Political Science The Theory And Practice Of Political Science

In this volume, the study of legislatures has traditionally been a central preoccupation of political scientists. Legislatures provide good laboratories for testing theories and methodologies of significance in the discipline and, more broadly, for contributing to an understanding of how representative government works.

This text demonstrates that there is a politics model that unifies the discipline and structures its relationship to the other social sciences. It shows how this model underlies important works of applied research in all the main political science subfields.

In this volume, the study of legislatures has traditionally been a central preoccupation of political scientists. Legislatures provide good laboratories for testing theories and methodologies of significance in the discipline and, more broadly, for contributing to an understanding of how representative government works.

Nothing rings truer to those teaching political science research methods: students hate taking this course. Tackle the challenge and turn the standard research methods teaching model on its head with Political Science Research in Practice. Akan Malici and Elizabeth S. Smith engage students first with pressing political questions and then demonstrate how a researcher has gone about answering them, walking them through real political science research that contributors have conducted. Through the exemplary use of a comparative case study, field research, interviews, textual and interpretive research, statistical research, survey research, public policy and program evaluation, content analysis, and field experiments, each chapter introduces students to a method of empirical inquiry through a specific topic that will spark their interest and curiosity. Each chapter shows the process of developing a research question, how and why a particular method was used, and the rewards and challenges discovered along the way. Students can better appreciate why we need a science of politics—why methods matter—with these first-hand, issue-based discussions. The second edition now includes: Two completely new chapters on field experiments and a chapter on the textual/interpretative method. New topics, ranging from the Arab Spring to political torture to politically sensitive research in China to social networking and voter turnout. Revised and updated "Exercises and Discussion Questions" sections. Revised and updated "Interested to Know More" and "Recommended Resources" sections.

This text demonstrates that there is a politics model that unifies the discipline and structures its relationship to the other social sciences. It shows how this model underlies important works of applied research in all the main political science subfields.

James W. Davis critically examines central claims and assumptions made by proponents of the scientific method in general, as well as the specific problems confronting the social sciences in particular, developing a middle ground between the uncritical application of the scientific method in pursuit of empirical truths and the postmodernist assertion that there is no foundation upon which to build an edifice of social science.