Useful Links
This page contains a non-exhaustive list of some useful links concerning the Comparative Methods. If you have any further suggestion or comment concerning this page, please send an email to Airo Hino
- Comparative methods/methodology broadly speaking
- QCA in other languages
- Other small N approaches and techniques (including software)
Comparative methods/methodology
Comparative Methods in Political & Social Research
This Website is maintained by David Levi-Faur (Political Science Department, University of Haifa, Israel)
ISA's Research Committee 33 on Logic and Methodology
The ISA Research Committee also publishes its Bulletin of Sociological Methodology
ISA's Research Committee 35 on Conceptual and Terminological Analysis
Scientific meetings of the Committee on Conceptual and Terminological Analysis (COCTA) are held during Congresses of the ISA, and at other times. COCTA participates in other modes of exchange, such as the Internet e-mail discussion group COCTA-L. It also maintains special scientific exchanges and joint programs with research committees of the same name within the International Political Sciences Association and within the International Social Science Council.
The Society for Political Methodology and the Political Methodology Section of the APSA
This is the home page of the Society for Political Methodology, the Political Methodology Section of the American Political Science Association, and the central web site for the political methodology community. The primary purpose of this site is to serve as the gateway to the Electronic Paper Archive. From here you can view abstracts of conference and Working Papers online and download papers for local printing. This is also the gateway to The Political Methodologist, our newsletter, and Political Analysis, the official journal of the section.
It consists of ten thematic WebPages (including a newsletter) with information about the section and the areas of comparative and historical sociology.
Research Committee on Concepts and Methods of the International Political Science Association
C&M understands itself as an open and plural platform of discussion. It strives to promote methodological discussion that takes seriously both concept analysis and qualitative methods in political science.
ECPR Standing Group on Political Methodology
The Standing Group is meant to provide a venue for methodological discussions among European political scientists and interested scholars and students from adjoining disciplines.
QCA in other languages
This page in German provides some interesting working papers of QCA applications in the field of political economy (most of them are in English).
This page in Japanese, maintained by Daisuke Mori (University of Tokyo), provides useful information about QCA including the translation of the Compasss Best Practices page, a glossary of key terms and concepts of QCA, and an introduction of related books and software of QCA.
This page
in Finnish, maintained by Pentti Luoma (University of Oulu, Finland) provides a bibliographical list.
Other small N approaches and techniques (including software)
APES (Actor Process Event Scheme)
APES is developed by Uwe Serdült, Chantal Vögeli, Christian Hirschi and Thomas Widmer. This is a web-based software tool allowing the use of qualitative case study data for a systematic comparative assessment of policy processes. Focusing on the actors' participation in decision-making processes, the description of a policy process can be visualized with APES. By defining the participating actors as well as all relevant events of the decision-making process, the user gets the possibility to generate with APES a graphical representation of qualitative case study data, which allows the comparison over different cases.
AQUAD Six
AQUAD software has been developed by G. L. Huber (University of Tübingen, Germany). It features many qualitative analysis procedures, and also allows one to treat cases/texts by Boolean analysis of critical features ("logical minimization").
Event Structure Analysis (ESA)
ESA is developed by David R. Heise (University of Indiana, Bloomington, USA). Event structure analysis is a qualitative methodology for understanding sequential events in a narrative. Prerequisite analysis focuses on how the events are connected logically. The program draws a chart showing the prerequisite structure. Composition analysis focuses on how the events link people and things. The program creates tables showing how people are associated with each other and with non-human entities.
Steve BORGATTI's (Boston College) qualitative research methods course homepage
It consists of Content Analysis, Ethnographic Methods, Cultural Domain Analysis, with many other features
Mixed Methods Network for Behavioral, Social, and Health Sciences homepage
This Website is based on the book by Tashakkori and Teddlie (2003) "Handbook of mixed methods in the social and behavioral research".