The logic of comparative development theory

Abstract

Although the politics of change is not exactly a novel focus of analysis in political science, political theory has only recently attempted to deal systematically with the study of political development and with the comparison of political systems at different stages of developmental change. This thesis attempts a detailed logical analysis and synthesis of the literature in this field, focussing in particular on the principal methods and models used by American political scientists to study the phenomena of political development. Almost all these scholars have been comparative theorists concerned with finding similarities and differences in political systems over time, and in comparing developmental experiences. They share an interest in the comparative study of change with a number of other social scientists whose works can be found adapted and reformulated in the literature on political development. Sociology, particularly the works of the traditional sociological theorists, and economics, from whence came the concept of development itself, have been the major sources of terminology and analytical approaches. This can be largely attributed to the fact that both economic development and social change have long been established areas of inquiry in social science. Nevertheless, the willingness on the part of political development theorists to utilize the conceptual frameworks of other disciplines, does reflect the conceptual sterility of their own discipline during the initial stages of the development of this field. Furthermore, the assimilation of analytic devices and vocabularies from other disciplines has frequently been uncritical and haphazard. One of the foremost attempts at cross-disciplinary borrowing - that of Gabriel Almond - is given intensive examination in Chapter One.