UCL - Political Science and Comparative politics Seminar

[SPRI2075]

[15h] 5 credits

Teacher(s): Benoît Rihoux

Language: French

Level: Second

Aims
Main themes
Content and teaching methods
Other information (prerequisite, evaluation (assessment methods), course materials recommended readings, ...)

Aims

The aim of this seminar is to provide training from A to Z (introductory to intermediate) on " Qualitative Com-parative Analysis " (QCA) both as an approach and as a set of specific techniques. After this seminar, the stu-dent should be able to apply QCA (including the software treatment) on some applied topic of his/her choice.

Main themes

Sequence of topics : How to move from single case studies to cross-case comparison ; 'small N' or 'intermedi-ate N' research designs ; Approach and assumptions of QCA ; complex causality ; QCA as a technique : csQCA, mvQCA and fsQCA ; concrete applications on macro-, meso- and micro-level cases ; complementarity with " case-oriented " research.

Content and teaching methods

The seminar is taugh in a classroom, followed by practical " hands-on " project work by the students, also pre-sented in the seminar sessions.

Other information (prerequisite, evaluation (assessment methods), course materials recommended readings, ...)

Evaluation : project reports and presentations.L