Chapter 5. A. The Flow of Political Science and This Book

Chapter 5. Theoretical Discussions

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A. The Flow of Political Science and This Book

 

What is politics? And what is political science? Politics is the art of acquiring and using power. (Based on the discussions so far) Power is the act of controlling cooperative relationships between people. Therefore, political science can be considered the study of the mechanisms that control human interactions.

 

There are other social sciences that study the relationships between people. If human relationships are examined from the perspective of individual interests, it becomes economics. To distinguish it from economics, political science is interested in how cooperative relationships between people change, regardless of (or due to) the material (economic) benefits that each individual expects or results from. Behind cooperative relationships lies regulatory relationships, which are also the power relationships that are the subject of political science's interest.

 

The history of political science research is long, but to briefly summarize its flow, there are generally three approaches to it: ① traditional approach, ② behavioral approach or empirical approach, and ③ post-behavioral approach.

 

Firstly, the traditional approach is characterized by understanding facts and values in relation to each other. In this approach, concepts related to politics were deduced from ideas about political purposes such as the nature, purpose, and function of the state. It also involved studying political science using methods similar to those in history and focused on defining the nature of laws and political systems.

 

Secondly, the behavioral or positivist approach aims to explain the process of people engaging in political actions, and the reasons why political processes and systems perform certain functions. In particular, this approach considers political institutions and human behavior, which are the subjects of political science, as objects separate from the observer, similar to a machine. It strives to construct a logically consistent model and deduce the content of political science. It can perhaps be considered the most similar to the natural sciences in terms of research methods in political science.

 

Thirdly, the post-behavioral approach emerged with the aim of overcoming the mechanistic view of humans assumed by the behavioral approach and constructing a human-centered political theory. Rather than immersing itself in the scientific research of political science (as required by the behavioral approach), this approach seeks to focus more on the pressing issues of society.

 

Among these, the first, the traditional approach, is a mix of political philosophy as a moral theory and political science as a science. This mixture arises from the perspective of viewing political science as political philosophy. This standpoint dates back to at least Plato and was established in Aristotle's politics. The purpose of Aristotle's political theory was to study the best form of political community for the most capable people to realize the ideal life. Aristotle understood ethics as part of state theory in his "Nicomachean Ethics," and for him, "political science was a theory of good and just life, just like ethics." Most subsequent political science research has not deviated from this path. For example, Hegel claimed that the 'state' is an objective entity, and its laws can be perceived by humans like natural laws but cannot be changed. Modern political philosophy also attempted to explain the basis of the legitimacy of political and legal order through the concept of a contract between individuals. Although the ethical focus differs from that of Aristotle and Hegel, who centered on the state, it is identical in that its purpose is solely to advocate for an ideal political system rather than focusing on factual relationships.

 

Attempts to break free from this moralism and scientize political science are found in the behavioral approach. In my opinion, the behavioral approach itself was essential in the development of political science. However, there was a serious problem here, which is that it failed to produce a proper conceptual system for substantial political understanding as research results suitable for this approach. For example, look at D. Easton's theory. Easton, with the same idea as me, said that empirical investigation of certain knowledge in political science "ultimately requires the establishment of a system theory at the highest level of generalization." However, the core content of his political system theory is nothing more than ⓐ the system's identity is revealed in the form of units and boundaries, ⓑ input and output, ⓒ differentiation within a system, and ⓓ integration within a system. There is not much to be called the content of the theory here, and it only raises a few general theories, so there are criticisms that it has not yet reached the level of a theory itself. Looking at the theory of another representative behavioral researcher, T. Parsons, although it goes through complex theoretical discussions such as defining five types of variables, there is no generalized specific conceptual system that can be called a specialized paradigm for political science. This is the reason why Wolin, Beardsley, and Eugene Meehan criticized that there has never been an established dominant theoretical paradigm in political science.

 

In this context, the post-behavioral approach emerged as an alternative to the behavioral approach, with its core being that it has not abandoned the behavioral approach because it failed, but because it did not achieve its goals.

 

As mentioned in Chapter 0 of this book, the 'scientific approach' is a behavioral approach, and the content of the political phenomenon theory I presented in this book follows this perspective. The 3․1 law system aims to deductively derive propositions that can explain political phenomena by combining the three laws of political phenomena, survival process theory, and principles of the naturality of human survival. It also assumes that the propositions of political science should have regularity and consistency, and that recorded data should be quantified and measurable, as the behavioral approach requires, aiming to explain "why people engage in such political behavior, and why political processes and systems ultimately function in such a way."