variables, including those you considered but rejected, (d) hypothesis to be tested, (e) operationalization of the variables, (f) identification or creation of appropriate data, (g) what level of data is this likely to be, (h) what analysis techniques might be appropriate and inappropriate, (I) what resources would you need to carry out this work, and (j) the impact of whether the hypothesis is confirmed or disproven on the argument within the discipline.

7 ALTERNATIVE RESEARCH STRATEGIES, PART II (SPRING) Roy Licklider, ADDITIONAL BOOKS FOR PURCHASE (paperbacks, Douglass bookstore): Alexander George and Andrew Bennett, Case Studies and Theory Development in the Social Sciences Kenneth Shepsle and Mark Bonchek, Analyzing Politics: Rationality, Behavior, and Institutions American Political Science Association, A Guide to Professional Ethics in Political Science SMALL-N ANALYSIS (CASE STUDIES) 1/18: Case Studies and Theory Development in the Social Sciences, chapters 1-4, 6, and 10 Guide to Methodology for Students of Political Science, chapter 2 Elisabeth Wood, An Insurgent Path to Democracy: Popular Mobilization, Economic Interests, and Regime Transition in South Africa and El Salvador, Comparative Political Studies, October 2001 OPTIONAL EXTRA READINGS: Case Studies and Theory Development in the Social Sciences, chapters 5, 7-9, and 11 Jack Levy, Presidential Address: Case Studies: Types, Designs, and Logics of Inference, Conflict Management and Peace Science, 25 (2008), Detlef F. Sprinz and Yael Wolinsky-Nahmias, Models, Numbers, and Cases, chapters 2-5 Jack Levy, Qualititative Methods in International Relations in Michael Brecher and Frank P. Harvey, Millenial Reflections on International Studies: Evaluating Methodology in International Studies, pp Gary King, Robert Keohane and Sidney Verba, Designing Social Inquiry, pp John Gerring, What is a Case Study and What Is It Good For? American Political Science Review, 98, 2 (May 2004), pp James Mahoney, Tentative Answers to Questions about Causal Mechanisms, paperat American Political Science Association, 2003, James Fearon, "Counterfactuals and Hypothesis Testing in Political Science," World Politics, 43 (January, 1991), pp James Mahoney. Nominal, Ordinal, and Narrative Appraisal in Macrocausal Analysis, American Journal of Sociology, 104 (January 1999), pp James Mahoney, Strategies of Causal Inference in Small-N Analysis, Sociological Methods and Research, 28, 4 (May 2000), pp Harry Eckstein, "Case Study and Theory in Policy Science" in Fred Greenstein and Nelson Polsby, Handbook of Political Science, Volume 7, Strategies of Inquiry, pp Alexander L. George and Andrew Bennett, Case Studies and Theory Development.

8 David Collier, The Comparative Method, pp in Ada Finifter (ed), Political Science: The State of the Discipline II Stanley Lieberson, "Small N's and Big Conclusions: An Examination of the Reasoning in Comparative Studies Based on a Small Number of Cases," Social Forces, 70 (December, 1991), Charles Ragin, The Comparative Method, especially chapter 3 James Mahoney and Gary Goertz, The Possibility Principle: Choosing Negative Cases in Comparative Research, American Political Science Review, 98, 4 (November 2005), pp. 653 ff. Jack S. Levy, Explaining Events and Developing Theories: History, Political Science and the Analysis of International Relations in Colin Elman and Mirian Elman (eds), Bridges and Boundaries Tulia Falleti, Theory-Guided Process-Tracing in Comparative Politics: Something Old, Something New, APSA-CP Newsletter, 17, 1 (Winter 2006), pp Michael Ross, How Does Natural Resource Wealth Influence Civil Wars? Evidence from Thirteen Case Studies, International Organization, 58 (Winter 2004), pp Jack Levy, "Preferences, Constraints, and Choices in July 1914," International Security, 15, 3 (Winter ), D. Michael Shafer, Deadly Paradigms: The Failure of U.S. Counterinsurgency Policy, especially chapters 1, 4-5, and 7-10 Robert Bates et. al., Analytic Narratives Edward L. Morse, Foreign Policy and Interdependence in Gaullist France Helen Milner, Resisting Protectionism: Global Industries and the Politics of International Trade Roy Licklider, Political Power and the Arab Oil Weapon: The Experience of Five Industrial Countries or "The Power of Oil: The Netherlands, the United Kingdom, Canada, Japan and the United States," International Studies Quarterly, 32 (June, 1988), pp Paul Collier and Nicholas Sambanis, Understanding Civil War, Volume 1 Africa, Volume 2 Europe, Asia and Other Regions T. Bernauer and P. Moser, Reducing Pollutions of the Rhine River: The Influence of International Cooperation, Journal of Environment and Development, 5, 4 (1996), pp Peter M. Haas, Banning Chloroflourocarbons, International Organization, 46, 1 (1992), pp Vincent Boudreau, Resisting Dictatorship: Repression and Protest in Southeast Asia 1/25: PAPER #2: Create a research design using the case study approach which would help resolve the arguments on the same problem as you used in paper #1. Focus on (a) a statement of the theoretical problem (presumably the same as your first paper), (b) why a small-n study would be useful in confronting this issue, (c) identification of independent and dependent, (d) process which the theory predicts will connect independent and dependent variables, (e) explaining how you would

9 select your cases, both the method you prefer and any methods you considered and rejected, (f) how would you carry out process tracing (specify at least one causal process you would look for), operationalization of the variables, (h) what resources would you need to carry out this work, and (j) the impact of whether the process tracing is successful or not on the argument within the discipline. FORMAL THEORY 2/1: Robert Jervis, "Models and Cases in the Study of International Conflict" in Robert Rothstein, The Evolution of Theory in International Relations, pp Analyzing Politics, chapters 1-4, 6, 8-9, and either 10 (last name A-J) or 14 (last name K-Z) Bruce Bueno de Mesquita, Making Security Studies Relevant to Policy Makers, National Security Studies Quarterly, III (Autumn, 1997), pp Bruce Bueno de Mesquita, Principles of International Politics: People s Power, Preferences, and Perceptions, Second Edition, pp Robert Bates, Avner Greif, and Smith Singh, Organizing Violence, Journal of Conflict Resolution, 46, 5 (October 2002), OPTIONAL EXTRA READINGS: Charles A. Lave and James G. March, An Introduction to Models in the Social Sciences Morris P. Fiorina, Formal Models in Political Science, American Journal of Political Science, 19, 1 (February 1975), pp Detlef F. Sprinz and Yael Wolinsky-Nahmias, Models, Numbers, and Cases, chapters 10 and 14 and pp Stephen M. Walt, Rigor or Rigor Mortis? Rational Choice and Security Studies and Lisa L. Martin, The Contributions of Rational Choice: A Defense of Pluralism, International Security, 23, 4 (Spring 1999) pp and 24, 2 (Fall 1999), pp Rebecca Morton, Methods and Models: A Guide to the Empirical Analysis of Formal Models Stephen L. Quackenbush, The Rationality of Rational Choice Theory, International Interactions, 20 (2004), pp Jon Elster, Rational Choice History: A Case of Excessive Ambition, American Political Science Review, 94, 3 (2000), pp Jeffrey Friedman, The Rational Choice Controversy: Economic Models of Politics Reconsidered Scott Gates and Brian D. Humes, Games, Information, and Politics

10 Peter Ordeshook, Game Theory and Political Theory Avanish Dixit and Barry Nalebuff, Thinking Strategically: The Competitive Edge in Business, Politics and Everyday Life John Brehm and Scott Gates, Donut Shops and Speed Traps: Evaluating Models of Supervision on Police Behavior, American Journal of Political Science, 37, 2 (May 1993), pp James D. Fearon, Ethnic War as a Commitment Problem, paper presented at the American Political Science Association, September, Barry Weingast, "The Fundamental Political and Economic Puzzles of Ethnic and Regional Violence," paper for Columbia Ford Foundation conference, /8: PAPER #3: Assume that the large-n study you outlined in paper #1 has been completed and has produced the correlation you predicted. State at least three different explanations of this result (presumably one will be the theory you are testing, while your original alternative explanation should now be excluded). Convert each into a formal model. Sketch out a research strategy to persuade a sceptical audience which of these three explanations is the best explanation for your large-n results. Xerox copies of your models and bring enough copies to class for everyone to have one. VALUES IN RESEARCH 2/15: Guide to Methodology for Students of Political Science, chapter 6 A Guide to Professional Ethics in Political Science, entire James N. Rosenau, The Dramas of Political Life, first edition, pp Roy Licklider, "The Ethics of Research of the Private Nuclear Strategists," paper for Inter-University Seminar on Armed Forces and Society, 1975 The Elements of Social Scientific Thinking, chapter 6 Glenn Paige, "On Values and Science: The Korean Decision Reconsidered," American Political Science Review, 71 (December, 1977), Norbert Kerr, letter from FRCRP project, Department of Psychology, Michigan State University, 7/1/94 Diana Baumrind, "Research Using Intentional Deception: Ethical Issues Revisited," American Psychologist, 40 (February, 1985), Charlotte Allen, Spies Like Us: When Sociologists Deceive Their Subjects, LinguaFranca, 7 (November, 1997), pp Sheila Carapico, No Easy Answers: The Ethics of Field Research in the Arab World, P.S. Political Science and Politics, 39, 3 (July 2006), pp

11 Christopher Shea, Don t Talk To The Humans: The Crackdown on Social Science Research, LinguaFranca, 10 (September 2000), pp ASSIGNMENT: Complete the Rutgers Human Subjects Certification Program, either by web test or viewing the film (a detailed explanation is at directions to access materials and the test are at directions for the film are at OPTIONAL EXTRA READINGS: Irving Louis Horowitz, The Rise & Fall of Project Camelot, Preface and pp. 3-17, 27-44, and (Horowitz, Silvert, Pool, Galtung) Johan Galtung, "A Structural Theory of Imperialism," Journal of Peace Research, 8 (1971),