1 The Comparative Method

➜ conclusions about a country or political system can be drawn only through scientific comparison to other countries or political systems.

➜ statements about a political system can be either empirical or normative.

➜ political systems are complex, and the inputs and outputs of the system operate within political culture unique to that society.

➜ political scientists gather and use data for comparison and test their hypotheses with data in a similar method to other sciences.

PURPOSE OF COMPARISON

The AP Comparative Government and Politics course aims to illustrate the rich diversity of political life. It will show available institutional alternatives, and examine the consequences of reforming those institutions. It will show policy processes and choices, and the consequences of those policies. The purpose of comparison is to identify social and political problems, and to be able to recommend a course of policy action or reform to best address those problems. This is only possible in the context of comparison. How could anyone know that Mexico has a problem with economic inequality without first comparing data in Mexico with data from other countries around the world? Or perhaps, even more so, with data from countries with similar levels of development and social characteristics? Comparison, in short, is one of the main ways that social studies transforms into social science. The framework for our comparisons will be six specific countries selected by the College Board as a relatively representative snapshot of an array of political systems and societies that exist in today’s world.

Empirical statements simply state facts.

Normative statements include value judgments.

Comparisons will involve both empirical statements—in which we simply compare data, making a statement that can be measured and proven true—and normative statements—which assert a particular norm or goal that a policy should move toward. One way to approach the difference is to think of empirical statements as asking “what happened and why?” and normative statements as asking “what should have happened?”

As an example, here is a set of economic data on the six countries of study, also including the United States as a point of reference:

Source: International Monetary Fund, 2014

Country	GDP Per Capita
United States	$54,597
United Kingdom	$45,653
Russia	$12,926
China	$7,589
Mexico	$10,715
Iran	$5,183
Nigeria	$3,298

One empirical statement that could be made would be “Mexico has a much higher GDP per capita than Nigeria.” Why is this empirical? Because measurable data proves the statement to be true. Meanwhile, a normative statement might be “Nigeria should model its economic policy on Mexico’s development strategy.” Why is this normative? Because it assumes that Nigeria’s goal should be economic growth, and it assumes Nigeria should not be content with having a lower average standard of living.

SYSTEMS THEORY

A political system is a complex organism, and it is important for students in Comparative Government to remember that the institutions of the state (such as a parliament or a president) are not the only significant actors. There are regular citizens with opinions. There are media commentators and writers. There are interest groups with a vested interest in the policy in question. There is a national history and political culture dictating what appropriate and inappropriate behaviors are for political elites. All these groups work together to create a complex system—one that systems theorists attempt to simplify with the following model.

Political culture is deeply rooted in society. It is difficult to change, and it establishes most of the rules that define how politics will work.

The “environment” would include the political culture of the society, meaning the basic norms and expectations people have with regard to how politics works. Political culture is grounded in things such as historical traditions, the features of a constitution, and expectations about how the transfer of power works.

Within the environment, there are also “inputs” into the system. Inputs are demands—made most commonly by political parties and interest groups, but also potentially by other citizen social movements and civil society groups—regarding policies they would like to see from the political system. These might include changes to tax rates, new environmental regulations, more spending on national defense, or any number of possible policy preferences. These groups may also input support for current governing officials in the political system, and the policies they are currently implementing.

After public policies are made, those decisions and actions become “outputs” that change the policy and produce feedback to the inputting forces. The most common source of feedback in a political system is the news media, whether print, radio, television, or online. Institutions outside the formal political system that still play an important role by providing inputs and feedback are called linkage institutions, so named because they link the people of the country to the policies their government is making. Linkage institutions include elections, political parties, interest groups, and the media.

Linkage institutions connect people to policymaking.

State institutions formally make and enforce the policies.

Inside the formal political system are the state institutions, which exercise the formal power of policymaking. These include branches of government, such as a legislature, an executive, or a judiciary, but often also include other elements of the state, such as the bureaucracy or the military.

When they act, all linkage institutions and state institutions must behave in the context of the political culture; otherwise, they risk losing their ability to wield influence. Imagine a scenario in a constitutional democracy where there is a clear term limit written into law that no previous president had ever attempted to break. What if the current president attempted to run for another term, in violation of this written constitutional tradition? How would political parties, interest groups, citizen activists, and the media respond? It is highly unlikely that the endeavor would be successful. Political culture runs deep in a country, and it largely shapes the manner in which political actors behave.

SOCIAL SCIENCE

In many ways, social sciences are similar to the physical sciences; they both require the presentation of a hypothesis and the testing of that hypothesis based on the gathering of data. Social sciences such as comparative government and politics largely involve the use of data in their study and comparison of countries. However, social scientists do not have the benefit of being able to run controlled lab experiments to determine proven causes and effects, such as whether a policy change caused economic growth or not. After all, it is impossible to create an alternate universe with two identical countries in which one is given the policy change, and the other is not, so that their differences can be observed over time. As a result, social scientists do their best to select societies with similar conditions, and they carefully observe key differences in order to make judgments about correlations.

To properly understand the work of social scientists, students should be aware that correlation does not mean causation. Correlation refers to a situation in which one set of observed data seems to be related closely to another set of data. For example, countries with high rates of poverty are likely to have lower rates of citizen participation in political processes than countries with low poverty. This is not causation, however, because this correlation does not prove that high poverty causes low citizen participation. It is possible that high poverty is a cause of low citizen participation. It is also possible that low citizen participation is one of the causes of high rates of poverty. It is also possible that there is a third characteristic that causes both high rates of poverty and low citizen participation, and that the two data sets are unrelated otherwise. Social scientists must be careful about making causal assertions without first conducting further tests and studies of their data to confirm their causal hypothesis.

The conclusions, rules, and theories explained about each country and political-economic system in the next chapters are possible only because of the collection of accurate data for comparison.

KEY TERMS

*Note: Terms with an asterisk (*) are those that consistently appear on the AP Comparative Government and Politics exam as tested concepts.

• Causation when evaluating the relationship of two variables, the evidentiary indication that changes to the independent variable cause statistically significant changes to the dependent variable
• Correlation when evaluating the relationship of two variables, the evidentiary indication that changes in one of the variables corresponds closely to changes in the other variable, though there is not necessarily enough evidence to indicate which is the cause of which
• *Empirical statements factual claims that are based on demonstrable evidence alone
• Environment in political systems theory, the political culture and expectations of elites and non-elites that surround the functioning of political institutions
• Feedback in political systems theory, the reactions to a public policy by citizens, the media, interest groups, and other actors outside of the state
• Inputs in political systems theory, the demands and expressions of support that individuals and groups make to political institutions
• *Interest groups organizations of individuals with a common public policy goal working to influence public policy in favor of that goal
• *Linkage institutions organizations and systems that help connect citizens to the public policymaking process, most commonly including elections, political parties, interest groups, and the media
• *Normative statements claims that assert a particular value judgment either instead of or in addition to factual, evidence-based assertions
• Outputs in political systems theory, the policy decisions made by the state in response to the inputs
• *Political culture norms, values, and expectations held by the public and elites about how the competition for and the wielding of political power should function
• *Political parties organizations of individuals seeking to win control of government and wield political power by running candidates for office and winning elections or otherwise, depending on the rules of the political system
• *State institutions formal organizations and systems established to make and implement public policy, most commonly including legislative, executive, judicial, bureaucratic, and military institutions
• Systems theory a holistic view of a political system that seeks to explain how public policy decisions are demanded, made, implemented, and altered

 

PRACTICE QUESTIONS

1. An empirical statement

   1. asserts the superiority of one country over another based on evidence
   2. usually involves assumed stereotypes about a country or its culture
   3. uses data to make a specific comparison between countries without any value judgment
   4. cannot be trusted for accurate comparison of political systems

2. Which of the following is a normative statement?

   1. The rate of violent crime in Mexico rose from the year 2000 to 2010.
   2. Voter turnout rates indicate that Nigeria must do more to increase citizen participation.
   3. More immigrants attempted entry into Britain in 2015 than in any previous year.
   4. Russian citizens are less likely to engage in protests than are Mexican citizens.

3. Inputs that make demands on the political system include

   1. political parties and interest groups
   2. state institutions and the political culture
   3. political efficacy and civil society
   4. policymaking institutions and the media

4. Which of the following is the best example of a state institution?

   1. Citizen activist group
   2. Political party
   3. The media
   4. National legislature

5. Which of the following best explains the relationship between correlation and causation?

   1. Correlation can indicate possible causation, but additional experiments must be conducted to prove causation.
   2. Causation can provide useful insight that reveals correlations.
   3. Correlation is a term that can be used synonymously with causation.
   4. Discovery of a correlation can lead scientists to make conclusions about causation.

6. Political culture would be instrumental in shaping

   1. how citizens expect political actors to conduct themselves in the seeking and exercising of political power
   2. the political ideology an individual develops
   3. the public policy goals of the current government
   4. election results in a particular country

7. Linkage institutions are organizations

   1. that exercise political power, such as national legislatures and executives
   2. that connect people to the public policymaking process
   3. responsible for protecting the integrity of the national constitution
   4. give citizens official responsibilities in society, such as voting

8. One example of a linkage institution would include

   1. one house of a national legislature
   2. a bureaucratic agency
   3. a religious charity
   4. an independent media outlet