Summary Comparative Politics 

University Leiden 

Year 1, Block 3, Politicologie 

Lecture 1: What is comparative politics 

Objectives: 

1. Define comparative politics 

2. The role of comparison

3. Recognise different theoretical approaches

Comparative Politics 

• addresses how factors influence others, what drives behavior including multi level politics. 

• There is a scientific reason to compare: does X influence Y? is there causality or correlation?

  • Statistical control: mathematically estimate the effects when changing one variable 

  • Comparative controle: Select cases in such a way that we can eliminate alternative explanation 

  • Qualitative Methods: Small cases but a lot of information

  • Quantitative methods: Statistical solvability by mathematical comparisons using graphs 

Single case studies according to leiphart:

• A-theoretical 

• Interpretative

• Hypothesis building 

• theory infirming 

• Deviant case study 

Comparative in this case means comparing your study to all other cases which accort to a specific theory 

Comparative research consists of:

• most similar system 

  • selecting cases which are as similar as possible but contain different outcomes 

  • look for the differences which determine the different outcomes