The power of negative thinking: The use of negative case methodology in the development of sociological theory

Theory and Society

Volumn 26, Issue 5, 1997, Pages 649-684

  Emigh, Rebecca Jean ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA   (United States)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 21944431889     PISSN: 03042421     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1023/A:1006896217647     Document Type: Article

References (7)

1. Charles Ragin, The Comparative Method: Moving Beyond Qualitative and Quantitative Stategies (Berkeley and Los Angeles: Univ. of Cal., 1987).
2. Theda Skocpol and Margaret Somers, "The Uses of Comparative History in Macrosocial Inquiry," Comparative Studies in Society and History 22 (1980): 174-281.
3. John Stuart Mill used the term "deduction" for reasoning that went from the general to the specific, and induction for reasoning that went from the specific to the general (Rudolf Carnap, An Introduction to the Philosophy of Science (New York: Basic Books, 19-20).
4. As Carnap pointed out, this use of deduction and induction is not entirely accurate. In this article, I use deduction to refer to forms of reasoning that draw out the implications of what is already known and induction to refer to reasoning that extends knowledge beyond what is known ( David Kelley, The Art of Reasoning (New York: W.W. Norton, 1988), 167).
5. Thus, a deductive argument implicitly contains the conclusions in the premise ( Kelley, The Art of Reasoning, 167).
6. In contrast, an inductive argument can only show that the conclusions are likely to be true ( Robert Martin, The Philosopher's Dictionary, (Ontario: Broadview, 1994), 63). This definition is standard in the literature, and these terms refer to aspects of theory and method.
7. "The Role of General Theory in Comparative-historical Sociology," American Journal of Sociology 97 (1991): 1-30.