Center for the Study of Liberal Democracy

Political Science Research: Is and Ought (by Avramenko)

What they Teach in Graduate School:

I surveyed a few friends to identify how political Science research ought to be approached. It goes something like this:

  1. Identify a problem
  2. Survey the literature
  3. Develop theory/formulate hypothesis
  4. Choose appropriate method/Design a study
  5. Operationalize
  6. Gather data
  7. Code data
  8. Analyze data/test hypothesis
  9. Write conclusions

Political Theorists, they say, don’t work like this. What, then, do they do? They ought to do something like this:

  1. Identify a problem/question
  2. Survey the (secondary) literature
  3. Formulate a hypothesis
  4. Operationalize (this includes identitfying dependent and independent variables)
  5. Choose appropriate method
  6. Gather “wisdom” (i.e., read primary texts)
  7. Sort “wisdom” into evidentiary argument (i.e., assemble your paper)
  8. Test/revisit hypothesis (i.e., do the texts support your early hunches?)

 

The Reality of the Discipline

Here is what’s probably closer to the Order of Things, at least in the social sciences:

  1. Pick a hot new method and/or instrument
  2. Borrow or steal an “under-utilized” data set
  3. Review literature until you find a hot theoretical conversation that might fit with data set
  4. Operationalize
  5. Code
  6. Analyze data until,
  7. an hypothesis appears, then
  8. re-code data to aid and abet hypothesis.
  9. Formulate better hypothesis to fit output from re-coded data.
  10. Emphasize bone fides by identifying problem with new method and/or instrument
  11. Publish
  12. Return to #6

For Political Theorists, it would be like this:

  1. Unselfconsciously choose a method by saying, “I’m a XYZ-ist (say, Marxist). I’ll do an XYZ-ist interpretation of…
  2. …Max Sterner (who reads and publishes on this guy?! Excellent! Uncharted territory!)” It’s best to use a German that no one can understand because he’s such a bad writer. Niklas Luhmann is a good candidate.
  3. Review the literature until you find a hot topic. Um, how about the “self”? It’s a catchy topic, so why not?
  4. Assign signifiers to words in the text that pertain to superstructure, the self, power relations, or something that fits the “method.”
  5. Search digitized texts for signifiers. Cut and paste paragraphs replete with signifiers. String them together to make a story.
  6. Write introductory paragraph, claiming you’ve discovered a “thread” in Sterner’s work…
  7. …then claim it sheds light on the uber-problem (the self, or identity, or inequality–whatever has been identified in 3)
  8. Scan the text again for more evidence, or better, scan the secondary literature on Sterner for citations from Sterner that can be used. Fill your footnotes with this evidence.
  9. Tweak thesis to better explain discoveries.
  10. Never doubt method.
  11. Submit for publication, but make sure only your fellow XYZ-ists review the paper. These have been identified in #3 and #8.
  12. return to #6, or, if you’re a purist, return to #2. but use Luhmann, (or maybe a feminist reading of Hrotsvitha von Gandersheim). One can also use a popular data set like, say, Hannah Arendt, but be sure to use “Revisiting” or “Reconsidered” in title

or,

  1. Pick an author, based solely on your love of her work
  2. Reject methods altogether, because they don’t apply to political theory
  3. Review the literature until you find an obscure, internal debate that could only be relevant to the 7 or 8 other people in the world that share your love of that author
  4. Analyze texts until,
  5. a thesis appears, then
  6. scan the text for better evidence. Or better, scan the secondary literature for citations from your beloved that can be used. Fill your footnotes with this “evidence.” It’s even better if this evidence comes from obscure letters and notes that your beloved author never intended to see the light of day. This gives you “exclusive” knowledge.
  7. Cut and paste paragraphs and string them together to make a story.
  8. Write introductory paragraph, claiming you’ve discovered a new kernel of your beloved author’s thought that renders all previous readings irrelevant.
  9. Submit for publication. Hope that the 7 or 8 other people identified in #3. have time to review paper. If the beloved is somewhat obscure, those 7 or 8 people will be inclined to review the paper positively, “to get the word out.”
  10. Return to #3.