Rethinking Comparison
Innovative Methods for Qualitative Political Inquiry

Brings together chapters from more than a dozen leading methods scholars to revolutionize qualitative research design.

Erica S. Simmons (Edited by), Nicholas Rush Smith (Edited by)

9781108832793, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 7 October 2021

225 pages, 2 b/w illus. 2 tables
23.5 x 15.8 x 2.3 cm, 0.62 kg

'This path-breaking volume shows scholars how to think and work 'outside the box' of Mill's logic of controlled comparison of nation-states, regions and organizations toward generative comparison of political processes, practices, meanings, and concepts. In chapter after chapter, the authors develop new conceptions of comparison that yield fundamental insights – new questions, concepts, categories, ways of viewing the world – not available under narrow conceptions of the comparative method.' Elisabeth Jean Wood, Yale University

Qualitative comparative methods – and specifically controlled qualitative comparisons – are central to the study of politics. They are not the only kind of comparison, though, that can help us better understand political processes and outcomes. Yet there are few guides for how to conduct non-controlled comparative research. This volume brings together chapters from more than a dozen leading methods scholars from across the discipline of political science, including positivist and interpretivist scholars, qualitative methodologists, mixed-methods researchers, ethnographers, historians, and statisticians. Their work revolutionizes qualitative research design by diversifying the repertoire of comparative methods available to students of politics, offering readers clear suggestions for what kinds of comparisons might be possible, why they are useful, and how to execute them. By systematically thinking through how we engage in qualitative comparisons and the kinds of insights those comparisons produce, these collected essays create new possibilities to advance what we know about politics.

1. Rethinking comparison: an introduction Erica S. Simmons and Nicholas Rush Smith
Part I. Rethinking the Building Blocks of Comparison: 2. Beyond mill: why cross-case qualitative causal inference is weak, and why we should still compare Jason Seawright
3. Two ways to compare Frederic Charles Schaffer
4. Unbound comparison Nick Cheesman
5. On casing a study versus studying a case Joe Soss
6. From cases to sites: studying global processes in comparative politics Thea Riofrancos
Part II. Developing New Approaches to Comparison Through Research: 7. Comparing complex cases using archival research Jonathan Obert
8. Composing comparisons: studying configurations of relations in social network research Sarah E. Parkinson
9. Against methodological nationalism: seeing comparisons as encompassing through the Arab uprisings Jillian Schwedler
10. Comparative analysis for theory development Mala Htun and Francesca R. Jensenius
11. Problems and possibilities of comparison across regime types: examples involving China Benjamin L. Read
12. Comparisons with an ethnographic sensibility: studies of protest and vigilantism Erica S. Simmons and Nicholas Rush Smith
Epilogue: 13. Theory and imagination in comparative politics: an interview with Lisa Wedeen Erica S. Simmons and Nicholas Rush Smith with Lisa Wedeen.

Subject Areas: Comparative politics [JPB], Social research & statistics [JHBC], Research methods: general [GPS]