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Unit 2: Comparative Method and Politics

Self-Assessment Notes
1. Fill in the blanks:
(i) Comparativists usually compare and contrast different component parts of countries
............... .
(ii) Switzerland is known as the ancestral home of ............... .
(iii) Bryce, Laski, Finer, Barker, etc. belong to the tradition called ............... .
(iv) Acheson era is considered in the period ............... .
(v) Dulles era is from ............... .

2.4 Summary
• The main advantage of comparative method is that it makes the study of politics more
structured and conclusions derived with this method are more precise. For example, we
shall compare electoral systems in the UK and Germany. In Britain the electoral system is
referred as single member plurality system.
• One of the strongest advantages of single member plurality system is that it produces clear-
cut electoral decisions with single-party governments able to exercise leadership. But the
disadvantage of this system is when the party achieves the second place in the majority of
seats, it will suffer from under-representation in the parliament, which means that many
votes are just wasted. This leads for more citizens to act in informal and unorthodox forms
of political participation.
• Comparative method is definitely the best choice to study and analyze contemporary politics,
but we should be aware of the difficulties associated with this method.
• In the literature of comparative politics, a widem variety of meanings is attached to the terms
“comparison” and “comparative method.” The comparative method is defined here as one of
the basic methods—the others being the experimental, statistical, and case study methods—
of establishing general empirical propositions.
• Comparative method simplifies a complex political reality and makes it more manageable.
Comparative politics brings us into contact with political worlds other than our own and
expands our political and cultural horizons.
• The experimental method, in its simplest form, uses two equivalent groups, one of which
(the experimental group) is exposed to a stimulus while the other (the control group) is not.
The two groups are then compared, and any difference can be attributed to the stimulus.
• The logic of the comparative method is, in accordance with the general standard expounded
by Nagel, also the same as the logic of the experimental method. The comparative method
resembles the statistical method in all respects except one. The crucial difference is that the
number of cases it deals with is too small to permit systematic control by means of partial
correlations.
• A clear awareness of the limitations of the comparative method is necessary but need not be
disabling, because, as we shall see, these weaknesses can be minimized. The “conscious
thinker” in comparative politics should realize the limitations of the comparative method,
but he should also recognize and take advantage of its possibilities.
• Comparative politics could thus discover “a world in which times and tongues and nations
which before seemed parted poles asunder, now find each one its own place, its own relation
to every other.”
• Whereas the first two ways of strengthening the comparative method were mainly concerned
with the problem of “small N,” this third approach focuses on the problem of “many
variables.” The focus on comparable cases differs from the first recommendation not only in
its preoccupation with the problem of “many variables” rather than with “small N,”.

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