Beyond methodological tenets the worlds of QCA and SNA and their benefits to policy analysis

Innovative Comparative Methods for Policy Analysis: Beyond the Quantitative-Qualitative Divide

Volumn , Issue , 2006, Pages 95-120

  Yamasaki, Sakura ^a   Spreitzer, Astrid ^b  

^a UNIVERSITÉ CATHOLIQUE DE LOUVAIN   (Belgium)

^b UNIVERSITY OF VIENNA   (Austria)

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[No Author keywords available]

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EID: 84892336247     PISSN: None     EISSN: None     Source Type: Book    
DOI: 10.1007/0-387-28829-5_5     Document Type: Chapter

References (22)

1. We are grateful for the many comments we received from the ESF workshop participants, and especially to Bernhard Kittel and Fritz Sager.
2. At least three different strands resting upon POA can be found: Policy Intertwining (Scharpf 1997, 1995, 2003), .
3. Constructivist elements in PA (Sabatier 1993, Majone 1993, 2001, Peters 1999).
4. Policy Network Analysis (Heritier 1993b, 1993c, Schumann 1996).
5. These strands do not, of course, have clear cut boundaries between them and their approach often overlap in many respects (Thatcher 1998: 406).
6. On case-studies, see Gerring (2004; forthcoming).
7. Mill even argues that one cannot talk about a 'cause' if one individualizes its components: "We have, philosophically speaking, no right to give the name of cause to one of them, exclusively of the others" (1872: III, v, 3).
8. This was also suggested by Mill, and he called this a "plurality of causes": "It is not true that one effect must be connected with only one cause, or assemblage of conditions; that each phenomenon can be produced only in some way. There are often several independent modes in which the same phenomenon could have originated" (1889, cited in Mackie 1974: 61).
9. Similarly to system theory where "the whole is more than the sum of the parts, not in an ultimate, metaphysical sense but in the important pragmatic sense that, given the properties of the parts and the laws of their interaction, it is not a trivial matter to infer the properties of the whole" (Simon 1981: 86).
10. Note here again the similarity with the system theory approach on causality.
11. For Boolean algebra, refer to Boole (1854), Carvallo (1970).
12. For the application of Boolean algebra in QCA, see Ragin (1987: 85ff), De Meur and Rihoux (2002). A bibliography of QCA applications as well as discussions around QCA is available at http://www.compasss.org.
13. All downloadable at http://www.compasss.org .
14. Visualization is possible in two dimensions through NetDraw, a package part of UCINet, or in three dimensions through the Pajek software.
15. The idea of having networks as independent or dependent variables is also presented in Kenis and Schneider 1991: 44ff.
16. A fifth variable obtained is the reputation of the actors, used in order to classify them. For our purpose it is sufficient to focus on the four main relations, and leave the analytical tool of reputation aside.
17. In network analysis, power is often associated with the level of activity of the network (information and opinion flow, contacts frequency, etc.).
18. For a comprehensive overview of the available software and free downloads, the International Network for Social Network Analysis gives the details on its homepage. , 30.08.04.
19. We analyze only one part of their study, the 1980s. We are grateful to the authors for letting us use their data.
20. For thresholds and their justifications, please refer to the original article.
21. Of course the co-occurrence of a condition with itself is not CQunted.
22. On transitivity, see Wassermann and Faust 1997: 150ff, 241ff.