The DOI matches its Crossref record; 30 of the 30 references it cites were found in a registry or an index.
The Causal Logic of Critical Junctures
Abstract
Despite the fact that critical junctures are frequently deployed in historical analyses, we lack an explicit causal logic for them. This article proposes a distinction between permissive and productive conditions in critical junctures. Permissive conditions are necessary conditions that mark the loosening of constraints on agency or contingency and thus provide the temporal bounds on critical junctures. Productive conditions, which can take various logical forms, act within the context of these permissive conditions to produce divergence. I develop these concepts in detail and use classic analyses that apply the concept to show the implications of this new framework for the scope conditions, case selection, and theoretical completeness of historical analysis, as well as for broader issues in historical analysis such as the relationships between crisis and outcome, and between stability and change.
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Cites
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×
“This formulation explains why my definition of critical juncture does not encompass arguments like Skocpol (1979): Although she does identify two separate necessary but insufficient conditions for revolution that are jointly sufficient when they concur, they are not explicitly defined as temporally…”
BackgroundPolitics in Time: History, Institutions, and Social Analysis
Pierson, P. (2004) · doi:10.1515/9781400841080 · Cited by 4,957
Path dependence in historical sociology
Mahoney, J. (2000) · Theory and Society · doi:10.1023/a:1007113830879 · Cited by 3,469
Political Process and the Development of Black Insurgency, 1930-1970
McAdam, D. (1999) · University of Chicago Press eBooks · doi:10.7208/chicago/9780226555553.001.0001 · Cited by 3,168
Explaining Institutional Change: Ambiguity, Agency and Power
Gómez, A. (2014) · LA Referencia (Red Federada de Repositorios Institucionales de Publicaciones Científicas) · Cited by 2,665
Capoccia, G., & Kelemen, R. D. (2007) · World Politics · doi:10.1017/s0043887100020852 · Cited by 2,410 · cited 3×
“…duration of the permissive condition narrows—as the window for change is shorter—it becomes more causally relevant for divergence; this too is intuitively satisfying since it suggests that critical junctures become more important as they narrow temporally (Capoccia & Kelemen, 2007, pp. 350-351).”
BackgroundMethodInfluentialExplaining Institutional Change: Ambiguity, Agency, and Power
(2009) · Cambridge University Press eBooks · doi:10.1017/cbo9780511806414 · Cited by 1,939
Time Matters: On Theory and Method
Abbott, A. D. (2001) · Cited by 1,231
States and Social Revolutions: A Comparative Analysis of France, Russia, and China
Skocpol, T. (2015) · Cambridge University Press eBooks · doi:10.1017/cbo9781316423998 · Cited by 1,177
Context and Causal Mechanisms in Political Analysis
Falleti, T. G., & Lynch, J. F. (2009) · Comparative Political Studies · doi:10.1177/0010414009331724 · Cited by 909
Cited by
Critical Event Analysis in Case Study Research
García-Montoya, L., & Mahoney, J. (2023) · Sociological Methods & Research · doi:10.1177/0049124120926201 · Cited by 62
Sorensen, A. (2023) · Planning Perspectives · doi:10.1080/02665433.2022.2137840 · Cited by 62
Metadata
- Authors
- Soifer, H. D.
- Venue
- Comparative Political Studies
- Publisher
- SAGE Publications
- Published
- 2012-10-29
- Volume
- 45
- Issue
- 12
- Pages
- 1572-1597
- ISSN
- 0010-4140 (ISSN-L)
- 1552-3829
- OpenAlex
- W2141344981
- Cited by
- 409
- References
- 30
- FWCI
- 30.66
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
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