Finally, some countries are not nation-states, either because they do not have a dominant ethnic majority, or because they have structured a more decentralized political system of power for semi-autonomous or autonomous regions. Belgium, for example, is a federal constitutional monarchy with a parliamentary system with three highly autonomous regions: Flanders, Wallonia and the Brussels-Capital Region. The European Union is an interesting case of a supranational political union of 28 states with a single legal system and an internal economic market. In the 1950s, the EU was born out of economic agreements between Western European countries and today is one of the largest single markets in the world and generates about a quarter of the world`s economic output. In addition to a parliament, the EU government, based in Brussels, Belgium, has a law enforcement commission, a judiciary and two councils, one for national ministers of member states and one for heads of state or government of member states. The EU`s complex political system allows for different and overlapping levels of legal and political authority. Some member states have anti-EU movements in their countries that largely share concerns about a loss of political and cultural autonomy in their countries. The UK`s decision to leave the EU, known as “Brexit”, has been a complex and controversial process. Comparative politics focuses its study of politics on a method, not on a specific object of study. This makes it unique, as all other subfields are focused on a major topic or area of study.
The comparative method is one of the four main methodological approaches in the sciences (the others are the statistical method, the experimental method and the case study method). The method consists of analyzing the relationship between different or similar variables. Comparative politics often uses this comparative method for two or more countries and evaluates a particular variable in those countries, such as a political structure, institution, behaviour or policy. For example, you may be interested in the form of representative democracy that best leads to consensus in government. You can compare majoritarian and proportional representation systems, such as those in the United States and Sweden, and assess the degree of consensus that develops in those governments. Conversely, you can take two proportional systems such as Sweden and the UK and assess whether there are differences in the search for consensus between similar forms of representative government. While comparative politics often makes comparisons between countries, it can also benchmark within a country and examine different governments or political phenomena over time. It was not considered that the task of the seminar was to formulate narrow, medium and policy-oriented problems exhaustively, but some typical problems were proposed by way of illustration: an analysis of the relationship between the power of dissolution and ministerial stability in parliamentary systems would fall under the narrow range theory. An examination of the political consequences of rapid industrialization in underdeveloped regions of the world would fall under the field theory. The problems of political orientation were as follows: the establishment of a constitutional Government in the colonial territories; how to deal with political instability in France; how to separate colonial nationalism from Soviet-inspired leadership and ideology; Determine the policy of constitutional regimes towards totalitarian parties, e.g. the Communist Party. The rational approach emphasizes an individual`s role in a nation and how they are supposed to make rational decisions that benefit both the nation and their own causes.
The third alternative approach to the study of comparative politics is the more systematic use of the concept of territory. However, neither geographical, historical, economic or cultural similarities constitute prima facie evidence of the existence of similar political characteristics. If the concept of zone is to make operational sense for comparison purposes, it should correspond to uniform policy models that allow for comparative analysis and explanation of differences. When working in the field, knowledge of local languages is crucial. Conducting interviews and field observations requires knowledge of the common languages spoken in the region. Scholarships are available from the U.S. Department of State and academic institutions for doctoral students (and in some cases, promising students) for language programs. The best environment for learning a foreign language is immersive – ideally, students should spend time in areas where they have research interests to become familiar with the language(s) and cultural practices. For example, if one wanted to conduct a comparative research project on political developments in Kosovo and Abkhazia – two separatist autonomous republics of similar size and population that are key sites in the geopolitical struggle between the West and Russia – it would be necessary to know Albanian (the dominant language of Kosovo) and Abkhazian. But it can also be useful to deal with Serbian, Russian and Georgian. The study of comparative politics cannot wait for the development of a complete conceptual scheme.
Instead of aiming for universality, it might be wise to take a more modest approach. The seminar agreed that the problem-based approach was a step in that direction. It was pointed out that the formulation of a problem itself had certain characteristics of a conceptual scheme. It directs research towards various aspects of the policy process and at the same time calls for an order of empirical data and the formulation of hypothetical hypotheses or series of relationships. Moreover, this approach is flexible enough to guide the researcher in the study of questions that are both theoretical and empirical in scope. The seminar agreed that it would be extremely ambitious to answer these methodological questions in detail while focusing on empirical investigation. It was assumed that if we could do some groundwork on methodological issues, we would invite members of the profession to make comments and suggestions and to make them aware of the need to make its methodological position explicit before conducting comparative empirical research. Another factor is social stratification – differentiation in society based on wealth and status. In most developed societies, social stratification can be complex, overlapping and influenced by various group characteristics such as race or ethnicity and gender. Social stratification can lead to political stratification – different levels of access, representation, influence, and control of political power in government.
This derived power can, in turn, reinforce social stratification in various ways. For example, a country`s rich and privileged may have derived political power from their wealth and, in turn, may shape and influence government to protect and increase its wealth, influence, and privileges. With the comparative method of political inquiry, political scientists can study the extent to which social stratification influences political processes across countries.
