Role Of Political Science Research Articles

Brans, Marleen & Timmermans, Arco (2022) (Eds.). The Advisory Roles of Political Scientists in Europe. Comparing Engagements in Policy Advisory Systems. Palgrave Macmillan. 421 Seiten. ISBN: 978-3-030-86007-3, Open Access.

This edited volume presents the results of a large comparative survey in 39 European countries about the role of political science and political scientists in diverse policy advisory systems. It delivers a fascinating view about the differently institutionalized networks between governmental, societal, and scientific actors of policy advice, documenting amongst other the different scope, content, and channels of advice, and offering, finally, a typology of advisors, distinguishing pure academics, experts, opinionated scholars, and public intellectuals. The book contains very useful introductions to theoretical approaches to policy advice, and the theoretical and empirical essentials of the survey, as well as 12 chapters about different European countries from Albania to the UK, and a final comparative view of different patterns in Europe. This volume, however, does not provide answers to all our theoretical and empirical queries, but it is an immensely valuable and readable contribution to the ongoing debates about the characteristics of policy advice, the professionalization of political science, and its social and political impact, as well as a very good foundation to further research.

Al-Fārābī’s Political Science and Its Contribution to Islamic Humanism as It is Expounded in His Iḥṣā’ al-ᶜUlūm (Enumeration of the Sciences)

Islam is the origin of humanism. God Almighty revealed it to guard and guarantee mankind’s saᶜādah (happiness) in this world and hereafter. The true humanism is for mankind to feel a sincere and veracious comfort that emanates from within him. Muslims recognise the highest levels of humanism, before others, because it is of complete love for people, which is to love khayr (good) for them. Therefore, the role of Muslims is to hold on to Islam and to convey its massage to all mankind. This helps to achieve the happiness and tranquility the world and hereafter need. Among Muslim philosophers, Al-Fārābī has distinguished himself in conveying this message in his classification of sciences, particularly in political science. He asserts that when human actions are examined and their ends, the role of political science is to illustrate that some of these ends are true happiness, while others are presumed to be happiness but, they are not. Although wealth, honour and pleasure are presumed to be happiness in this life, he argues that it is impossible for true happiness to be of this life, it is in fact of another life which is the life of hereafter. Al-Fārābī provides a purely religious perspective of true happiness, which is of hereafter and paradise. This article examines the political science of Al-Fārābī as his contribution to Islamic humanism. It discusses his main ideas of political science, which he calls “virtuous leadership” or “virtuous monarchical profession”, arguing that a leader enacts rules, preserves virtuous cities and nations, and whose end is true happiness, which is attained by good, noble, and virtuous deeds.

“WHY AND HOW CAN POLITICAL SCIENCE CONTRIBUTE TO PUBLIC HEALTH? PROPOSALS FOR DIRECTIONS OF JOINT RESEARCH”

Investigated by a group of political science researchers, this branch focuses on the contribution of political science to public health and proposes lines of research to increase this contribution. Despite progress, links between researchers from these two fields are developing only slowly. Discrepancies between political science's approach to public policy and the expectations that public health may have regarding the role of political science, is often seen as an obstacle to collaboration between experts in the two fields. Given the interdisciplinary and intersectoral nature of public health, it is important to build a critical mass of researchers interested in public health and sound public policy that can flourish at the intersection of political science and public health.

Posture Maketh the Man

In this article from Ever Since Darwin, Stephen Jay Gould describes how the Museum of Natural History's Gobi Desert expeditions of the 1920s failed to achieve their stated purpose: to find the ancestors of man in Central Asia. In a perceptive analysis of the political role of science and of the social biases that affect thought, Gould describes how anthropologists—despite a complete lack of direct evidence—believed that human evolution was propelled by an enlarging brain, and not, as is the case, upright posture.

Teaching Statistics: Going from Scary, Boring, and Useless to, Well, Something Better

ABSTRACTAlthough research methods and statistics play an increasing role in political science and beyond, students all too often find statistics classes intimidating and boring. This need not be the case, however, because statistics classes provide opportunities to pose and answer questions about which students care. This article highlights four steps to making our methods and statistics classes more engaging and meaningful.

Why and How Political Science Can Contribute to Public Health? Proposals for Collaborative Research Avenues.

Written by a group of political science researchers, this commentary focuses on the contributions of political science to public health and proposes research avenues to increase those contributions. Despite progress, the links between researchers from these two fields develop only slowly. Divergences between the approach of political science to public policy and the expectations that public health can have about the role of political science, are often seen as an obstacle to collaboration between experts in these two areas. Thus, promising and practical research avenues are proposed along with strategies to strengthen and develop them. Considering the interdisciplinary and intersectoral nature of population health, it is important to create a critical mass of researchers interested in the health of populations and in healthy public policy that can thrive working at the junction of political science and public health.

A Discussion of Alexander Cooley and Jack Snyder's Ranking the World: Grading States as a Tool for Global Governance

Ranking the World: Grading States as a Tool of Global Governance, edited by Alexander Cooley and Jack Snyder, assembles an impressive group of political scientists to critically discuss “the important analytical, normative, and policy issues associated with the contemporary practice of ‘grading states.’” The volume addresses a topic of importance to a wide range of political scientists in comparative politics, international relations, and political theory, and raises some fundamental questions about the role of political science at the nexus of theory and practice. We have thus invited a number of colleagues to discuss the volume and its broader implications for political science inquiry.

A Discussion of Alexander Cooley and Jack Snyder's Ranking the World: Grading States as a Tool for Global Governance

Ranking the World: Grading States as a Tool of Global Governance, edited by Alexander Cooley and Jack Snyder, assembles an impressive group of political scientists to critically discuss “the important analytical, normative, and policy issues associated with the contemporary practice of ‘grading states.’” The volume addresses a topic of importance to a wide range of political scientists in comparative politics, international relations, and political theory, and raises some fundamental questions about the role of political science at the nexus of theory and practice. We have thus invited a number of colleagues to discuss the volume and its broader implications for political science inquiry.

A Discussion of Alexander Cooley and Jack Snyder's Ranking the World: Grading States as a Tool for Global Governance

Ranking the World: Grading States as a Tool of Global Governance, edited by Alexander Cooley and Jack Snyder, assembles an impressive group of political scientists to critically discuss “the important analytical, normative, and policy issues associated with the contemporary practice of ‘grading states.’” The volume addresses a topic of importance to a wide range of political scientists in comparative politics, international relations, and political theory, and raises some fundamental questions about the role of political science at the nexus of theory and practice. We have thus invited a number of colleagues to discuss the volume and its broader implications for political science inquiry.

A Discussion of Alexander Cooley and Jack Snyder's Ranking the World: Grading States as a Tool for Global Governance

Ranking the World: Grading States as a Tool of Global Governance, edited by Alexander Cooley and Jack Snyder, assembles an impressive group of political scientists to critically discuss “the important analytical, normative, and policy issues associated with the contemporary practice of ‘grading states.’” The volume addresses a topic of importance to a wide range of political scientists in comparative politics, international relations, and political theory, and raises some fundamental questions about the role of political science at the nexus of theory and practice. We have thus invited a number of colleagues to discuss the volume and its broader implications for political science inquiry.

The Role of Political Science in China: Intellectuals and Authoritarian Resilience

The Role of Political Science in China: Intellectuals and Authoritarian Resilience

United in Diversity: Overcoming Parochialism Through Political Science

In its earliest iterations, General Education served not only as an intellectual foundation, but also as a normative, homogenizing tool that instilled the “right values” to form good citizens among elites. It taught students the “adequate philosophy of life” to challenge intellectual relativism. While maintaining its holistic focus on “good citizen” creation, Gen Ed has undergone repeated redefinitions to match changing societal priorities and pedagogic paradigms. This paper analyzes the evolution of thinking about General Education at Harvard University, as it emerges from university documents, reports, books, websites and in-depth interviews with participants in the decision-making process. Political science played a crucial role in the successive recalibrations of the Core/Gen Ed curriculum, as the goal of forming responsible citizens acquired a global, cosmopolitan dimension. The pressures of globalization and an increasingly diverse student body reinforced and multiplied the functions of political science in the Gen Ed program. This essay compares the General Education in a Free Society 1945-1950 Report: The Good Man and the Citizen with the Core Curriculum of the 1980s (Guide to the Core Program and Phyllis Keller’s 1982 Getting at the Core: Curricular reform at Harvard), and the Report of the Task Force on General Education of 2007. It reveals three phases corresponding to three distinct paradigms, each emerging roughly three decades after its predecessor. The first reflects the traditional focus on forming “the good man,” “the good citizen,” and “the useful man” by instilling the “right” set of values. The second produced the Core Curriculum, which distanced itself from fixed knowledge to expose students to different “areas and approaches to knowledge.” The third, contemporary phase emphasizes “overcoming parochialism” as a guiding principle and diversity as a resource. This paradigm wants to unsettle, disorient, and defamiliarize students, so they can reorient themselves. It explicitly connects students’ liberal education to life beyond college. Differences aside, Gen Ed visions share a key dimension: their desire that the student become a zoon politikon, an engaged member of society, equipped with critical spirit, ethical awareness, and the confidence to face the challenges of the “real world.”In this context, the paper discusses the role of political science in the Gen Ed curriculum, pointing out how the discipline has capitalized on the diversity of students and faculty as a resource. The paper starts a conversation about the growing importance of political science in Gen Ed by using the case of the Government Department at Harvard.

Editor's Welcome

Editor's Welcome

Who Discriminates More? Comparing Religious Discrimination in Western Democracies, Asia and the Middle East

Unlike its presence in the world of politics, religion failed to take a prominent role in political science in much of the modern era. Recent research suggests this might be changing. It also suggests that in order to study religion, scholars need more data on the subject. This study introduces a new data collection on religious discrimination at the minority level and uses this new data collection to compare religious discrimination in western democracies, Asia and the Middle East for the time period 1990–2004. In this paper, religious discrimination, ethnicity and religion are first discussed with specific emphasis on Muslim majority states and the Middle East. Second, the process of data collection, including case selection, forming a religious discrimination index, coding and back-up coding issues, is outlined. Finally, results on religious discrimination in different regions and states with different majority religions are presented. The data indicate that western democracies treat their religious minorities much better than Middle Eastern countries or Asian countries. Yet the Middle East, which is considered the most prominent example of a region with religious tension, does not have significantly higher average religious discrimination values than Asia. Similarly, even though states with a Muslim majority seem to be less tolerant compared to states with a Christian majority, in states with other majority religions such as Buddhism or Hinduism, discrimination against ethnoreligious groups is present as well. Moreover, religious discrimination values for the minorities in western democracies increased after September 11.

Risk, Realism and the Politics of Resistance

Social theorizing about risk has produced important implications for both analytic strategy and resistance. The ontology of risk, however, has either been taken for granted or dismissed altogether. We consider what a realist philosophy of risk might look like given the desire to analyze risks as more than discursive constructs yet avoiding the pitfalls of empiricism. We argue that a necessary first step is to treat as ontologically real both the objects and subjects of risk power. While a realist philosophy of risk does not necessarily produce critical praxis, within the context of class struggle it does allow for this possibility by providing the tools necessary for recognizing risk's historical situatedness and the political role of science in resisting risk ideologies.

CHOICE FUNCTIONS AND UPPER CHOICE FUNCTIONS

Choice functions play an important role in political science. We present structure results of choice functions following an algebraic approach. It is logical that rational political actors are not able to perceive every alternative in a set of alternatives X. They may also choose to exclude some alternatives from consideration. Let S be a subset of X that some set of political actors are not able to perceive. Then the complement X\S is the set comprising those alternatives considered in the decision process. If C is a choice function on X, then C(X\S) are the alternatives chosen and X\C(X\S) are those that are not. We are thus led to the concept of an upper choice function. We define upper choice functions in terms of choice functions and we give relationships between them.

Cancer and Global Environmental Politics: Proposing a New Research Agenda

More than six million people die of cancer every year. Over the next two decades, the World Health Organization predicts global cancer rates will rise to 10 million deaths annually. What is the impact of the global political and economic processes of environmental change on cancer rates? Why, given the strong intuitive reasons to worry about the carcinogenic effects of global environmental change, is there so little research on this topic? What is the political role of science, corporations, nongovernmental organizations and international institutions on cancer research and cancer rates? What is the impact of global patterns of trade, financing, production and consumption on research and rates? This article charts the current social science literature on cancer and global environmental change with the hope of encouraging scholars of global environmental politics to pursue a new research agenda around questions like these.

The State of Undergraduate Research Methods Training in Political Science

Debates over methodology have long occupied a prominent role in political science and its various empirical sub-fields. Recently, these debates and occasional dialogues seem to have intensified. The Perestroika movement within APSA protested the perceived hegemony of rational choice and quantitative methods in journal publications and graduate training (Kasza 2001). Renewed attention has focused on the types of methodologies employed by studies published in the discipline's leading journals (Garand and Giles 2003; Bennett, Barth, and Rutherford 2003; Braumoeller 2003). The kinds of concerns over methodological diversity that motivate these studies also inform discussions about graduate training (Alvarez 1992; Dyer 1992; Schwartz-Shea 2003; Morrow 2003; Smith 2003).

The Changes in the Conception of the Relation between Politics and Science: from Weber to Habermas

The article seeks to demonstrate the changes in the conception of relations between science and politics in the 20 th century German tradition of social philosophy. This tradition encompasses Max Weber, Karl Mannheim, Frankfurt School and Jürgen Habermas. The analysis of their works revealed that Weber’s neutral attitude towards the political role of science had experienced couple of transformations. First, Weber’s idea of science as a political instrument was radicalized in Mannheim’s sociology of knowledge. In the latter science as an institution is conceived much more positively because it can replace politics by controllable administration. Second, Frankfurt School denies the mannheimian optimism stressing the negative consequences of that substitution: scientific rationalism invades social and political life at the same time ignoring qualitative aspects that are so important in political field. And, finally, trying to breakthrough the one-sided negativism of elder colleagues in Frankfurt School, Habermas restores weberian attitude towards instrumental character of science. In order to elude the dominance of science two steps are of crucial importance: repoliticization of public sphere and removing restrictions on communication.

The Place of Political Science in Canadian Universities

AbstractThis article addresses the proper role of political science in Canadian universities. The thesis is twofold: first, the main tasks of political scientists are first-rate teaching and reflective inquiry about citizenship: second, in the past few years we have been moving away from this understanding, and remedial action is required. Our delinquency stems mainly from our obsession with “frontier research,” the main result of which is the widespread decline of attentive teaching, which we rationalize with a number of implausible myths. We are primarily responsible for the current state of political science, and only we can remedy it.