THE PROMISE AND PITFALLS OF THE COMPARATIVE METHOD

THE PROMISE AND PITFALLS OF THE COMPARATIVE METHOD

At its heart, the study of comparative politics is two-fold: first, to understand how

the varieties of governing models around the world; and second, to use comparisons

to build theories and draw lessons about the advantages and weaknesses of different

political systems. The promise of these goals is not only to better understand how

other countries’ politics works, but to be better critical thinkers about our own

government. The approach taken in this book is to use the comparative method to

better understand the variety as well as the striking consistencies of governing

systems around the world, focusing especially on the experiences from the Global

types” of a particular phenomenon, such as statehood, democracy, or authoritarianism

(Weber, 2011). These models are overwhelmingly from the Global North. As noted in

the preface, while this book doesn’t wish to detract from the lessons that can be drawn

from these states, it also wishes to decenter the discipline of comparative politics from

the Global North, and challenge some of the Eurocentrism that has plagued not only

comparative politics but political science as a whole. The reasons for this go beyond

mere inclusiveness. The goal of comparative politics at its most basic level is to give

students an understanding of how other countries govern themselves, as well as the

historical and cultural logic for those choices. This goal is undermined if the

comparisons are consistently between societies with which students are least vaguely

(see Chapter 4: States and Regimes for more on what we mean when we say “state”)

based on these typologies. There is value to this approach as it is the first step in

making a comparison; we can say that states that are all grouped as the same type

have some basic characteristics in common, while those that aren’t in the same group

must be different in important ways. Most comparativists start with grouping states by

regime type, such as monarchies, dictatorships, and democracies.

Today, we use the term Global South and Global North as a somewhat simplistic

but useful depiction of countries divided by socio-economic and political attributes.

While there is a striking geographical divide between these two categories, it is

important to note that the terms North and South are meant to depict much more than

knowing their limitations), and the “First,” “Second,” and “Third” World. These terms

came under criticism as being rooted in a self-serving narrative of Western superiority

during the Cold War. Global South countries have rarely if ever referred to themselves

as “Third” World, preferring terms like “non-aligned” to refer to their attempt at

neutrality during the Cold War, and efforts to build solidarity among themselves as

“South-South” cooperation (Gray & Gills, 2016). Therefore, if the goal of this text is to

decenter comparative politics away from treating the “First” World as a model for

understanding the “Third World,” we might begin by using terminology that is more

preferred by those we are trying to understand.

affluent, former Soviet states (those that were referred to as “Second World”) are in

• Why are there such stark differences politically, socially, and economically between

the Global North and the Global South?

• Finally, are there differences in how these broad regions are changing, transitioning,

and adapting to the new realities of a globalized world?

These questions posed above are inherently comparative. Comparative politics

is both a subfield in political science as well as a method of studying politics, which

sets it apart from many of the other subfields. There are two main methodological

approaches in comparative politics: the single case study and the comparative case

study. A “case” is an observation or an example of a more general phenomenon you

wish to understand. For example, you may wish to study Saudi Arabia as a case of

modern monarchies. In comparative politics, the case that is most often used is that

of a state (or country) but could be “any spatially bounded phenomenon…observed at

a single point in time or over some delimited period of time” (Gerring, 2004, p. 342).

As we saw above, this can include macro-regions such as the Global South and the

contextualizes cultures and actors, so they are more accessible to outsiders. While

many question the value of a single case study, since it is difficult (although not

impossible, as we shall see below) to build a general explanation that could be applied

to other cases based solely on one example, it can be important to new students of

comparative politics as it gives students access to a foreign governing system in an

approachable but contextualized fashion. One could even argue that despite deep

an authentic picture of how another country has designed its government, both

deliberately and sub-consciously, focusing on one important aspect of that government

such as its party system or rates of youth participation, a single case study is well

positioned to achieve this goal.

The comparative part of comparative politics is necessary but also a secondary

goal especially for students who are new to the discipline. While a single case study

may not appear to be comparative at first glance, one can argue that there is a

comparative element because you are comparing one case to a larger population of

cases. Therefore, several case studies that appear in this text are single cases, using

one of the logics of case selection discussed below.

There are some important strategies for choosing a single case that isn’t simply

random and can add to our knowledge of political science. The main types of single

comparative politics texts treat the United States as a representative case of

democracy, and in fact, American political science has often treated American

democracy as the working definition of democracy. This text approaches this issue

with the view that democracy in the United States is unique, and therefore worthy of

study, but not necessarily as a representative case or a working definition. Following

a similar critique by Paul Musgrave (2021) who said, “[w]hen the implicit definition of

democracy is democracy with American characteristics,14 the exceptions don’t even

register as exceptions….” This text responds to that critique by looking at the United

States as a crucial case of democratic backsliding. (See below on crucial cases; see

Student Feature: United States of America, page 318 for this case study). An example

308). While it may be tempting to use your own country of origin as a representative

together, a collection of representative case studies can help us understand the larger

phenomenon in question (such as democracy), and may also alert us to the fact that

what we might have thought of as representative may not be when compared to others.

a precursor to a future representative study. This can be problematic because it

involves a prediction that a trend will become more typical, which may not materialize.

Again, the United States is frequently used as a prototypical case study of democracy

before democracy spread in popularity, citing Alexis de Tocqueville’s Democracy in

America (Tocqueville, 1835). Democracy in America has a lot to offer students of

comparative politics as an early and groundbreaking use of thick description of the

Exemplary cases are those that are considered to have generated the

phenomenon in question. This type is once again susceptible to cultural bias as it is

easy to assume that a country we are familiar with must be exemplary, which blinds

us to earlier or culturally unfamiliar cases. Traditionalists will often point to the US as

an exemplary case of the presidential system, as well as the UK as exemplary of the

parliamentary system. While there are good arguments for these choices, it has the

potential to assume that these systems should be or have been mimicked by other

states that fall into the broad category of “presidential” or “parliamentary” system. This

system respectively, when in fact, there are distinctive features to both that have not

been adopted by many other presidential and parliamentary systems (such as the

Electoral College in the US and the first-past-the-post electoral system in the UK).

democracy and economic development, a link first postulated by Lipset (1959),

studying the case of India can shed light on why this link exists in most cases but not

in India (Lijphart, 1996). Similarly, one might question why some rich countries

(especially oil-exporting countries) are not democracies, such as Singapore and the

United Arab Emirates (Roylance, 2015). In this volume, Ethiopia is treated as a deviant

case of an African state that didn’t experience prolonged colonization, and yet still

experiences many of the effects of colonization. Deviant cases not only add to our

knowledge of the so-called “rule” but also about the distinctiveness of the case itself.

Yet, caution is warranted when choosing to study a deviant case. First, we

shouldn’t stretch our conclusions too far when studying a deviant case because we

favorable circumstances. In short, if it is true in the critical case, then it is likely true in

(most) other cases. An example of a critical case that doesn’t focus on the state as the

unit of analysis would be Whyte’s 1943 study of Italian street gangs in a Boston slum,

which he described as having a high degree of social organization, despite desperate

poverty and lack of basic services such as education and work (Whyte, 2012). This

Crucial case studies are difficult to identify, but if done well, can yield a high

others. Of course, one study cannot confirm or disprove a theory entirely, and any

good crucial case study should be followed by other studies of other “unlikely” cases.

Therefore, like deviant cases, crucial cases should not be stretched too far in their

Comparative Case Studies

Indeed, utilizing single case studies exclusively is a bit like buying a car while only

considering one make and model. Adding the comparison ingredient to the recipe of

political science is important since it is better equipped to produce more reliable and

generalizable knowledge. Therefore, comparisons attempt to satisfy the scientific

method requirement of political science.

First, because the comparative method is meant to follow, at least to some degree, the

scientific method, comparative research is by definition empirical. Empirical simply

and of itself, but what it does mean is that a comparative case study alone is not

normative. Normative means making value judgements, such as asking whether

democracy is the best form of government. This book believes that one of the

important goals of studying comparative politics is to develop well-informed opinions

concerning effective governing strategies, but the comparative method alone cannot

do this. Second, despite being a heavily empirical method, it often suffers from a lack

of evidence. The contributions in this book were encouraged to make use of the vast

number of databases available on the web (also listed in Appendix 1: Weblinks and

Databases), but these databases are far from perfect. First, many countries, such as

Cuba, Venezuela, and North Korea, are notoriously difficult to obtain data from. Data

measured. Most of the databases are indexes, which take a number of measurements

For example, the Fragile State Index, which we will explore in more detail in the

section State Capacity, page 164, attempts to create a measurement of the stability of

countries using five indicators, each of which includes several variables.16 Similarly,

the Human Development Index provides an alternative measure of development that

focuses on health, education and standard of living rather than economic growth

measured by Gross Domestic Product. While assigning one number on a scale to

measure state stability or human development can be incredibly illuminating,

researchers from the postpositivist tradition may rightly critique this emphasis on

of the problems associated with state fragility and development. Postpositivism refers

to a philosophy of science that believes that a researcher cannot be an independent

observer of the world and are thus often skeptical of databases and their attempt to

objectively quantify the social world.

difficulty in the social sciences but not necessarily a weakness. In fact, plenty of other

natural sciences also face this problem such as geology, which cannot do experiments

on mountain ranges or isolate a volcano to make causal predictions. And yet, the fields

of geology and comparative politics have been able to make important contributions

by finding patterns and trends.

Finally, the comparative method brings up important ethical considerations in

the way that knowledge is produced. A positivist would suggest that as long as the

scientific method is followed, researchers can make observations of the world with

postcolonial perspective, which we will discuss in more detail in subsequent chapters,

critique the idea that knowledge is somehow neutral. They believe that there is an

intersection of knowledge and power such that those with power get to define what

ethical, for researchers to conduct studies on cultures and societies as an outsider.

Indeed, as many postcolonial scholars suggest, “scientific research” was one of many

tools used by colonial empires to justify their subjugation of native peoples and

overseas territory. (See for example Chandra, 2013). On the other hand, as has been

suggested previously, it begs the question of whether an insider can produce reliable

knowledge about their own society in which they have been embedded and socialized.

Standpoint theorists take the position that the unprivileged are able to generate

more wholistic knowledge about the social world than those in a position of power

(Harding, 1998; Rolin, 2009). The corollary to this is that those in a position of privilege

will produce partial knowledge—knowledge that is likely to justify or maintain their

position of power, even if unintentionally. For students of comparative politics in the

Global North, particularly those in the US, there is no easy solution to this dilemma.

Perhaps the best way forward is just to recognize that no society or country can or

should be treated as an ideal for comparison’s sake. Luckily, we have some checks

against this temptation if utilized properly.

History of the Comparative Method

Comparative politics usually traces its methodology back to Aristotle, although

it is likely he wasn’t the first to attempt a scientific study of political organizations based

on developing classification systems. Aristotle used a simple typology based two

simple questions: who rules and for whom do they rule? Interestingly, Aristotle defined

Aristotle’s definition of a polity?

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