Introduction to Political Science

1. Introduction
Knowledge...wisdom
Knowledge: Natural world - Science; Social world – Social
Science;
Social Sciences: Political Science, Sociology, Economics...
Political Science
Politics – Cooperation and Conflict...political entities, values;
Power/authority; State/Government;
Political institutions,
phenomenon...behaviour...structure...function...process...system
Political Thought
Political Theory
Political Philosophy
Political Ideology –Detailed program to attain the end

2. Key concepts in PT
Why key concepts?
1.Ontology...What
2.Epistemology...Methodology...How
3.Empiricism: attempt to tie knowledge to experience by the
use of the senses; Locke, Berkeley, and Hume; closely related
term pragmatism
4.Rationalism: innate or intuitive knowledge or general
principles gaining credibility simply through the use of
reason; Plato, Descartes, Leibniz, and Spinoza
5.Fact: empirically verifiable...quantify
6.Value: difficult…what is important in life...qualitative
7.Idealist: Permanent immutable Ideas – reality to adjust…Plato
8.Realist/Materialist: Ideas are derived from material
reality…Locke
9.Inductive: P2G - makes broad generalizations from specific
observations
10. Deductive: G2P…Conclusion derived from premises
11. Deontology: irrespective of outcome...based on action
right/wrong...Kant, Rawls
12. Teleology: based on outcome... right/wrong...; the
doctrine of design and purpose in the material world.
13. Subjective: personal
14. Objective: impartial
15. Positivism:

3. Positivism is the name for the scientific study of the social
world. Its goal is to formulate abstract and universal laws on
the operative dynamics of the social universe...based on
Verification; Auguste Comte
Logical Positivism: A form of positivism, developed by
members of the Vienna Circle, which considers that the only
meaningful philosophical problems are those which can be
solved by logical analysis; based on Verification
Metaphysics (Meta means „beyond‟) is the study of those things
and phenomena that are beyond the physical realm. It is a
philosophy that concerns the nature and description of an ultimate
reality that stands behind the physical world or the world of
appearances. The metaphysical statement usually implies an idea
about the world or the universe, which may seem reasonable but is
ultimately not empirically verifiable, testable or provable.
16. Reductionism
It involves actually breaking the system into its parts and studying
the parts‟ behaviour in isolation under controlled conditions.
Political Theory – for what?...To have order in the society
History of Political Thought
Technique of Analysis/Conceptual clarification
Governing Institutions in the society

4. Power equations in the society
Questions of Justice, liberty…
Formal Model building
Political processes, Political behaviour
Further Reading:
https://www.oxfordreference.com/view/10.1093/oi/authority.20110
803100405393
https://www.oxfordreference.com/view/10.1093/oi/authority.20110
803095750220
https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/social-sciences/positivism

6. Books & Journals

7. Intellectual influences responsible for the decline of Traditional
Political Theory (normative)
1.Positivism
2.Logical Positivism
3.Karl Popper‟s...principle of falsification...also opposed to any
form determinism...
4.Linguistic philosophy...philosophers lack influence on
politicians...but that is not true
5.Behaviouralism - Cobban, Easton, Waldo
Strongly influenced by positivism - started in the early
19th
century – became clear in the 1950s & 1960s– emphasised
pure science of politics – preferred factual & statistical enquiries –
Reductionism – 8 major tenets: PRIST VVQ;
Pure science; Regularities; Integration; Systematization; Techniques;
Verification; Values; Quantification;
Values: Ethical evaluation and empirical explanation involve two different kinds of
propositions that, for the sake of clarity, should be kept analytically distinct …
https://thefinancialexpress.com.bd/views/behaviouralism-in-
the-analysis-of-politics-and-society-1511965625
https://oxfordre.com/view/10.1093/acrefore/9780190846626.001
.0001/acrefore-9780190846626-e-376/version/0
Criticism:
Mindless empiricism
Inductive

8. Emphasis on data
Readily observable
Non-humane
Political Theory Dead?
Mid 20th
century...because of normative character...beyond the
control of empirical testing
Cobban, Easton...Decline
Laslett, Dahl...Death
Easton contends that since political theory is concerned with some
kind of historical form, it had lost its constructive role
Political theory as practised by W. Dunning, CH. McIlwain and GH Sabine had declined
into “historicism”
Dunning...Ideas influenced social conditions
McIlwain...Social milieu influenced thoughts
Sabine...combined both...emphasised the role of ethical judgements
Revival of political theory:
1. Scientific political theory...controlling the human behaviour
...Merriam, Lasswell...would describe rather than prescribe
Political theory in traditional sense:
H. Arendt, T. Adorno, H. Marcuse, L. Strauss, M. Oakeshott,
BD Jouvenal, E. Voglin
Arendt:

9. The Human Condition...
Focus was on the uniqueness and responsibility of the individual human being with
which she initiated her criticism of Behaviouralism...its search for uniformities
Oakeshott
Multidimensionality-Experience and its Modes- hi
story, science, practice and poetry. Science concerned itself with measurement and
quantification, history with the past, practice with an act of desiring and obtaining, and
poetry with imagination and contemplation.
Political philosophy to remove the crookedness in our thinking
Arendt & Oakeshott: Political philosophy did not to promise
salvation...politics...continuous activity...
Political theory...not ideology, utopian scientific
methodology...but an experimental science of the right order
in both the individual and society
Stauss: reaffirmed the importance of
classical political theory...nihilism not acceptable...Strauss resembles Voegelin in
that he also is seeking to recover political ethics as an objective science accessible
to human reason
The Straussian approach to politics was the focus on the "philosophic
dimension" of statecraft, often at the expense of mass behavior or interest-
group politics that attracted the attention of mainstream of political
science.
The Frankfurt School, to which Adorno and Marcuse belonged, emerged in
Germany in the 1920s and attracted some of the best minds of contemporary
German social sciences. The works of the members of the school were recognized
as a distinct category under the term critical theory. They were opposed to all
forms of positivism and were critical of any possibility of a value-free social
science.
Kolakowski...6 basic characteristics of Frankfurt School...

10. 2. Berlin‟s view
Started as a logical positivist but later developed critical response
towards that
Freedom & Pluralism
Positive liberty...freedom to act...
Negative liberty... freedom from interferences
3. Wolin‟s defence of the classical political tradition
Futuristic quality...political order
Public concern...
Evolving grammar and vocabulary to facilitate communication
Kuhn‟s seminal contribution
With respect to natural science, in every age a discipline solved
some of its problems but in the process generate new
ones...however this may true to social sciences
Paradigm...is to selection of problems and finding solutions
Post-behaviouralism & Neo-behaviouralism
Pre
paradigmatic
Paradigmatic Crisis
Scientific
revolution

11. 1969 Easton – announced Post-behaviouralism: less emphasis on
scientific method and more stress on public responsibilities...
Tenets of post-behaviouralism...6... students have to do
The possibility of different theories yielding different observations
Revival of interpretive understanding and historical analysis
New concerns such as feminism, environmentalism, ethnicity, racial identity and equality
and nuclear war have emerged
WHY IS THE CLASSICAL TRADITION IMPORTANT?
“Classics”, address both local issues and contain principles of universal significance
Rival conceptual frameworks (Ex: Plato vs. Aristotle) which enable us to choose and
state our preference
Political theory normally taken place during periods of acute crisis - comprehended and
articulated the spirit and temper of events... the desirable thing
to happen.
A political theory must contain three elements: students have to do
The great classics were composed by political exiles or by failed politicians
like...examples?
Plato and Aristotle Sought to recreate pre-eminence of the
Greek city states or the polis
Machiavelli Focused on Italian unification & emerging
commercial society
Hobbes and Locke Addressed crisis of political authority in
times of English civil war
Germino identifies the seven characteristics of an authentic political theory...what they
are?

12. Hacker points out that a theory has two functions... explain behaviour (causal theory) &
ought to behave (ethical theory)
Moderns looked to good life, which could be secured not through rational understanding,
but by gaining power over nature.
LIMITATIONS OF THE CLASSICAL TRADITION
Gender Bias - exclusion of women from the political process
Eurocentricism - dismissing non-Western civilizations as unchanging and
unhistorical
CONCLUSION
Resurgence in political theory, largely due to the efforts of Habermas, Nozick and Rawls...
Rawls for whom, justice meant fairness. Rawls attempts to furnish an answer to how a just
society should distribute liberties, opportunities, income, wealth and bases of self-respect.
Utopian and radical schemes are no longer theoretically and practically desirable and feasible
alternatives - only liberal democracy
Postmodernism, Multiculturalism...
Further Reading:
HOW TO STUDY THE CLASSICS
The textualist approach - ideas, divorced from the
time and context from which they arise; milieu in
which these texts have originate may give us some
insights but they do not play central role in
interpreting them. perennial interest. Hacker and
Plamentaz
Skinner (1966), Pocock (1971), Dunn (1979)
and Collini (1983), are the leading exponents
of contextualism - historical background

13. https://oxfordre.com/view/10.1093/acrefore/9780190846626.001.0
001/acrefore-9780190846626-e-376/version/0