Political Science 379
Problems in International Relations:
Conducting Empirical Research in International Relations
Spring 2005
Assignment 8. Due: Wednesday, May 11th, 3PM
There's an old saying in political science: "It takes a theory to kill a theory."
Ok, it's not an old saying. But here's the meaning. What we should try to do is
test one idea about why conflict happens against another, rather than to test one
idea against a null model (a null model is one that hypothesizes that there is no
relationship between the variables).
In this assignment you will develop two ideas for causes of war. This is not a
research paper, or even a research design. But it is a start.
Begin by reading chapter 14 of Johnson and Reynolds ("J&R"). Although the example
they use is not from international relations, this chapter will give you some
guidance on how to develop your ideas. You should also read chapter 12 of
Blainey, "Vendetta of the Black Sea." In this chapter, Blainey notes that
Turkey and Russia fought a number of times from 1678 to 1878 (ten, according to
his count). He offers a number of possible explanations for these repeated
conflicts. Note there is nothing about these explanations that is particularly
unique to Turkey and Russia, but that is the only pair of countries that you will
consider. In this assignment you will take two of the ideas that Blainey
presents in chapter 12 and develop them.
What to Do
- Take one of the ideas from chapter 12. Explain how war happens if the
idea is correct. If we think of the idea as "X leads to war," then your
task is to explain the process by which X leads to war. You can begin to do
this by "telling a story" (explaining a hypothetical sequence by which X
leads to war), or by presenting a historical example (understanding that
neither you nor I are world-class historians). This is the most important
part of your research. You have to be able to explain how X leads to war.
For example (yes, I've used this example before), consider the assertion
that domestic unrest leads to international conflict. Sure, why not? But
what is the connection? Here is one story: domestic unrest increases in a
country (Why? Perhaps because of a poor economy.). As unrest increases,
the leadership of the country searches for an external enemy to deflect attention from the
domestic problems. The leadership begins by asserting that an enemy is
acting against the country. The leadership then acts militarily against the
country. This action rallies the public to support the leadership. Take a
closer look at the story. It begins with domestic difficulties. So when
one tries to test this idea, you have to identify the nature of these
difficulties. It would be great if you could then determine what country is
the likely target of the leadership's action. But that may not be possible.
But if we follow the logic of the story, it would seem that the leadership would
initiate the conflict against the other country. If you think this makes
sense then you have just added something to the model: the prediction that
the leadership will initiate conflict. So if you find that the country with
domestic unrest is the target of a conflict, this does not support the model.
I realize this seems like a simple process. And in some ways it is. But it
is critical to moving from a vague and interesting idea to something that
can be subjected to an explicit test.
- Do the same thing for the second idea.
- Develop several hypotheses from each idea; be sure to state them in
a formal and explicit manner. Keep in mind that ideally, you want to compare
the two ideas. So it would be nice if the hypotheses you develop would help
you do this. You might want to review pages 113-119 in chapter 4 of J&R;
these pages discuss the characteristics of good hypotheses. In a perfect world
your hypotheses would be central to the theories you are testing, and also
allow you to draw some conclusions as to which of the two theories provides
a better explanation for what happened.
- What information (data) would you use to test the ideas? Obivously, I
don't expect you to do an exhaustive search for information. But I want you
to make some effort because the information that is (and is not) available to
you will have a significant impact on your research; in the worst case, a
lack of available information will limit your research or even prevent you
from conducting it. You should look over the following websites to find
data to test the theories:
- The Correlates of War Project.
I have mentioned various datasets from the COW Project (yes, that is how
people refer to it) throughout the course. Data developed by the COW
Project are widely used in international relations research.
- Paul Hensel's website.
Hensel maintains an extensive series of links to various data sources.
Many IR scholars will start their search for available data by going to
his website. But note that Paul Hensel can't control whether websites
disappear. But if you do find a broken link, please let me know so that
I can inform him.
Guidelines for Your Report.
The simplest way to prepare your report is to use the following guidelines.
- Present the first idea. Begin by indicating what Blainey has to say
about it. Then you need to "tell your story." Explain how war will happen
if the idea is correct. Be sure to provide a complete chain of reasoning.
This is not necessarily a difficult thing to do. But it is easy to skip over
or ignore one or more steps. This is the heart of any good research project.
It should also help you derive hypotheses. If you take less than half a page
to do this, your probably have not said enough about the idea. But you should
not need to write more than a page and a half for this part of the assignment.
- Present two (or more if you want) hypotheses that you derive from the idea.
The presentation of the hypotheses should not take more than half a page.
- Present the data you would use to test the hypotheses. Indicate the
precise data you will use. Be sure to include the link(s) to the sources for
all of your data. Also indicate what years will be part of your research.
While Blainey talks about the years 1678 to 1878, the data sources you find
may require you to examine a different time period. This presentation should
take between a half page and a full page.
- Repeat the same steps for the second idea.
- Discuss the relationship between the hypotheses of the two ideas. If
you were to find support for the hypotheses of one idea, would that have
implications for the other idea? For example, if the hypotheses for the
first idea are supported, which of the following would be accurate:
- The hypotheses for the second idea will not be supported.
- The hypotheses for the second idea will be supported.
- There is no relationship between support for hypotheses from the
first idea and support for hypotheses from the second idea.
This should take no more than half a page.
You must include complete references. At a minimum, your references should
be: Blainey, Johnson and Reynolds, and the websites that contain the data
your propose to use. If you consult any other sources, they should be
included in the references as well. Needless to say, failure to include a
complete set of references would be an Honor Code violation, and you don't
want to do that.
Honor Code. The assignment is pledged. Do not consult with anyone in the
class about it.