POLITICAL SCIENCE.

SCOPE AND CONCEPTS

Prof. Dr. Daniel BARBU

The course grows out of a specific theoretical assumption: the way we study politics usually abides by the politics we study. That is to say, in opposition to the behavioral tradition, that political science should be more realist than scientist, i.e. more about politics than about science. Is there a hard science in political science? Is there a real explanation of politics and a fair understanding of the political in political science? The course focuses on the different answers that were given to these questions, and explores a variety of themes that epitomize some of the critical concerns raised by the fact that political scientists tend to discuss their epistemological choices at separate tables, as Gabriel Almond famously argued. Indeed, if political science governs a realm of unreason, determined by a plurality of research objects such as power, participation, government, and the state, it does so according to its own rational self, set by political judgment, scientific knowledge, and the different languages of science and of politics itself. Assessing the evolution of political science as a autonomous academic discipline in the making, the course will probe, the scope and methods of political science deemed as a disciplinary matrix, in Thomas Kuhns words, that is as a series of instructions as to where and how to look for what politics is, or can be, and does, or may do. GENERAL BIBLIOGRAPHY ALMOND Gabriel A., A Discipline Divided. Schools and Sects in Political Science, Sage Publications, Newbury Park and London, 1990. BALL Terence (editor), Idioms of Inquiry. Critique and Renewal in Political Science, State University of New York Press, Albany, 1987. DUNN John, The Cunning of Unreason. Making Sense of Politics, Basic Books, New York, 2000. FARR James, John S. DRYZEK, Stephen T. LEONARD (editors), Political Science in History. Research Programs and Political Traditions, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge and New York, 1995. EASTON David, John G. GUNNELL, and Luigi GRAZIANO (editors), The Development of Political Science. A Comparative Survey, Routlege, London and New York, 1991. EASTON David, John G. GUNNELL, and Michael B. STEIN (editors), Regime and Discipline. Democracy and the Development of Political Science, The University of Michigan Press, Ann Arbor, 1995. RICCI David M., The Tragedy of Political Science. Politics, Scholarship and Democracy, Yale University Press, New Haven and London, 1984. REQUIREMENTS AND EVALUATION The attribution of the 5 credits is conditional on the capacity of each student to devote to this course 5 hours of intellectual work per week, 3 hours in class and 2 hours of individual study. This capacity is measured by the following factors: Active participation in class, at least 10 attendances being required (20% of the final grade). A mid-term paper of 10 000 characters (40% of the final grade). Based on at least 5 references, other than dictionaries and the course bibliography, the paper will analyze the particular approach to political science of an author that had significantly influenced the discipline. The paper should comply with the rules of the manual of style available on the Departments website. Final written exam (40% of the final grade). Students should prove thorough knowledge of the courses references and of the topics addressed by the lectures. Successful completion of the requirements above is sanctioned by a grade not higher than 8 (B). Students willing to be graded A, or 9-10 (the remaining 20% of the final grade), should submit an additional paper in the last week of the course and defend it in an oral exam. The paper will be a 10 000 character draft of a research project in political science. At any time individual students may be asked in class to write within a week occasional papers on given topics; failure to comply might lead to the rebuttal of credits. Students should be aware of the Departments policy of academic integrity: cheating, falsification, forgery, multiple subsission, plagiarism, complicity and computer misuse will result in the invalidation of both grade and credits. Courses program Week I. October 9th Introduction: aims and methods of the course LOWI Theodore J., The State in Political Science: How We Become What we Study, American Political Science Review, vol. 86, no. 1, 1992, pp. 1-7. Week II. October 16th Politics: the object of political science SARTORI Giovanni, What is Politics?, Political Theory, vol. I, no. 1, 1973, pp. 5-26.

Week III. October 23rd The science of politics before political science HUME David, That politics may be reduced to a science, in IDEM, Political Essays, edited by Knud HAAKONSSEN, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1994, pp. 4-15. Week IV. October 30th Political science, an American academic discipline? FARR James, From modern republic to administrative state: the American political science in the Nineteenth Century, in EASTON David, John G. GUNNELL, and Michael B. STEIN, editors, Regime and Discipline. Democracy and the Development of Political Science, The University of Michigan Press, Ann Arbor, 1995, pp. 131-167. Week V. November 6th The make up of modern political science LASSWELL Harold D., Politics. Who gets What, When, How, Peter Smith, New York, 1950 [McGraw-Hill, 1936], pp. 233-250. Week VI. November 13th The behavioral revolution I RICCI David M., The Tragedy of Political Science. Politics, Scholarship and Democracy, Yale University Press, New Haven and London, 1984, pp. 133-175. Week VII. November 20th The behavioral revolution II RICCI David M., The Tragedy of Political Science. Politics, Scholarship and Democracy, Yale University Press, New Haven and London, 1984, pp. 133-175. Week VIII. November 27th Political science in France LECA Jean, French Political Science and its subfields: Some Reflections on the Intellectual Organization of the Discipline in Relation to its Historical and Social Situation, in EASTON David, John G. GUNNELL, and Luigi GRAZIANO (editors), The Development of Political Science. A Comparative Survey, Routlege, London and New York, 1991, pp. 147-186. Week IX. December 4th Political science in Great Britain HAYWARD Jack, Cultural and Contextual Constraints upon the Development of Political Science in Grat Britain, in EASTON David, John G. GUNNELL, and Luigi GRAZIANO (editors), The Development of Political Science. A Comparative Survey, Routlege, London and New York, 1991, pp. 93-105. Week X. December 11th Political science in Italy GRAZIANO Luigi, The Development and institutionalization of Political Science in Italy, in EASTON David, John G. GUNNELL, and Luigi GRAZIANO (editors), The Development of Political Science. A Comparative Survey, Routlege, London and New York, 1991, pp. 127-146. Week XI. December 18th Crisis and regeneration of political science I ALMOND Gabriel A., A Discipline Divided. Schools and Sects in Political Science, Sage Publications, Newbury Park and London, 1990, pp 13-31. Week XII. January 8th Crisis and regeneration of political science II ISAAC Jeffrey C., After Empiricism: The Realist Alternative, in BALL Terence (editor), Idioms of Inquiry. Critique and Renewal in Political Science, State University of New York Press, Albany, 1987, pp. 187-205. Week XIII. January 15th The rise of political science in Romania BARBU Daniel, From the Politics of Science to the Science of Politics: The Difficult Make Up of the Romanian Political Science, Studia Politica. Romanian Political Science Review, vol. II, no. 1, 2002, pp. 273-295. WRITTEN EXAM