№ 6 - 2001
Ilyin M.V.
Basic Methodological Problems of Comparative Political Science

Comparative political science having been defined in the beginning of his article as a discipline mediating between political theory (as well as other branches of nomothetical knowledge) and descriptive, ideographic disciplines, the author then specifies with more exactness the position of comparative research within the dimensions of political science as a whole, as well as its subject and method. Comparative political science is qualified as a discipline empirical in a strict sense of the word, that traces correlation between universal vision of reality and its unique description, applying for the purpose methodological devices it specially creates. The article contains a detailed review of types of comparative studies, whether methodologically pure, or pragmatic, that correspond with prevalent sets of research problems and strategies of their solution. A good deal of care is given in the article to the analysis of the existing approaches to the solution of the key dilemmas of comparative research: «cases vs. parameters» and «delimitation vs. taking account of the influence of the context».