The Conduct of Inquiry in International Relations ─ Philosophy of Science and Its Implications for the Study of World Politics

There are many different scientifically valid ways to produce knowledge. The field of International Relations should pay closer attention to these methodological differences, and to their implications for concrete research on world politics.

The Conduct of Inquiry in International Relations provides an introduction to the philosophy of science issues and their implications for the study of global politics. The author draws attention to the problems caused by the misleading notion of a single unified scientific method, and proposes a framework that clarifies the variety of ways that IR scholars establish the authority and validity of their empirical claims. Jackson connects philosophical considerations with concrete issues of research design within neopositivist, critical realist, analyticist, and reflexive approaches to the study of world politics. Envisioning a pluralist science for a global IR field, this volume organizes the significant differences between methodological stances so as to promote internal consistency, public discussion, and worldly insight as the hallmarks of any scientific study of world politics.

In this second edition, Jackson has centralised the philisophical history into a discrete chapter, seeking to map more closely the way that philisophy of science is normally taught and explored. The central chapters feature more detailed and useful contemporary illustrations of the methodological commitments discussed and the work concludes with a new postscript -Science and its Alternatives where Jackson tackles his critics head on and seeks to continue the debate.

This important volume will be essential reading for all students and scholars of International Relations, Political Science and Philosophy of Science.

Patrick Thaddeus Jackson is Professor of International Relations and Associate Dean for Undergraduate Education in the School of International Service at the American University in Washington, DC. He is the author of Civilizing the Enemy (2006) and the co-editor of Civilizational Identity (2007).