How Political Science Interpretive and Mixed Methods can Deter the Coming Cold War between China and the USA
In a recent paper, published online by the American Political Science Association preprint service and Cambridge University Press [1], I showed that there are three key standards for assessing the goodness of any political system. The first is that the social interactions under consideration fit the definition of a “political system,” as defined by David Easton. That is, behavior undertaken in relation to the authoritative allocation of values. The second standard is that of the system’s operational goodness. That is, its efficiency and effectiveness at the allocation of values. The third standard is the way people living in the system feel about their experience in it. That is, population affect. Assessing that affect requires the political scientist to focus on the politically relevant feelings of the people, especially what Easton means by the term “political happiness.” [2] The paper shows why, within this interpretive framework, population affect is the most important index of a p...