The DOI matches its Crossref record; 7 of the 7 references it cites were found in a registry or an index.
Systematic Process Analysis: when and how to use it
Abstract
Challenging the contention that statistical methods applied to large numbers of cases invariably provide better grounds for causal inference, this article explores the value of a method of systematic process analysis that can be applied in a small number of cases. It distinguishes among three modes of explanation – historically specific, multivariate and theory-oriented – and argues that systematic process analysis has special value for developing theory-oriented explanations. It outlines the steps required to perform such analysis well and illustrates them with reference to Owen's investigation of the ‘democratic peace’. Comparing the results available from this kind of method with those from statistical analysis, it examines the conditions under which each method is warranted. Against conceptions of the ‘comparative method’, which imply that small- n case-studies provide weak grounds for causal inference, it argues that the intensive examination of a small number of cases can be an appropriate research design for testing such inferences.
Overview
Integrity signals
Registry
Cites
Statistics
Verification
Claims the paper makes
Citations
Cites
Increasing Returns, Path Dependence, and the Study of Politics
Pierson, P. (2000) · American Political Science Review · doi:10.2307/2586011 · Cited by 8,094 · cited 1×
“Path-dependent models of the polity often specify an accumulation of interaction effects over time, creating so many divergent contextual effects in the cases that it becomes unreasonable to expect the same causal factor to produce similar effects in each of them (Mahoney, 2000a; Pierson, 2000).”
BackgroundDesigning Social Inquiry: Scientific Inference in Qualitative Research
King, G., Keohane, R. O., & Verba, S. (1994) · Princeton University Press · doi:10.1515/9781400821211 · Cited by 7,225
States and Social Revolutions: A Comparative Analysis of France, Russia and China
Skocpol, T. (1979) · Cambridge University Press · doi:10.1017/cbo9780511815805 · Cited by 5,408 · cited 1×
“…long-standing conventional wisdom about how social science advances.4 Under one rubric or another, it has been practiced to good effect, albeit with some variation, by many scholars, including Moore (1966), Skocpol (1979), Collier and Collier (1991), Rueschemeyer et al. (1992) and Moravcsik (1998).”
BackgroundFalsification and the Methodology of Scientific Research Programmes
Lakatos, I. (1970) · Criticism and the Growth of Knowledge · doi:10.1017/cbo9781139171434.009 · Cited by 4,649 · cited 2×
“As the familiar adage has it, research in social science is most likely to advance when it focuses on a 'three-cornered fight' among a theory, a rival theory, and a set of empirical observations (Lakatos, 1970).”
Path dependence in historical sociology
Mahoney, J. (2000) · Theory and Society · doi:10.1023/a:1007113830879 · Cited by 3,469
The Comparative Method: Moving Beyond Qualitative and Quantitative Strategies
Ragin, C. C. (2014) · doi:10.1525/9780520957350 · Cited by 2,130
The Logic of Historical Explanation
Roberts, C. (1996) · doi:10.1515/9780271097657 · Cited by 108
Research works printed but not linked: 35
- Archer, M., Bhaskar, R., Collier, A., Lawson, T. and Norrie, A. (eds.) (1998) Critical Realism: Essential Readings, London: Routledge.
- Bates, R., Griet, A., Levi, M., Rosenthal, J.-L. and Weingast, B. (1998) Analytical Narratives, Princeton: Princeton University Press.
- Becker, H. (1992) ‘Cases, Causes, Conjunctures, Stories and Imagery’, in C.C. Ragin and H.S. Becker (eds.) What is a Case?, New York: Cambridge University Press, pp. 205–216.
- Bennett, A. and George, A. (2005) Case Studies and Theory Development in the Social Sciences, Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
- Campbell, D.T. (1975) ‘Degrees of freedom and the case study’, Comparative Political Studies 8: 178–193. · DOI
- Cartwright, N. (1997) ‘What is a Causal Structure?’, in V.R. McKim and S.P. Turner (eds.) Causality in Crisis? Statistical Methods and the Search for Causal Knowledge in the Social Sciences, Notre Dame, IN: Notre Dame University Press, pp. 342–358.
- Collier, D. (1991) ‘The Comparative Method: Two Decades of Change’, in D. Rustow and K. Erickson (eds.) Comparative Political Dynamics, New York: Harper Collins, pp. 7–31.
- Collier, R.B. and Collier, D. (1991) Shaping the Political Arena, Princeton: Princeton University Press.
- Doyle, M. (1983) ‘Kant, liberal legacies and foreign affairs Part I’, Philosophy and Public Affairs 12: 205–235.
- Doyle, M. (1986) ‘Liberalism and world politics’, American Political Science Review 80: 1151–1169. · DOI
- Eckstein, H. (1975) ‘Case Study and Theory in Macro-politics’, in F. Greenstein and N. Polsby (eds.) Handbook of Political Science, Vol. 1, Reading, MA: Addison Wesley, pp. 79–138.
- Elster, J. (2000) ‘Review essay: ‘analytical narratives’’, American Political Science Review 94: 685–695. · DOI
- Friedman, M. (1968) ‘The Methodology of Positive Economics’, in M. Brodbeck (ed.) Readings in the Philosophy of Social Science, New York: Macmillan, pp. 508–529.
- Geddes, B. (1990) ‘How the cases you choose affect the answers you get’, Political Analysis 2: 131–149. · DOI
- George, A. (1979) ‘Case Studies and Theory: the Method of Structured, Focused Comparison’, in P. Larson (ed.) Diplomacy: New Approaches to History, Theory and Policy, New York: Free Press, pp. 43–68.
- George, A. and McKeown, T.J. (1985) ‘Case studies and theories of organizational decision-making’, Advances in Information Processing in Organizations 2: 21–58.
- Hall, P.A. (2003) ‘Aligning Ontology and Methodology in Comparative Research’, in J. Mahoney and D. Rueschemeyer (eds.) Comparative Historical Analysis in the Social Sciences, New York: Cambridge University Press, pp. 373–406. · DOI
- Kuhn, T. (1970) The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
- Lijphart, A. (1971) ‘Comparative politics and the comparative method’, American Political Science Review 64: 682–693. · DOI · Paper page
- Lipset, S.M. (1959) ‘Some social requisites of democracy: economic development and political legitimacy’, American Political Science Review 53: 69–105. · DOI · Paper page
- Mahoney, J. (2000b) ‘Strategies of causal inference in small-Nanalysis’, Sociological Methods and Research 28: 387–424. · DOI
- Moon, D. (1975) ‘The Logic of Political Inquiry’, in F. Greenstein and N Polsby (eds.) Handbook of Political Science I, pp. 131–195.
- Moore Jr, B. (1966) Social Origins of Dictatorship and Democracy, Boston: Beacon Press.
- Moravcsik, A. (1998) The Choice for Europe, Ithaca: Cornell University Press.
- O'Donnell, G. and Schmitter, P. (eds.) (1986) Transitions from Authoritarian Rule, Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press.
- Owen IV, J.M. (1994) ‘How liberalism produces democratic peace’, International Security 19: 87–125. · DOI
- Owen IV, J.M. (1997) Liberal Peace, Liberal War: American Politics and International Security., Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.
- Przeworski, A. and Teune, H. (1970) The Logic of Comparative Social Inquiry, New York: Wiley.
- Ragin, C.C. (1987) The Comparative Method, Berkeley: University of California Press.
- Rueschemeyer, D., Stephens, E.H. and Stephens, J.D. (1992) Capitalist Development and Democracy, Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
- Stone, L. (1972) The Causes of the English Revolution, New York: Harper and Row.
- Taylor, C. (1971) ‘Interpretation and the sciences of man’, Review of Metaphysics 25: 3–51.
- Wallerstein, M. (2000) ‘Trying to navigate between Scylla and Charybdis: misspecified and unidentified models in comparative politics’, APSA-CP: Newsletter for the Organized Section in Comparative Politics of the American Political Science Association 11: 1–21.
- Waltz, K. (1979) A Theory of International Relations, Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley.
- Weber, M. (1949) The Methodology of the Social Sciences, New York: Free Press.
Cited by
Sorted by citations
Items 201–214 of 214
Avlijaš, S. (2018) · Sociologija · doi:10.2298/soc1801035a
“…assumptions about the nonlinear structure of causal relationships between the independent variables and their interaction with the dependent variable also point to the theory-oriented explanation as the most appropriate methodological approach for the research question of interest (Hall, 2006: 25).”
BackgroundMethodInfluentialThe Case of Case Study Research in Europe: Practice and Potential
Haverland, M., & van der Veer, R. A. (2016) · Palgrave Macmillan UK eBooks · doi:10.1057/978-1-137-55269-3_58
Gottschall, K., Kittel, B., Briken, K., Heuer, J., Hils, S., Streb, S., & Tepe, M. (2015) · Palgrave Macmillan UK eBooks · doi:10.1057/9781137313119_3 · Cited by 2
Beach, D. (2012) · European Political Science · doi:10.1057/eps.2012.5 · Cited by 10
“14 Question 2: Peter Hall states that it is desirable to ‘apply systematic process analysis to several cases’ (Hall, 2006: 30), but is the type of causal inference made between cases the same here as in the individual case analysis?”
BackgroundSymbiosis in the Sahara and SahelPreprint
Provoost, M. (2024) · Social Science Research Network · doi:10.2139/ssrn.4704133
Explaining Causes and Dynamics of Policy Change and Policy Deadlock
McKeever, A. (2020) · Springer eBooks · doi:10.1007/978-3-030-41761-1_2
From Macro to Micro Evidence: Supranational Strategies, Local Interpretations
Scalise, G. (2020) · The Political Economy of Policy Ideas · doi:10.1007/978-3-030-55750-8_5
Regional Policymaking and Policy Divergence
Dupuy, C. (2020) · Springer eBooks · doi:10.1007/978-3-030-40834-3_1
Kaleja, A. (2019) · doi:10.11588/heidok.00025995
“…Hall (2003, p. 397-398) can be particularly useful methodologies in situations when a universal explanatory theory is lacking, because it advances a multitude of observations that can contribute to refining existing theories or propose new modes of explanation (Hall and Taylor, 1996; Hall, 2006).”
BackgroundIntroduction: Multilevel Labor Activism, Transnational Institutions, and China
Zajak, S. (2017) · Palgrave Macmillan US eBooks · doi:10.1057/978-1-349-95022-5_1
Cotta, B. (2016) · doi:10.2870/766609
Adding “Some Flesh to the Bones”: Illustrative Case Studies of Four Diverse Cases Over Seven Decades
Garritzmann, J. L. (2016) · Springer eBooks · doi:10.1007/978-3-319-29913-6_3
The Case Study of Bonfol Chemical Landfill: Logic of Selection, Data and Methods
Dupuis, J., & Knoepfel, P. (2014) · Springer eBooks · doi:10.1007/978-3-319-11307-4_4
Metadata
- Authors
- Hall, P. A.
- Affiliations
- Harvard University (US)
- Corresponding author
- Hall, Peter A
- ORCID
- Hall, Peter A
- Venue
- European Political Science
- Publisher
- Cambridge University Press (CUP)
- Published
- 2008-08
- Volume
- 7
- Issue
- 3
- Pages
- 304-317
- ISSN
- 1680-4333 (ISSN-L)
- 1682-0983
- OpenAlex
- W2037420462
- Cited by
- 143
- References
- 0
- Citations by year
- 2026: 5 · 2025: 15 · 2024: 7 · 2023: 1 · 2022: 6 · 2021: 20 · 2020: 5 · 2019: 6 · 2018: 8 · 2017: 3 · 2016: 10 · 2015: 8 · 2014: 9 · 2013: 11 · 2012: 13
- FWCI
- 18.52
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Licence
- www.springer.com/tdm (tdm)
- Locations
- European Political Science (publishedVersion)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Qualitative Comparative Analysis Research
- Social Sciences › Political Science and International Relations › Political Science Research and Education
- Social Sciences › Arts and Humanities › History and Philosophy of Science › Philosophy of Biology and Scientific Explanation
- Keywords
- causal inference, comparative analysis, democratic peace, research design
About these checks
Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.
Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.
Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.
What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›
Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review