lecture 1 - Introduction

ideal state - justice as first virtue of politics shows core question politics = applied ethics = what should politics be *not empiric or descriptive *political science is at its core normative

1580-1655 first endowed chair of politics (1612 Professor Politices)

mainly: political science has for long time been in the law + philosophy + behavior discipline *don’t memorize

tracks historical developments in politics development -> change in political science + other sciences • comparative politics = creation of states • international politics = interactions between states • transnational politics = movement across state borders • beyond US & Europe = globalization • study of citizens = process and waves of democratization developments in other disciplines also shape the study of political science • behavioral revolution = sociology and psychology, impacting political science on how to think (e.g. more focus on predicting)

study of one aspect of human behavior/life from different theoretical perspectives. a social science of politics no one theoretical approach completely dominates the field (LMS: celebration of diversity) political science is by definition pluralistic distinct = subject focus in the discipline itself, it’s not a methodological approach, but it designates a subjective area focus - criminal science has the same: already a clear subject

LMS only highlights the positive lecture mentions that there are also negative points political science is by definition pluralistic

ideas about human behavior that can be applied to the subject/substance of political science • philosophy, law, anthropology, sociology, psychology, (micro)economics in practice: theoretical approaches to political science - behavioralism - rational choice - neo-institutionalism - constructivism - marxism - feminism - normative political theory these are all different sets of assumptions, questions, research designs, etc.

encouraged to go back to it regularly, as we go through it, it will be a summary, it will make sense study table 1.1 as summary and as overview

different answers with different theoretical approaches theories determines research puzzle, research question, conceptualization, operationalization into variable, research design, research method different theories don’t talk about the same thing if they talk about politics - necessary to understand why different theorists look at different thing: from extremely niche to really broad, from government to movements

ideal (social definition) = shared notion that doesn’t necessarily work in the real world, not a perfect thing, but a category that helps to understand reality arena definition = political parties, elections, etc. - definition for people that don’t study political science - definitions most people don’t care about - traditional view - arena, because: specific place for politics proces definition = politics embedded in all sort of social relations - e.g. in the family, bedroom, marketplace, class room, the streets arena conception can be seen as narrow -> risk of ignoring, overlooking, misunderstanding (e.g. only focusing on in parliament, not on lobbying, then the behavior is sometimes hard to understand/explain) process conception can be seen as to broad -> risk of conceptual overstretching + not everything is equally important

constrained use of social power means: - enabling collective choice and action, without simple resort to (threat of) force or violence (but not excluded) - politics enables some, but constrains others - politics has intended + unintended consequences - politics is active and passive (passive: shared norms governing behavior) - most political scientists focus on collective and public elements of power struggles

demand that Dutch government away from fuel subsidies = social movement, civil disobedience but a strong political focus both arena and proces c of conception political science ! in practice, categories don’t exist in practice phenomena don’t fall in one or another category

'’Categories don’t exist in practice’’ conceptualization/language is applied and imposed on happenings - concepts can be good and bad old categories can become out of use it is important to be clear what we talk about it doesn’t matter in what concept you place something, it is important to explain where you stand and how you understand it - you have to work within the same framework to have a good understanding

minimalist approach = ordered knowledge based on systematic enquiry ontology = what can we know epistemology = how can we know

what can we know

how can we know

• to conduct science, is to compare • to compare, we need points of reference: concepts • conceptualization is (to a large extent) determined by theoretical perspective (theory)