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You find the content and required readings for each session below. Book chapters of the core readings will be provided by the course faculty on CANVAS; it will be the students' responsibility to obtain the journal articles if these are not uploaded on CANVAS.
All core texts should be read prior to the start of the course. For most sessions you have at least one text which is a more general description of the theory or method and at least one text which is an application.
Day 1 - Conceptual analysis and case studies
Conceptual analysis (Manuele Citi)
In this session we will introduce concepts as essential tools for theoretical and empirical analysis. We will focus on issues of conceptualization, such as conceptual stretching, the link between conceptual intension and extension, the relationship between conceptual definition and empirical measurement, and the levels and rules of aggregation for multi-dimensional concepts.
Readings
Goertz, G. (2006) Concept Intension and Extension, in Goertz, G., Social Science Concepts: A User’s Guide, Princeton: Princeton University Press, Ch.2 (pp. 69-94).
Munck, G. L. and Verkuilen, J. (2002) Conceptualizing and measuring democracy: Evaluating alternative indices, Comparative Political Studies 35(1): 5-34.
Supplementary Readings
Adcock, Robert, and David Collier. 2001. “Measurement Validity: A Shared Standard for Qualitative and Quantitative Research.” American Political Sciences Review 95(3): 529–546.
Coppedge, Michael et al. 2011. “Conceptualizing and Measuring Democracy: A New Approach.” Perspectives on Politics 9(02): 247–67.
Case-selection and analysis (Emanuele Ferragina)
Case studies are key for theory development and refinement in the social science. This session will teach you advanced approaches to strategically select cases with variation on relevant dimensions and the different steps to design and execute case studies.
Readings
Case Selection
Methodological Articles
Seawright, J., & Gerring, J. (2008). Case Selection Techniques in Case Study Research: A Menu of Qualitative and Quantitative Options. Political Research Quarterly, 61(2): 294-308.
Applied Examples
Ferragina, E. (2013). The socio-economic determinants of social capital and the mediating effect of history: Making Democracy Work revisited. International Journal of Comparative Sociology, 54(1), 48-73
Ferragina, E., Arrigoni, A., & Spreckelsen, T. F. (2020). The rising invisible majority: bringing society back into international political economy. Review of International Political Economy, 1-38.
Moore, Barrington Jr. (1966) Social Origins of Dictatorship and Democracy. Lord and Peasant in the Making of the Modern World, London: Allen Lane the Penguin Press (Preface).
Supplementary Readings
Eckstein, H. (1975). Case studies and theory in political science. In Handbook of political science. Vol. 7 of Political science: Scope and theory, ed. Fred I. Greenstein and Nelson W. Polsby, 79-138. Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley.
Ferragina, E., & Seeleib-Kaiser, M. (2011). Thematic Review: Welfare regime debate: past, present, futures?. Policy & Politics, 39(4), 583-611.
George, A. L., & Bennett, A. (2005). Case studies and theory development in the social sciences. Mit Press. Chapter: 3-6
Gerring, J. (2004). What is a case study and what is it good for?. American political science review, 98 (2) 341-354.
Gerring, J. (2007). Is there a (viable) Crucial-Case Method?. Comparative political studies, 40(3), 231-253.
Lijphart, A. (1971). Comparative politics and the comparative method. American Political Science Review, 65(3), 682-693 (Especially pages 691-693 on the use of case studies)
Skocpol, T. (1992) Protecting Soldiers and Mothers. The Political Origins of Social Policy in the United States, Cambridge: Harvard University Press (Introduction).
Day 2 - Small-N designs (I)
Comparative qualitative analysis (Jasper Hotho, Copenhagen Business School)
This session provides an introduction to the value and logic of comparative research designs in the social sciences. Key issues that will be discussed are the different rationales for adopting comparative research designs, the design choices this involves, and the challenges and pitfalls involved in doing comparative research and getting it published. With the help of two exercises, this session aims to equip PhD students with the ability to evaluate the quality and appropriateness of comparative research designs, the ability to articulate both the merits and limitations of such research designs, and the ability to offer constructive suggestions for improvement.
Readings
Ragin, C.C. (1987) Case-oriented comparative methods. In: C.C. Ragin, The Comparative Method: Moving Beyond Qualitative and Quantitative Strategies. University of California Press, Berkeley, CA (pp. 34-52).
Locke, R. M., & Thelen, K. (1995). Apples and oranges revisited: Contextualized comparisons and the study of comparative labor politics. Politics & Society, 23(3), 337-367. [Please read pp. 337-344; rest optional]
Battilana, J., & Dorado, S. (2010). Building sustainable hybrid organizations: The case of commercial microfinance organizations. Academy of Management Journal, 53(6), 1419-1440.
Process tracing (Rasmus Brun, Aarhus University)
Process-tracing in social science is a method for studying causal mechanisms linking causes with outcomes. This enables the researcher to make strong inferences about how a cause (or set of causes) contributes to producing an outcome. Derek Beach introduces a refined definition of process-tracing, differentiating it into three distinct variants and explaining the applications and limitations of each.
Readings
Beach (2017) ‘Process-tracing methods.’ Oxford Research Encyclopedia. http://politics.oxfordre.com/view/10.1093/acrefore/9780190228637.001.0001/acrefore-9780190228637-e-176
O'Mahoney, J. (2017). Making the Real: Rhetorical Adduction and the Bangladesh Liberation War. International Organization, 71(2), 317-348. doi:10.1017/S0020818317000054
Supplementary Readings
Beach and Pedersen (2016) Causal Case Study Methods. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. (Especially chapters 2 – 5, 9)
Day 3 – Small-N designs (II), Large-N designs (Surveys, experiments and and survey experiments)
Elite interviews and content analysis for small-n analyses (Caroline de la Porte)
Elite interviews are often central sources of data for small-n analyses (case studies and comparative analyses). This session addresses various issues with elite interviews, from practical tricks of interviewing, to ethical dilemmas, as well as how to use elite interviews in your research and how to code them.
Readings
Symposium consisting of seven short articles in Political Science and Politics on Interview techniques in social sciences, 35(4): 2002. Access the articles here: https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/ps-political-science-and-politics/issue/E30FCCB00ED41AA25653C84094851A72
The logic and design of surveys (Rasmus Tue Pedersen)
In this session, we will briefly discuss the use of surveys in social science research, and the remainder of the section will primarily focus on possible ways of handling potential challenges when doing survey research. We will discuss challenges related to, e.g., low response rates, respondent satisficing and social desirability, question wording effects, context effects and non-attitudes. We will also address some of the practicalities of survey research.
Readings
Krosnick, Jon A. (1999). Survey Research, Annual Review of Psychology. 50: 537-67 (31 pages).
Kennedy, C. et al. (2018). An Evaluation of the 2016 Election Polls in the United States. Public Opinion Quarterly. 82(1): 1-33 (33 pages)
Supplementary readings
Tourangeau, R., Rips, L. J., & Rasinski, K. (2000). The psychology of survey response. Cambridge University Press.
Groves, R. M., Fowler Jr, F. J., Couper, M. P., Lepkowski, J. M., Singer, E., & Tourangeau, R. (2011). Survey methodology (Vol. 561). John Wiley & Sons.
Dillman, D. A. (2011). Mail and Internet surveys: The tailored design method. John Wiley & Sons.
Stern, M. J., Bilgen, I., & Dillman, D. A. (2014). The state of survey methodology: Challenges, dilemmas, and new frontiers in the era of the tailored design. Field Methods, 26(3), 284-301.
Experiments and survey experiments (Rasmus Tue Pedersen)
Experiments are key tools in the methodological toolbox for anyone interested in causal inference, and the use of experiments in social science has increased dramatically. This session cover the logic of randomized experiments, different types of experiments (lab, field, and survey) and the key considerations when designing, analyzing and interpreting experiments. As a part of this, we will also discuss ethical considerations for researchers using experimental methods.
Readings
Druckman, J. et al. (2011). Cambridge handbook of experimental political science. Cambridge, New York: Cambridge University Press. Chapters 2 and 3 (26 pages)
Mutz, Diana C. (2011). Population-Based Survey Experiments. Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press. Chapter 1 (23 pages)
Bertrand, M., & Mullainathan, S. (2004). Are Emily and Greg more employable than Lakisha and Jamal? A field experiment on labor market discrimination. American economic review, 94(4), 991-1013. (23 pages)
Pedersen, RT, JO Dahlgaard & M Citi (2019). Voter Reactions to Candidate Background Characteristics Depend on Candidate Policy Positions. Electoral Studies, 61. (10 pages)
Supplementary readings
Druckman, J. et al. (2011). Cambridge handbook of experimental political science. Cambridge, New York: Cambridge University Press. (Remaining chapters)
Mutz, Diana C. (2011). Population-Based Survey Experiments. Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press. (Remaining chapters)
McDermott, R. (2002). Experimental methods in political science. Annual Review of Political Science, 5(1): 31-61.
Day 4 – Hybrid quant-qual methods (I)
Mixed-method approaches (Janine Leschke)
Mixed or multi-methods approaches combining and integrating qualitative and quantitative social sciences tools have become popular in recent years. Rather than seeing methods as mutually exclusive alternatives, such approaches exploit the fact that multiple measurement offers the chance to assess each method’s validity in the light of other methods and thereby come to more sound conclusions. This session will discuss the advantages and drawbacks of mixed-methods approaches in PhD projects. We will in particular consider the combination of indepths case-study analysis with statistical analysis.
Readings
Creswell, J. and Plano Clark, V. (2018) Designing and Conducting Mixed Methods Research, Third Edition, London: Sage, ch. 3 (Core mixed methods designs)
Lieberman, E. (2005) Nested Analysis as a Mixed-Method Strategy for Comparative Research, The American Political Science Review 99(3), 435-452.
Supplementary Readings
Casal Bértoa, F. (2017) It’s been mostly about money! A Multi-method research approach to the sources of institutionalization, Sociological Methods & Research 46(4): 683-714.
Fearon, J. and Laitin, D. (2008) Integrating Qualitative and Quantitative Methods, in: Box-Steffensmeier, J., Brady, H. and Collier D. (eds.) The Oxford Handbook of Political Methodology, Oxford: Oxford University Press: 756-776.
Becker, R. and Teney, C. (2020) Understanding high-skilled intra-European migration patterns: the case of European physicians in Germany, Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, 46:9, 1737-1755.
Applied Network Analysis (Christoph Houman Ellersgaard)
Empirically and theoretically, the session will focus on elites and decision-makers in a policy-making setting and provide examples that cut across the national, European and global levels. In a first part we cover how to identify the most powerful individuals in different societies, the elites, using social network analysis.
Readings
Larsen, Anton Grau, and Christoph Houman Ellersgaard. “A Scandinavian Variety of Power Elites? – Key Institutional Orders in the Danish Elite Networks.” In New Directions in Elite Research, edited by Olav Korsnes, Johan Heilbron, Johannes Hjellbrekke, Felix Bühlmann, and Mike Savage. Routledge, forthcoming.
Larsen, Anton Grau, and Christoph Houman Ellersgaard. “Identifying Power Elites—k-Cores in Heterogeneous Affiliation Networks.” Social Networks 50 (July 2017): 55–69.
Ellersgaard, Christoph Houmann, Lasse Folke Henriksen, Peter Marcus Kristensen, and Anton Grau Larsen. 2016. “Social Spaces.” In Routledge Handbook of International Political Sociology. Routledge. http://www.forskningsdatabasen.dk/en/catalog/2305208216.
Supplementary Readings
Khan, Shamus Rahman (2012) The Sociology of Elites. Annual Review of Sociology 38(1): 361–77. doi:10.1146/annurev-soc-071811-145542.
Bühlmann, Felix, Thomas David, and André Mach (2012) The Swiss Business Elite (1980–2000): How the Changing Composition of the Elite Explains the Decline of the Swiss Company Network. Economy and Society 41(2), pp 199–226. doi:10.1080/03085147.2011.602542.
Afternoon Session - Feedback to students (I) (Janine Leschke & Manuele Citi)
In this session we will draw on the various elements of the course providing indepths feedback to the student’s projects.
Day 5 – Hybrid quant-qual methods (II) & feedback
Morning Session - Feedback to students (II) (Janine Leschke & Manuele Citi)
In this session we will draw on the various elements of the course providing indepths feedback to the student’s projects.
Applied Textual Analysis (Manuele Citi)
This session introduces the fundamental tools of quantitative analysis developed by social science for the analysis of political and social texts (political speeches, party manifestos, policy documents, but also conversations on the social media). The aim is to help students understand the types of research questions we can ask with text, and the type of analytical tools that are currently available for answering them.
Readings
Grimmer, J. and Stewart, B. M. (2013) ‘Text as data: The promise and pitfalls of automatic content analysis methods for political texts’, Political Analysis 21(3): 267–297.
Brady, W. J., Wills, J. A., Jost, J. T., Tucker, J. A. and Van Bavel, J. J. (2017) ‘Emotion shapes the diffusion of moralized content in social networks’, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 114(28): 7313–7318.
Supplementary readings
Lacy, S., Watson, B. R., Riffe, D. and Lovejoy, J. (2015) ‘Issues and best practices in content analysis’, Journalism and Mass Communication Quarterly 92(4): 791–811.
Afternoon Session - Feedback to students (III) (Janine Leschke & Manuele Citi)
In this session we will draw on the various elements of the course providing indepths feedback to the student’s projects.
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