Comparative Politics

1. Comparative Politics An Introduction

2. Goals of the Introductory Section • Goal 1: After completing this introductory section, you should have gained an understanding of the history of comparative politics and its relationship to other fields of study in Political Science, especially International Relations. • Goal 2: You should be able to appreciate what makes comparative politics a necessary branch of political science for better understanding the complexity of the world around us. • Goal 3: You should be able to identify the main methodological approaches that comparative political scientists use in their work, as well as understand the strengths and weaknesses of each.

3. Today’s topics • “A Description of Egypt” • Political Science and comparative politics • Defining Comparative Politics (CP) • Types of Study • Why study CP?

4. “A Description of Egypt” • Following the invasion of Egypt (1796), Napoleon attempted to apply the new scientific rational principles of the French Enlightenment and set his expeditionary force to collecting information about this fabled land. As an anecdote, we must remember that the revolution was in full swing in France, and Napoleon had every incentive not to go back to Paris too quickly! • Involved 30,000 men, thousands of copper plate engravings • Baron Dominique Vivant-Denon (1747–1825), who was the official expedition archeologist, published in 1802 the work Voyage dans la Basse et la Haute Egypte pendant les campagnes du general Bonaparte (you can find more information about it at: (http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/empr/hd_empr.htm). The book was so large that a special teak table had to be constructed to hold it. • Today, the information collected is of use to all sorts of social and natural scientific disciplines; for example, we have a good baseline to measure information about climate change, species disappearance, etc. • Yet despite it usefulness as a source of information today, there is no real knowledge at all in the book! There is not one word of science; no theories, no hypotheses, no inferences, it is pure description. • Our goal, in comparative political science, is to produce knowledge of the political world around us. Facts alone are not enough; we use the principles of the scientific method (which we will look at later in this first unit) to turn facts into knowledge. • Thus the experience of this famous work is a lesson to us: we never stop at mere description, but we always aim to understand the underlying causes and consequences of patterns of politics around the world.

5. Comparative Politics: A sub-field • Political science as a discipline amy be defined as the “systematic study of power” (The study of power in comparative politics will be the first topic in Unit Two of the course). • The American Political Science Association, the largest professional organization of political scientists with over 15,000 members worldwide, (www.apsanet.org) divides the discipline into several sub-disciplines; Political Theory, Comparative Politics, American Politics, International Relations, Public Policy, Public Administration, Public Law, Methodology • Comparative politics claims to be the oldest sub-field in the empirical study of politics (meaning the observation of what actually exists, as opposed to the normative approach which is the study of what we would prefer to exist. We will come back to this point later in the unit). • The first comparative political scientist is often claimed to be Aristotle, the great Greek political observer; Aristotle was in part a philosopher, but he also set out to collect all the existing constitutions of the Greek city-states and analyze them. Of the 159 that he collected and analyzed, the only one that we have today is his analysis of the Athenian constitution.

6. Defining Comparative Politics • The classic definition of comparative politics is, “The analytical study of world’s political systems”. However, you may notice that this seems to reduce the emphasis on what Sodaro in Chapter One calls “non-state actors” (page 5). • Therefore, we can usefully adjust the defintion to become that which Sodaro gives on page 6. You should think about this defintion and keep it close to the surface of your mind as we go through the course. At the end, you might reflect whether it really is the best defintion that we can come up with. • The mission of comparative politics – thus our mission in this course - is primarily to compare and contrast the processes and institutions of government (in Europe, this concept is often called governance), and the relationships between government and the governed. We often use the term civil society to denote the latter. • As social scientitsts, we aim to identity and explain similarities, but also to identify and explain differences.

7. Comparative Politics and International Politics (Pages 9-10) • Comparative Politics examines political dynamics within nations, i.e. “domestic” politics • International Politics seeks to explain political dynamics between nations, i.e. “foreign policy” • However, the line between the two is increasingly blurred, primarily as a consequence of interdependence and globalization

8. Interdependence • Interdependence is the notion that the domestic politics of one country cannot exist in isolation of others. • The corollary is that we cannot understand politics in any one nation without taking into account external, or international, forces. • Globalization is a special case of interdependence, referring to the transformation of the world economy since the 1970’s (page 10)

9. The Environment • The range of problems facing countries in the world has become global in nature • Most obviously, “global warming”. • Any concerted action, by definition, requires the mutual agreement of all countries • However, domestic politics may affect the capacity of any government to enter into such agreements • The most obvious example is the Kyoto Treaty • This is a very good example of how the line between comparative politics and international politics has become blurred

10. Human Migration • In the last two decades, human migration has become one of the most profound political issues facing the world’s nations. • Migration encompasses refugees (both political and economic), economic migration, and human trafficking. • Migration has differential consequences (i.e. it affects rich countries differently to poorer ones) • For some poor countries, migration is essential; yet rich countries see migration as a potential threat • Again, we see an overlap between the concerns of comparative political scientists and those who study international politics

11. The role of comparative politics • We ask tough questions; why are some countries richer than others? Is there such a thing as a global “poverty trap”? • Which is more important; democracy or stability? What are the consequences of democracy? • Can democracy survive without economic growth? What is the relationship between the two? • What are the different ways of organizing democracies? Are some forms of institutions better than others? • Are rich democracies in some sort of crisis (crisis of participation, crisis of representation)

12. Types of Study Used in Comparative Politics • Case studies: By this, we mean the study of just one country, or one case. The advantages of case studies are that they allow us to really investigate one country in very great depth, and achieve a really complex understanding of politics there. However, the disadvantage is that there is nothing explicitly comparative about a case study; what are we comparing the country to? Good case studies are often implicitly comparative, and are very useful in providing information. However, it is difficult to do good social science when there is only one case. • Small-N studies By this, we mean comparing a small number of countries that are quite similar. Just like case studies, we can do quite detailed studies, yet now we have something to compare against explicitly. However, one disadvantage of small-n studies may be the greater time and effort to conduct them well, not to mention the potential language difficulties. • Regional, or area, studies Rather than investing the time needed to do small-n research, another approach would be to take a region that has some similar cultural, historical, or linguistic characteristics, e.g. Latin America, Europe, Africa, etc. The advantages are that we are then working with a larger number of countries to compare, but we minimize the linguistic difficulties. However, many social scientists criticize area studies because they produce information that is very hard to compare across regions. • Cross-regional studies Here, we do what the name implies, compare across the kind of regions mentioned above. However, this is very hard to do, and it often runs the risk of looking quite ethnocentric, • Cross national (large-N) studies When we do cross-national studies, we try to incorporate as many countries (cases) as possible in our analyses. The treatment of the information is often highly statistical, i.e. we are looking for systematic patterns in the data. The cross-national method is very powerful as a scientific tool, although many critics charge that it reduces everything to numbers, which may be (a) unreliable and (b) hard to obtain. Furthermore, many who do area studies complain that statistical studies often lack any sort of appreciation or understanding of the results that they produce. • Thematic studies Here, we choose countries to study not on any of the criteria mentioned above, but according to a particular theme; so for example, we might decide to study military coups by selecting all countries that have experienced military coups, or we might study the effects of voter registration systems by selecting all countries that use this kind of approach (actually, quite few, it turns out). Critics of thematic studies argue that, in just selecting cases when something has taken place or a phenomenon is present, we neglect an understanding of why things do NOT take place, which may be just as important. • Nonetheless, all of these approaches have some usefulness, and we will encounter all of them throughout the course.

13. Why study comparatively? Some arguments in favor of comparative politics • It avoids ethnocentrism. By studying comparatively, we can better understand and place into context what is most familiar to us. • It places seemingly random or idiosyncratic events into broader perspective. Sometimes political events in the world might seem unpredictable or chaotic; yet comparative politics teaches us that most events have some sort of precursors or equivalents elsewhere. The (political) world may be a bit more predictable than most people think. • It is stimulating for building theory. Theories, as we will discuss, are really useful tools for helping us form ideas about what makes what work, and then going out and testing those ideas. • It is good methodology. It is hard to claim that we have an understanding of the world, or to fully justify our belief systems, if we have not had some rigorous basis of comparison. • As a practical matter, it helps develop good foreign policy. It is tempting to think that the United States as a superpower can essentially do what it wants in the world. But often actions based on even our best intentions have unintended consequences, and comparative politics helps us predict what the consequences of particular actions might be. • Its fun…! Learning more about the world and, eventually, doing research in other countries is just fun. Through my 20-year career, I have traveled to many different countries, worked with colleagues at universities all over the world, made life-long friends, and eaten much good food! Along the way, I have learned much about myself and our own society here in the United States through comparison with others.

14. Topics for discussion from chapter one • You should look particularly at the relationship between comparative politics and international politics (international relations). How do the two differ? Are there any points that they have in common? • You should read the discussions of globalization and democratization carefully. What does this tell us about the way in which “real world events” drive what we choose to study? What do you think are the most important things for a comparative political scientist to study today? • Where does terrorism fit in with the study of comparative politics? How could a comparative political scientist help ensure that terrorism does not threaten countries and peoples around the world?