The Craft of Political Research

By W. Phillips Shively and James W. Endersby

Book Overview

The Craft of Political Research is a nontechnical introduction to research design and analysis in political science, emphasizing the choices we make when we design a research project and analyze its results. The book's approach centers on asking an interesting research question, then designing inquiry to eliminate as many alternative explanations as possible.

How do we develop theory, and what constitutes a good research question? How do we operationalize measures and gather evidence to answer a question? How do we analyze our data? Students are introduced to such topics as multidimensional concepts, levels of measurement, validity, reliability, random and non-random measurement error, sampling, case selection, causality, experimental and quasi-experimental design, statistical inference, and regression and correlation analysis. Throughout, the emphasis is on understanding the "back story" of analysis--why do we measure in a particular way, why do we choose one design as against another, why do we conduct our analysis as we do.

Emphasizing the internal logic of research methods, the greatest strength of the book is its clarity and the broad range of political science examples provided. It works at a conceptual level, seeking an understanding of the principles that underlie techniques and the reasons why we choose them.

New to this edition:

New and revised examples from the US, UK, Canada, Latin America, and Africa among others, and updated international data from organizations such as the World Bank and the United Nations. Separate chapters on causality and research design, with more discussion of each component of the political science research process New section on indexes and scales that reviews ways to improve reliability and validity of measures by combining several variables New sections reviewing collection of publicly available data including downloadable sources of quantitative data New material on internet surveys and other contemporary techniques used in political science research.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1032414960
• ISBN13: 9781032414966
• Release Date: February 2025
• Publisher: Routledge
• Length: 228 Pages
• Weight: 0.74 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.5" x 6.0" x 9.0"

Customer Reviews

Excelent for Students

I am writing this from a students perspective. The book is written well and is easy to understand, it gets to the point without losing meaning.

An Excellent Primer for Political Research, but of Limited Use for Those Working at Higher Research

Shively provides and excellent primer for buddinng social scientists beginnig to conduct thier own poltical research. Shively starts at the beginning, explaining the history of political science and the numerous theories and paradigms that charaterize our field. From here he branches off into the more specific techniques of political reserch, i.e formal theory, and normative philosophy, and the particular usefulness of each approach. Building upon this base, Shively emphasizes the importance of correctly operationalizing variables, namely through validity and precision. His useful examples illustrate the differences in the concepts and why such careful consideration is imperative in political research. Additionally, Shively adequately covers the importance of case selection and briefly touches on statistical methods. All though it is impossible to give a thourogh explination of quantitiative methods in a primer, it would have been helpful for Shively to go into greater depth on the subject. As stated above, the work is an excellent primer for those beginning research. However, it is of limited use to those who are undertaking a more extensive researh task. It would serve as an excellent text for upper level undergraduate courses, graduate students may need something with a little more meat.

Impressive for the genre...

This work raises salient issues and poses important questions about the political science investigative process from start to finish. The emphasis here is on squarely on political science. This would not be an appropriate text for related fields (e.g. history or sociology). While accessible to all, it would best be read after one has taken a quantitatively based statistics course, as an introduction into research where control groups are less plausible, and where data collection constraints are formidable. It also directly assails problematic points of the research process, and so rather than taking academia's methodological disposition as given, as does Creswell, it delineates to students the tradeoffs and disputes involved in forming the consensus as to how the research process is generally accepted to operate. However, to portray this text as a volume on how to do research is a bit misleading, as it is better read as a compendium of well thought out caveats to procedural outlines one can find elsewhere. Finally, it shows that this work was written for the author's students at Yale, not just merely in the quality of the writing, but in addition to the caliber of the research examples used.

For anyone preparing to write a thesis

I am a Master's degree student in the throes of writing my thesis. Initially, I had absolutely no idea how to go about the process until I took a class in which this book was part of the cirriculum. Shively breaks down the process step by step and prepares you for contingencies that are bound to happen along the way. Chapter two is especially useful in learning how to choose a topic and furthermore, a question from which to base a thesis.