Research in the interdisciplinary field, which is aimed at the use of techniques and methods in the knowledge of the conduct of the state strategy, is carried out by the political sciences. Thus, personnel are trained to solve various problems of the life of the state. The political sciences are purely applied, in contrast to the "pure" sciences. The range of problems in this area is extremely wide, so absolutely any disciplines can adjoin political ones, not only social sciences, but also physical, biological, mathematical, sociological ones.
Most closely related to the approach used by the political sciences are political science, sociology, management, law, municipal and state administration, history. Ways of knowing are also often borrowed from areas of such frontier disciplines as operations research, systems analysis, cybernetics, general systems theory, game theory, and so on. All this becomes the subject of study if it helps to find a solution to issues of national importance, whichengaged in political science.
Goals and means
Research is directed in such a way as to clarify goals, evaluate alternatives, recognize trends and analyze the situation, and then develop a specific policy for solving public problems. There is no need to talk about fundamental values here, but a proposition of fact to be investigated, which is what political science does. The development of political science is faster if its representatives independently participate in the choice of ends, reason about the suitability or unsuitability of means, lay out possible choices and foresee the consequences of alternative options.
Most modern and historical political systems have always given and continue to give one of the most important places "at the helm" to highbrow experts who provide their knowledge and skills to the main developers of government policy. But a truly scientific, coordinated, multidisciplinary approach to the effectiveness of public policy has been developed not so long ago. The formation of political science did not begin until 1951, when this term was coined by the American psychologist, and later by the political scientist Harold Lasswell. Since that time, scientists and political scientists have been purposefully making an individual contribution to the entire structure of ensuring state policy. And interdisciplinary cooperation is really effective.
Enforce policyscience
What do political sciences study? They investigate everything, depending on the situation. This is very clearly seen in the participation in the development of strategy of such a discipline as systems analysis, which develops first the planning, then the programming, then the financing of each specific government program. The boundaries between disciplines are blurring more and more, and politicians seriously expect that they will disappear altogether soon. This course of events is characterized by the fact that a variety of scientific knowledge is integrated into the political process. Perhaps they are right, and what they study political science will make them a supra-discipline.
Here it should be taken into account that this is by no means political science itself (that is, a big political science), - it is rather what is put in the title - the scientific support of the state strategy. The term, which has already come into use, is applied political science, a kind of institute of political science, dealing with the patterns of the emergence of various phenomena in the work of a huge state machine. These are both relations and processes related to the life of the country. Applied political science is also busy looking for ways, forms of functioning, development and management methods in political processes, it takes care of both political consciousness and culture.
Probably there is no area where political science would not find its application. The development of political science cannot be stopped, since it covers almost all human activity. Political science as a pure science studies the real state of the political life of states,but the applied one is aimed at researching and accumulating knowledge about political processes, as well as transferring them to the widest possible range of people.
Objects and objects
It is necessary to distinguish between the objective reality, which does not depend on the cognizing subject, and the subject of research itself, that is, certain properties, qualities, facets of the object under study. The subject is always chosen in connection with the tasks and goals of a particular study, and the object itself is a given that does not depend on anything. The object can be investigated by as many sciences as you like.
Social class, for example, is studied by psychology, sociology, political science, enthology, and a number of other sciences. However, each of them in this object has its own methods and its own subject of research. Philosophers, apologists for speculative and contemplative science, explore in the social class the enduring problems of human existence, historians will help to compile a chronology of events in the development of a given social class, while economists will trace aspects of the life of this part of society characteristic of their science. This is how modern political science gets its real meaning in the life of the state.
But political scientists study in the same object everything that is associated with the word "politics" in people's lives. These are political structure, institutions, relationships, personality traits, behavior, and so on (one could go on and on). All this means that the object of study for political scientists is the political sphere of society, sincethe researcher cannot change it in any way. The subjects of political research can not only be different, but depending on the degree of study and propaganda, they may well be changed for the better (although there are reverse examples when the result was too dependent on the human factor and the goals were set incorrectly in relation to other political systems, but this is already international -political science, more on that below).
Method and direction
Applied political science is a multifunctional science that uses a variety of directions and methods in research according to the materials of the disciplines involved in the work. By studying certain categories of political science, humanity gains power over the course of the historical development of society, replenishes the arsenal with effective methods of influence, acquiring specific research methods. Of the most basic areas of research are political institutions, and this is the state and power, law, various parties, social movements, that is, all kinds of formalized or not political institutions. What is meant by this term? This is one or another area of politics with a set of established norms and rules, principles and traditions, as well as with relations that can be somehow regulated.
The methodology of political science will help to consider, for example, the institution of the presidency with its rules for the election procedure, limits of competence, methods of removal from office, and so on. An equally important direction is the study of political phenomena and processes, where the identified objective laws are studied, analyzedlaws of development of the entire system of society, political technologies are being developed for their practical application in this area. The third direction explores political consciousness, psychology and ideology, culture of behavior, motivation, ways of communication and methods of managing all these phenomena.
History of Political Science
Theoretical generalization of knowledge about politics was first attempted in antiquity. Most of these studies were based on speculative philosophical and ethical ideas. The philosophers of this trend, Aristotle and Plato, were mainly interested not in some real state, but in an ideal one, in what it should be in their ideas. Further, in the Middle Ages, Western European concepts had a religious dominant, and therefore political theories had corresponding interpretations, since any thought, including a political one, could develop only in the territories of the theological paradigm. The directions of political science have not yet developed, and the prerequisites for this will appear very soon.
Political ideas were interpreted as one of the many areas of theology, where the highest authority is God. The civic concept appeared in political thought only in the seventeenth century, which gave some impetus to the emergence and development of truly independent methods for studying current political processes. The works of Montesquieu, Locke, Burke became the basis of the institutional method, which is so widely used in modern applied political science, although political science itself has not yet taken shape. This concept took shape only in the twentieth century. Nevertheless, in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, it was precisely the study of political institutions that the best minds engaged in their work. And what this method is, you need to consider in more detail.
Institutional method
This method, as mentioned above, can be used to study various political institutions: states, organizations, parties, movements, electoral systems and many other regulators of processes in society. The stages of political science in its consistent development can be continued with studies of the external activities of states and the international political process. Institutionalization is the ordering, standardization and formalization of social relations in the studied sphere of human life. Thus, when using this method, it is assumed that a large part of society recognizes the legitimacy of such a social institution and that the legal registration of relations and the establishment of rules that are uniform for the whole society and regulate all social life will be able to ensure the planned behavior of all subjects in social interaction.
This method drives the process of institutionalization. Applied political science, by this very method, checks political institutions for their legal legitimacy, social legitimacy and mutual compatibility. It must be remembered here that the concept of institutional agreement is of key importance for the development of society. Any violations that have already becomegenerally accepted institutional norms, as well as the transition to new rules of the game without convincing grounds, lead to social conflicts of varying severity. When applying the institutional method of research, the political sphere becomes visible as an integral system of social institutions that have their own structures and rules for their activities.
Sociological, anthropological and psychological methods
The sociological method of research is called upon to reveal the social conditioning of phenomena. It allows you to better reveal the nature of power, to define its strategy as the interaction of huge social communities. Applied political science combines for this purpose various social political sciences that are engaged in the collection and analysis of real facts, that is, specific sociological research. Thus, the foundation is laid for the work of political strategists focused on applying the results in the practice of building plans for the further development of the political process under study.
The anthropological method analyzes the political phenomenon, if only the collectivist essence of the individual is considered. According to Aristotle, a person cannot live alone, apart, because he is a political being. However, evolutionary development shows how long it takes to improve the social organization in order to reach the stage when it will be possible to move on to the political organization of the society where a person is constantly trying to isolate himself.
Motivation and other behavioral mechanisms are considered by a researcher using the psychological method of research. As a scientific direction, this method arose in the nineteenth century, however, it was based on the ideas of Confucius, Seneca, Aristotle, and scientists of the New Age - Rousseau, Hobbes, Machiavelli - supported the ancient thinkers. Here the most important link is psychoanalysis developed by Freud, where processes in the unconscious are studied that can have a significant impact on the behavior of the individual, including the political one.
Comparative method
Comparative, or comparative, method came to our days from ancient times. Even Aristotle and Plato compared various political regimes and determined the correctness and incorrectness of the forms of statehood, and then constructed, in their opinion, ideal ways of arranging the world order. Now the comparative method is quite widely used in applied political science, even a separate branch has grown - comparative political science - and has become a completely independent direction in the general structure of political science.
The essence of this method is to compare different and similar phenomena - regimes, movements, parties, political systems or their decisions, methods of development, and so on. So you can easily identify the special and the common in any objects under study, as well as more objectively assess the realities and identify patterns, which means finding the most optimal solutions to problems. After analyzing, for example, two hundred different states and howa greater number of their characteristic features, all similar and different features are selected by the method of comparison, similar phenomena are typologized, and possible alternatives are identified. And you can use the experience of other states, developing your own. Comparison is the best means of acquiring knowledge.
Behaviorism in political science
The behavioral method is based on purely empirical observations. The social behavior of the individual and individual groups is studied. Priority is given to the study of individual characteristics. That is, the social political sciences do not participate in these studies. This method was considered and studied the electoral behavior of voters, and also with its help, pre-election technologies were developed. Despite the fact that behaviorism has made a significant contribution to the development of empirical research methods, as well as to the development of applied political science, the area of application of this method is rather limited.
The main drawback of behaviorism is that they give priority to the study of separate, isolated from the general structure and social environment, atomized groups or individuals. This method does not take into account either historical traditions or moral principles. Everything about him is pure rationality. Not that this method is bad. It is not universal. America fits. But Russia, for example, is not. If a society is deprived of the natural roots from which its history has grown, each individual in it is like an atom, he knows only external limitations, since he feels the pressure of other atoms. The internal restrictions of suchthere is no individual, he is not burdened by traditions or moral values. This is a free player, and he has one goal - to beat the rest.
A lot in short
Systems analysis, widely used in applied political science, was developed by Plato and Aristotle, continued by Marx and Spencer and finalized by Easton and Almond. This is an alternative to behaviorism, since it considers the entire political sphere as an integral self-regulating system that is located in the external environment and actively interacts with it. Using a theory common to all systems, system analysis helps to streamline ideas about the political sphere, systematize the variety of events, and build a model of action. Then the object under study appears as a single organism, whose properties are in no way the sum of the properties of its individual elements.
The method of synergetics is relatively new and comes from the natural sciences. Its essence is that structures that lose order can self-organize in chemical and physical processes. This is a rather complex and weighty part of applied political science, which allows you to take a fresh look not only at the causes and forms of the development of matter, but also acquire a new understanding of historical processes in social, economic, political and many other spheres of human life.
Sociology, in collaboration with political science, gave birth to the so-called theory of social action. Previously, she viewed society as a unity, but industrialization, and subsequentlypost-industrialization has created a situation where individual social movements make their own history, creating problem fields and arranging social conflicts. If earlier it was possible to appeal to justice in a temple or in a palace, then in modern conditions this will not help. Moreover, sacred concepts have practically disappeared. In their place, fundamental conflicts grow instead of a world of higher justice. The subjects of such political conflicts are no longer parties, not classes, but social movements.
Theoretical political science develops general methods for the study of the public political sphere. However, all theories are somehow always aimed at practical problems and are able to solve them in most cases. Applied political science studies each specific political situation, obtains the necessary information, develops political forecasts, gives practical advice and recommendations, and solves emerging social and political problems. For this purpose, the above methods of political research have been developed and repeatedly used. Applied political science does not just describe political systems, phenomena and relationships, it tries to identify patterns, trends, analyzes the development of social relations and the functioning of political institutions. In addition, her vigilant attention is the study of the essential aspects of the object, the motivating forces for political activity and the principles on which this activity is built.
