Wednesday, February 16, 2005
A revolution in political science
The Perestroika movement. An interesting read, and essential for poli-sci people that don't already know about it.
What strikes from that article me is the comparison made to the discipline of economics, where mathematics and rational choice theory have already won. If political science goes that route, where do the qualitative researchers go? I guess they go where the qualitative economists have gone: they'll become historians, because history is not bound by straightjackets of methodology. You can almost write whatever you want, as long as it works. And while gaining more minds is good for history (and future historians like me), it's certainly bad for the disciplines that are locking themselves into one mindset and losing intelligent people. Haven't people learned by now that pluralism is always good?
What strikes from that article me is the comparison made to the discipline of economics, where mathematics and rational choice theory have already won. If political science goes that route, where do the qualitative researchers go? I guess they go where the qualitative economists have gone: they'll become historians, because history is not bound by straightjackets of methodology. You can almost write whatever you want, as long as it works. And while gaining more minds is good for history (and future historians like me), it's certainly bad for the disciplines that are locking themselves into one mindset and losing intelligent people. Haven't people learned by now that pluralism is always good?
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