Economics Dictionary of ArgumentsHome
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| Positive Political Theory: Positive Political Theory applies economic models and empirical methods to analyze political behaviors, institutions, and outcomes. It seeks to explain and predict political phenomena by examining individual incentives, strategic interactions, and rational decision-making within the political realm. This approach uses formal models and data-driven analysis to understand political processes and behavior. See also Political Theory, Political Philosophy, Economic theories, Economic behavior, Politics, Rational choice, Decisions, Decision-making processes, Decision theory._____________Annotation: The above characterizations of concepts are neither definitions nor exhausting presentations of problems related to them. Instead, they are intended to give a short introduction to the contributions below. – Lexicon of Arguments. | |||
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H. Donald Forbes on Positive Political Theory - Dictionary of Arguments
Gaus I 57 Def Positive Political Theory/Forbes: Positive political theory, narrowly understood, means rational choice theory applied to the study of politics. More broadly understood (...) it can refer to a much wider array of analytic approaches and final goals. Its limits are set by two familiar contrasts: positive, or what is, is contrasted with normative, or what ought to be; and theory, in the sense of abstraction and explanation, is contrasted with detailed descriptions of particular cases. Three main kinds of positive theorizing will be distinguished, which will be called, for want of any better terms, conditional, rational, and intentional. Analysis: The analysis of political facts is often cast in terms of the relations between independent and dependent variables (...). Causality: Are any of these correlations more than just correlations - that is, evidence of causal connections? What are the necessary and/or sufficient conditions for the outcomes of interest?(1) ((s) For the philosophical discussion of difficulties related to the concept ofcausality see >Causality/Philosophical Theories). Normative analysis: E.g., Why do some citizens of Detroit vote Democrat and others Republican? Surveys may suggest that Catholics vote significantly more often for the Democrats than do Protestants or Jews. This correlation between religion and vote may be a clear statistical fact, derived by rigorous reasoning from some more elementary (or ‘brute’) facts about the way a sample of Detroit’s residents have answered questions about their race, religion, occupation,education, and so on. In short, it may be part of a ‘causal’ theory of voting, in Detroit or elsewhere, and the theory may be true or false, regardless of what one thinks ‘normatively’ about voting for any particular party. Gaus I 58 Causality: E.g., Liberal democracies have rarely or never gone to war with each other. But can we say that democracy is a cause of peace or a sufficient condition for it? The hypothesis can claim a root deep in modern political theory (Doyle, 1983(2); Cavallar, 2001(3); Franceschet, 2001(4)). Statistics: The earliest statistical studies (Babst, 1972(5); Small and Singer, 1976(6)) suffered from some obvious shortcomings, but more recent studies have been models of careful conceptualization, assiduous data collection, and sophisticated multivariate data analysis. To do so statistically one must introduce additional variables and test more complex models. Unfortunately, the more elaborate the statistical models, the more precarious their empirical foundations. War is a rare event, and since most of its causal conditions change only slowly (...). Problems: (...) since the relevant cases are so few, the coding of one or two problematic ones (Spain’s status as a democracy in 1898, Finland’s status as an enemy of the Allied powers from 1941 to 1944) can have a substantial impact on the results of any statistical analysis. „Empirical laws“: Despite these difficulties, there is now a consensus that empirical research generally supports the hypothesis: joint democracy seems to be a sufficient condition for peaceful relations between states (for reviews of the literature see Chan, 1997(7); Ray, 1995(8); 1998(9); Russett, 1993(10); Russett and Oneal, 2001(11)). This now widely accepted ‘empirical law’ about ‘democratic dyads’ provides an outstanding example of statistically based causal theorizing in political science. 1. King, Gary, Robert O. Keohane and Sidney Verba (1994) Designing Social Inquiry: Scientific Inference in Qualitative Research. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. 2. Doyle, Michael (1983) ‘Kant, liberal legacies, and foreign affairs’, Parts I and II. Philosophy and Public Affairs, 12: 205–35, 323–53. 3. Cavallar, Georg (2001) ‘Kantian perspectives on democratic peace: alternatives to Doyle’. Review of International Studies, 27: 229–48. 4. Franceschet, Antonio (2001) ‘Sovereignty and freedom: Immanuel Kant’s liberal internationalist “legacy”’. Review of International Studies, 27: 209–28. 5. Babst, Dean (1972) ‘A force for peace’. Industrial Research, 4 (4): 55–8. 6. Small, Melvin and J. David Singer (1976) ‘The warproneness of democratic regimes’. Jerusalem Journal of International Relations, 1: 50–69. 7. Chan, Steve (1997) ‘In search of democratic peace: problems and promise’. Mershon International Studies Review, 41: 59–91. 8. Ray, James Lee (1995) Democracy and International Conflict: An Evaluation of the Democratic Peace Proposition. Columbia, SC: University of South Carolina Press. 9. Ray, James Lee (1998) ‘Does democracy cause peace?’ Annual Review of Political Science, 1: 27–46. 10. Russett, Bruce (1993) Grasping the Democratic Peace: Principles for a Post-Cold War World. Princeton: Princeton University Press. 11. Russett, Bruce and John R. Oneal (2001) Triangulating Peace: Democracy, Interdependence, and International Organizations. New York: Norton. Forbes, H. Donald 2004. „Positive Political Theory“. In: Gaus, Gerald F. & Kukathas, Chandran 2004. Handbook of Political Theory. SAGE Publications._____________Explanation of symbols: Roman numerals indicate the source, arabic numerals indicate the page number. The corresponding books are indicated on the right hand side. ((s)…): Comment by the sender of the contribution. Translations: Dictionary of Arguments The note [Concept/Author], [Author1]Vs[Author2] or [Author]Vs[term] resp. "problem:"/"solution:", "old:"/"new:" and "thesis:" is an addition from the Dictionary of Arguments. If a German edition is specified, the page numbers refer to this edition. |
Forbes, H. Donald Gaus I Gerald F. Gaus Chandran Kukathas Handbook of Political Theory London 2004 |
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