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.
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Notes
3 This phrase is usually attributed to the American author, Elbert Hubbard.
4 Although my argument is similar in key respects to the important formulations of George (1979), Campbell (1975), Bennett and George (2005), I adopt a slightly different term for it in order to associate it with the very specific conditions I consider crucial to its practice. However, I want to acknowledge here the similarity and fruitfulness of these prior formulations.
5 This section draws on Hall (2003).
6 When I use the term ‘predictions’, I refer not only (or even primarily) to future developments but to predictions about patterns observable in data gathered from past events.
7 Although not strictly entailed by the method, as Weber (1949) advises, the investigator should also ask whether each theory is consistent with the meanings the historical actors themselves attributed to their actions.
8 In a work larger than the article discussed here, Owen (1997) considers an additional eight cases, gaining further comparative leverage. Although his own theory was developed in the context of these cases, as he notes, there would be stronger grounds for causal inference if the theory had been developed in some cases and then tested in others.
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Acknowledgements
I am grateful to Hervé Dumez for comments on a previous version of this essay and to Sidney Verba and Robert Putnam, who may not agree with all that is written here but from whom I first learned much of what I know about social science methodology. For support while this essay was written, I acknowledge the Wissenschaftskolleg zu Berlin.
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This paper was first published in European Management Review 3(1): 24–31. Reprinted with kind permission from Peter Hall and the European Academy of Management.
2 For discussion of this issue see: Roberts (1996) and Taylor (1971).
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Hall, P. Systematic Process Analysis: when and how to use it. Eur Polit Sci 7, 304–317 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1057/palgrave.eps.2210130
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/palgrave.eps.2210130