Political Science in History: Research Programs and Political Traditions

Cambridge University Press, 5/26/1995
EAN 9780521474221, ISBN10: 0521474221

Hardcover, 378 pages, 22.8 x 15.2 x 3.1 cm
Language: English

The guiding theme of this volume is that contemporary political science owes much of its present character to its past. In twelve essays, the contributors - all practising political scientists - explore the emergence and transformation of political traditions and research programmes that have helped make political science what it is today. Included are histories of political themes and ideals (democracy, race, political education), conceptual and philosophical frameworks (the state and pluralism, behaviouralism, policy analysis, public opinion, biology and politics), and theoretical projects and programmes (realism in international relations, spatial theory of elections, rational choice and historical approaches to institutional analysis). Each essay provides special insight and a distinct approach to particular episodes, moments, trends, and aspects of the history of academic political science; the volume as a whole provides a general overview of the history of the discipline and the variety of ways disciplinary history can illuminate the present.

Editor's introduction
1. The declination of the state and the origins of American pluralism John G. Gunnell
2. An ambivalent alliance
political science and American democracy Terence Ball
3. The pedagogical purposes of a political science Stephen T. Leonard
4. Public opinion in modern political science J. A. W. Gunn
5. Disciplining Darwin
biology in the history of political science John S. Dryzek and David Schlosberg
6. Race and political science
the dual traditions of race relations politics and African-American politics Hanes Walton, Jr., Cheryl M. Miller, and Joseph P. McCormick, II
7. Realism in international relations Jack Donnelly
8. Remembering the revolution
behavioralism in American political science James Farr
9. Policy analysis and public life
the restoration of phronesis? Douglas Torgerson
10. The development of the spatial theory of elections John Ferejohn
11. Studying institutions
some lessons from the rational choice approach Kenneth A. Shepsle
12. Order and time in institutional study
a brief for the historical approach Karen Orren and Stephen Skowronek
Bibliography.

"...this book should be read by anyone interested in the history--present and future--of the social sciences generally. It exemplifies new maturity and sophistication in the telling and mining of the discipline's own checkered history. Furthering the promise of a reasoned discourse about the social sciences in America, it reflects the many dilemmas inherent in contemporary social and political inquiry." Journal of Interdisciplinary History