If you’re going to reject the scientific approach you have to really believe it’s impossible!!! That you can’t draw anything new by gathering outside infor—seems unlikely. World Politics AFTER MIDTEM 10/28/14 Social Science and World PoliticsHow can we decide which theory is more useful? - Usefulness, “not truth”o All the theories are false because they simplify o Useful theories explain many cases o Useful is provisional; truth it not—in social science we are not looking for a theory that will forever be held as true. We are looking for a theory that proves to be most useful now. - Some reject the social-scientific approacho Missing some - Do arms race lead to war?o Liberal approach: yes!1 Race increases mistrust between states Brings hardlines to power on both sides—tendency for people to electleader who are more are mire aggressive when there are arms race  This process will increase probability of war Favorite historical example: anglo-german naval race, 1900-1914o Realist position: NO!  Arms race indicate that both sides are balancing power. According to realist states go to war when there is an imbalance of power—by thenthey can see that there is a potential gain by going to war  Because one side is weaker.  Favorite example: prewar spending before WWII. Only Germany was building up their military spending—according to realist if Britain and France built up their races Hitler would not have thought that he could have been so successful.  Policy implication: build arms to balance power! You have to do something so the other side wont exploit you o The social scientific approach to resolving the debate.  If all you do is look at one case at a time you will be stuck. Because both realist and liberals have historical examples that defend theirposition. The point is to find out which one is more unique and which is more regular(you will always find a claim to support a general example) Look at systematic data vs. “ransacking history”—look at all the cases that can represent what you are studying (instead of just looking at one event and saying that proves my belief when it doesn’t represent the whole)  Testing observable implications of theory. ---singer had the idea to collect as much info about the world as you can and then see if these ideas hold to see if they are correct.  Falsifiable—has to be logically possible to explain that your claim is false(doesn’t mean its false just could be proven false)  You have to be open to the idea that you could be wrong!! You need to be curious about things but not assume that you know how the world works and then apply those thoughts to your approach—BC you can always find an example to fit a generalization. And if you are curious and develop a real thought but are wrong you have still found something out!- Testing whether Arms Races Lead to Waro Wallace hypothesis: serious disputes are more likely to escalate to war duringan arms race (looked at serious disputes that could lead to war)o Steps needed to take Defining “serious disputes” - Incident is serious when one state threaten or uses forces against one another - In 1970, COW identifies 99 serious disputed between powers that threatened one another—only 26 lead to war. So war was not the most common outcome.  Defining an “arms race” - Rapid, simultaneous buildup - But how rapid? And how simultaneous—a lot harder to figure this out when dealing with multiple cases - Operational definition is complex function of both states military spending in preceding ten years. When numbers high-arms race = high and vice versa. - Dyad=pair of disputes - Result:- Look at chart on slide - Objection to Wallace’s Results o Wallace treated dyads within the same dispute separately Disputes related to the same war are not really intendant observations o Some dyads include a state that is already at war  Apparent arms race results only from one states high wartime spending  Example: Germany looked like it was having an arms race with the U.Sin 1947 but really they were spending more bc Germany was already in a war and that was the reason for their increased spending o Arms race index cannot be replicated  Importance of replication in social science  Alternative indices produce different results - Assessing Social Scientific Debateo Scientific debate is about the observable implications  Only observable implications are falsifiable—only things you can see can be tested! Operational …o Systematic collection of data is crucial  Rules for including and excluding cases are importanto Final resolution may take a long time in scientific research  Debate over arms race continues  Terms for eventual resolution of debate do exist, however10/30/2014 Globalization in Trade -volume of trade has increased ove the last 50 years - trading with boats and using boats to ship has helped tremendously with economic trade - also using crates helped to make it more organizational and easy to use ships - World trade organization- when states join the world trade organization they are agreeing to certin rules. Like how much tax they can charge on exported goods and other regulations - all this helped to increase world trade - while trade has increased a lot there is no reason to believe it is iriversable. This could go backwords. Things like war and depression can come up. - --it’s a global and economic thing but politics also have an effect on themWhy trade?--because we want what other have - ex: German cars Italian wine -you can gain from trade - mercantilism: set of ideas that imerged with the modern state. It stresses the importance of state power. Its important for society to have things they need. But getting foreign products and trading can also put the state power at risk. For example, if you are tradingor need something form anoter country you might become under their control. Mercantilist care more about the state than the individual - view trade as a “zero sum gam”—what ever you produce has to come from something else- tired to set up a system that allowed for as much hard currency for themselves as possible. Accomplsish that by limiting what people in the state buy from others and maxamizinf what they buy from within the state. The Liberal case for free trade - The problem of trade production o Protection leads to higher prices 11/4/2014Globalization in Money and Finance -