Introduction

This chapter presents a set of approaches to systematic explanation of specific empirical political and social phenomena. These approaches strive to create theoretical, generalizable knowledge with respect to the phenomena in question. In the search for terms of generalization, they differ from research that seeks an in-depth understanding and an ideographic description of the unique and singular aspects of a given empirical political or social phenomenon (see Bray, ch. 15). Rather, they concentrate on theory development and the use of empirical cases or observations as illustrations or as a way of testing hypotheses and theories (Von Wright 1971: 19). This type of social science strives to provide answers to ‘why’ questions by seeking to identify one or several antecedent factors (explanans) that are responsible for the occurrence of the event or behaviour in question (explanandum) (Nachmias and Frankfort-Nachmias 1976). As Gerring (2005: 170) puts it: ‘to be causal, the cause in question must generate, create, or produce the supposed effect’.

The procedures of explanation discussed here are all based on the ontological (unproven) assumptions that there are recognizable regularities and a recognizable order in the world ‘out there’. No causal argument can be made without making a number of assumptions about how the world works – ‘that there is a degree of order and structure and that change itself is patterned and can be understood’ (Nachmias and Frankfort-Nachmias 1976: 6–7).