What Is a Case?
Exploring the Foundations of Social Inquiry

The contributors probe the nature of the case and the ways in which different understandings of the concept affect the conduct and results of research.

Charles C. Ragin (Edited by), Howard Saul Becker (Edited by)

9780521421881, Cambridge University Press

Paperback, published 31 July 1992

254 pages, 2 tables
22.7 x 15.4 x 1.4 cm, 0.36 kg

"[T]here is something of value in the book for almost anyone....What Is a Case? is a useful book, reflecting a new level of methodological/theoretical self-awareness and subtlety of the kind that will benefit the discipline." Alan Sica, American Journal of Sociology

The concept of the case is a basic feature of social science research and yet many questions about how a case should be defined, selected, and judged are far from settled. The contributors to this volume probe the nature of the case and the ways in which different understandings of the concept affect the conduct and the results of research. The contributions demonstrate that the work of any given researcher is often characterised by some hybrid of these basic approaches, and it is important to understand that most research involves multiple definitions and uses of cases, as both specific empirical phenomena and as general theoretical categories.

Introduction
1. Cases of 'what is a case?' Charles C. Ragin
Part I. Cases Are Found: 2. Small Ns and community case studies Douglas Harper
3. What do cases do? Some notes on activity in sociological analysis Andrew Abbott
Part II. Cases Are Objects: 4. Small Ns and big conclusions: an examination of the reasoning in comparative studies based on a small number of cases Stanley Lieberson
5. Theory elaboration: the heuristics of case analysis Diane Vaughan
Part III. Cases Are Made: 6. Case studies: history or sociology? Michel Wieviorka
7. Making theoretical cases John Walton
Part IV. Cases Are Conventions: 8. Cases on cases … of cases Jennifer Platt
9. Cases are for identity, for explanation, or for control
Conclusion
10. Cases, causes, conjunctures, stories and imagery Howard C. White.

Subject Areas: Sociology & anthropology [JH]