POL 257: Introduction to Comparative Politics 1A

Key Terms - Politics: The struggle for any group for power that will give one or more persons the ability To make decisions for the larger group - Power: The ability to influence others or impose ones will upon them - Comparative Politics: A subfield of political science that compares the pursuit of power Across countries - Comparing countries against each other can show stark differences and curious similarities - Inductive reasoning: The means by which we go from studying a case to generating a Hypothesis - Deductive reasoning: Starting with a question and from there generating some Hypothesis about cause and effect to test against several cases. - Correlation: An apparent association between factors and variables - Causal relation: Direct cause and effect Comparative Politics - The comparative method: Comparing cases and drawing conclusions - By comparing countries scholars seek out conclusions and generalizations that could be Valid in other cases The History of Comparative Politics - Aristotle (384 BC – 322 BC) was one of the first comparative thinkers - He departed from the traditional emphasis on political ideals and conducted comparative Research on existing political systems - He eventually analyzed the constitutions of 158 Greek city-states - By the 20th century political science formally existed, but was much more of political Journalism and did not have a major focus on comparativism. - This changed after the World Wars, as there began an intentional switch to studying Human behavior in universities - In the mid 20th century political science focus was on capitalism and democracy as ideals - Modernization Theory: The belief that once countries modernized, they would become Capitalist democracies - In the 1960s and 1970s political science switched from the study of political institutions to The study of individual political behavior in an objective, quantified way - This was called the Behavioral Revolution Niccolò Machiavelli (1469-1527) - Not until Machiavelli did a comparative approach to politics truly emerge - He analyzed the political systems that existed around him, as well as those that preceded Him - He used comparative politics as a way for statesmen to avoid the mistakes of others - For his work, Machiavelli is often considered to be the first modern political scientist Other Notable Comparative Thinkers - Thomas Hobbes - John Locke - Jean-Jacques Rousseau - Baron de Montesquieu - Karl Marx - Max Weber