Nothing Succeeds like Success: The Past and Future of European Political Science

Abstract

Nine years ago, I organized a workshop called “Why is European political science so unproductive and what should be done about it” (Schneider 2007). One colleague was, to say the least, a bit outraged and remarked: “This is the most arrogant title of the entire conference,” which happened to be a convention of the European Consortium for Political Research (ECPR) in Budapest. I would like to admit two things almost a decade later. First, the title I chose for this academic event was indeed slightly preposterous, but I exaggerated my assessment to make the point that European political science, especially its continental variant, is awfully conservative and not sufficiently internationalized. Second, and more importantly, there is growing evidence that I was at least partly wrong. European political science was already then catching up and is now in many subfields on a par with North America. You might object that my current evaluation is overly rosy. Indeed, a president of an academic organization risks becoming very unpopular among its members if he or she tells them how badly they are all doing. Such a dark message is obviously not what I intend to communicate in this wonderful city with its distinguished tradition in science and philosophy. I will, on the contrary, present some evidence that justifies my new optimism. My address will advance in four steps. First, I will introduce some reasons why political science after World War II originated as an “American social science,” as Hoffmann (1977) controversially argued for international relations, one of our sub-disciplines. My discussion of our joint past will identify three root causes of the malaise that destroyed the nascent modern field before World War II and that has held European political science back for a long time after 1945: fascism, underfunding and disrespect for academic standards. I will present in a second step some evidence from the Social Science Citation Index that European political scientists have become increasingly productive and effective. As I will demonstrate, some countries have overtaken the United States and Canada on a per capita basis in research efficiency. Third, I will show that not only the financial resources devoted to higher education matter. The macro-quantitative evidence I have assembled demonstrates that the organization of the educational system is equally important for the achievements of European political science. I will conclude that an increasing orientation toward competiveness and the growing Europeanization of the job market bode well for our future. In other words, I am confident that European political science will continue to be a success. Merton’s (1968) “Matthew Effect,” according to which nothing succeeds like success in