Evolution in Political Science: A Reply to Kerr

2003 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 102-111 ◽  
Author(s):  
Adrian Kay
Keyword(s):  
Political Science ◽  
Evolutionary Theory ◽  
Political Change ◽  
Evolutionary Economics ◽  
Explanatory Power ◽  
Great Benefit ◽  
Dynamic Approach ◽  
Evolutionary Theories ◽  
Dynamic Mechanisms

Peter Kerr ( Kerr 2002 ) recently argued in this journal that evolutionary theories could be of great benefit to political scientists' investigations of change. He is not successful in establishing a case for evolutionary theory in political science due to the misconception that evolutionary theory can have explanatory power without being functionalist. Two options for the use of evolution in political science are set out: firstly, leave the concept at the level of metaphor which might add richness to narratives of political change; or secondly, accept functionalism and construct political science theories along the lines beginning to develop in evolutionary economics. The conclusion is the need for a dynamic approach whilst avoiding functionalism and that political science at this stage should remain agnostic and critical about when and where particular dynamic mechanisms may operate.

Evolutionary Theorising in Economics

2002 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard R. Nelson
Keyword(s):  
Evolutionary Theory ◽  
Cultural Change ◽  
Evolutionary Economics ◽  
Adam Smith ◽  
Neoclassical Economics ◽  
Economic Discourse ◽  
Evolutionary Theories ◽  
Evolutionary Thought ◽  
The Social ◽  
Wealth Of Nations

This chapter deals with evolutionary theorising in economics, first by considering two quite different ways in which evolutionary arguments have entered economic discourse. In particular, it discusses the link between economic dynamics and evolutionary theory in biology, citing the views espoused by Adam Smith in his book The Wealth of Nations. It then examines the argument put forward by a number of economists that modern neoclassical economics and evolutionary theory in biology are basically the same thing. It also outlines the similarities and differences between several contemporary strands of evolutionary economic theorising. The chapter proposes an alternative kind of economic evolutionary theorising and how it fits with other bodies of evolutionary thought in the social sciences, and especially in terms of evolutionary epistemology. Finally, it outlines the way scholars outside of economics are embracing evolutionary economics by developing evolutionary theories of processes of economic, social, and cultural change in their own fields.

Agency, Structure and Causality in Political Science: A Comment on Sibeon

Politics ◽  
2002 ◽  
Vol 22 (1) ◽  
pp. 17-23 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paul A. Lewis
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Social Structure ◽  
Political Science ◽  
Critical Realism ◽  
Explanatory Power ◽  
Recent Contribution ◽  
Ontological Commitments ◽  
Political Analysis ◽  
The Social ◽  
Ontological Turn

Researchers in political science are devoting increasing attention to the ontological commitments of their theories – that is, to what those theories presuppose about the nature of the political world. This article focuses on a recent contribution to this ‘ontological turn’ in political science ( Sibeon, 1999 ). Tensions are identified in Sibeon's account of the causal interplay between agency and social structure. It is argued that these tensions can be resolved by reflecting explicitly on ontological issues, in particular the causal efficacy of social structure, using a particular approach to the philosophy of the social sciences known as critical realism. The value of such reflection for the explanatory power of political analysis is highlighted.

Cooperation, Coordination, and Collective Action

2012 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lee Cronk ◽  
Beth L. Leech
Keyword(s):  
Natural Selection ◽  
Collective Action ◽  
Political Science ◽  
Empirical Research ◽  
Evolutionary Theory ◽  
Coordination Problems ◽  
Evolutionary Biologist ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Two Bodies

This book investigates a wide range of ideas, theories, and existing empirical research relevant to the study of the complex and diverse phenomenon of human cooperation. Issues relating to cooperation are examined from the perspective of evolutionary theory, political science, and related social sciences. The book draws upon two bodies of work: Mancur Olson's The Logic of Collective Action (1965) and George C. Williams's Adaptation and Natural Selection (1966). Olson, an economist, and Williams, an evolutionary biologist, both argued that a focus on groups would not provide a complete understanding of collective action and other social behaviors. This introductory chapter discusses some important definitions relating to cooperation, with particular emphasis on collective action and collective action dilemmas, along with coordination and coordination problems. It also provides an overview of the chapters that follow.

The Goose, The Fly, and the Submarine Navigator

2011 ◽  
pp. 1636-1657
Author(s):  
Alexander Riegler
Keyword(s):  
Artificial Intelligence ◽  
Evolutionary Theory ◽  
Interdisciplinary Research ◽  
Explanatory Power ◽  
Cognitive Systems ◽  
Rule Based ◽  
Artificial Intelligence Research ◽  
Rule Based System ◽  
Organizational Closure ◽  
Neuronal Systems

Interdisciplinary research provides in¬spirations and insights into how a variety of disciplines can contribute to the formulation of an alternative path to artificial cognition systems. It has been suggested that results from ethology, evolutionary theory and epistemology can be condensed into four boundary conditions. They lead to the outline of an architecture for genuine cognitive systems, which seeks to overcome traditional problems known from artificial intelligence research. Two major points are stressed: (a) The maintenance of explanatory power by favoring an advanced rule-based system rather than neuronal systems, and (b) the organizational closure of the cognitive apparatus, which has far-reaching implications for the creation of meaningful agents.

scholarly journals How Labor Market Inequality Transforms Mass Politics

2019 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 344-355
Author(s):  
Silja Häusermann ◽  
Achim Kemmerling ◽  
David Rueda
Keyword(s):  
Labor Market ◽  
Political Science ◽  
Identity Politics ◽  
Comparative Politics ◽  
Structural Changes ◽  
Explanatory Power ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
Left Wing ◽  
Mass Politics ◽  
Labor Market Inequality

AbstractWhy do left parties lose vote shares in times of economic crisis and hardship? Why do right-wing governments implement seemingly left-wing policies, such as labor market activation? Why is representation becoming more and more unequal? And why do workers vote for right-wing populist parties? Several political science theories propose meaningful and important answers to these key questions for comparative politics, focusing on identity politics, programmatic convergence of parties or exogenous constraints. However, there is an additional and distinct approach to all of the questions above, which emphasizes socio-structural transformations in the labor market: most of the processes above can be understood with reference to increasing labor market inequality and its political implications. The relevance and explanatory power of labor market inequality for mass politics have not been fully acknowledged in comparative political science and this is the reason for this symposium. Labor market inequality affects political preferences and behavior, electoral politics, representation, and government strategies. The main purpose of our symposium is to make broader comparative politics research aware of the crucial structural changes that labor markets have undergone in the advanced capitalist democracies of the OECD, and of the tremendous implications these changes have had for politics.

scholarly journals What Are We Doing When We Are Doing Democratic Theory?

2019 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 12-26
Author(s):  
Dannica Fleuß ◽  
Gary S. Schaal
Keyword(s):  
Political Philosophy ◽  
Political Science ◽  
Democratic Theory ◽  
Feedback Loops ◽  
Scholarly Activity ◽  
Dynamic Approach ◽  
The Core ◽  
The One ◽  
Induced Changes ◽  
Core Features

The article analyzes the (often implicit) understanding of democratic theory that is presupposed by scholars who engage in this practice and provides an answer to the question: “What are we doing when we are doing democratic theory?” We flesh out the core features of this scholarly activity by relating it to and differentiating it from assessments made from the perspective of political philosophy and political science. We argue that democratic theory aims at proposing institutional devices that are (a) problem-solving approaches and (b) embodiments of normative principles. This two-faced structure requires democratic theorists to engage in feedback loops with political philosophy on the one hand and empirical political science on the other. This implies that democratic theorists must adopt a dynamic approach: democratic theories must “fit” societal circumstances. In consequence, they must be adapted in case of fundamental societal transformations. We exemplify this dynamic character by referring to digitalization-induced changes in democratic societies and their implications for democratic theorists’ practice.

scholarly journals Gender and evolutionary theory in workplace health promotion

2017 ◽  
Vol 76 (8) ◽  
pp. 893-905
Author(s):  
Erika Björklund ◽  
Jan Wright
Keyword(s):  
Health Promotion ◽  
Evolutionary Theory ◽  
Workplace Health Promotion ◽  
Ethnographic Study ◽  
Stone Age ◽  
Workplace Health ◽  
Evolutionary Theories ◽  
And Gender ◽  
Health Promotion Interventions ◽  
Health Promotion Practice

Objective: Ideas from evolutionary theories are increasingly taken up in health promotion. This article seeks to demonstrate how such a trend has the potential to embed essentialist and limiting stereotypes of women and men in health promotion practice. Design: We draw on material gathered for a larger ethnographic study that examined how discourses of health were re-contextualised in four workplace health promotion interventions in Sweden. Method: This study provided the opportunity to investigate how ideas derived from evolutionary theories produced particular constructs of the healthy employee. A Foucauldian notion of governmentality was used to examine the rationalities, truths and techniques that informed what we have called a ‘Stone Age’ discourse as these contributed to shaping the desires, actions and beliefs of lecturers and participants in the interventions. Results: We focus on one intervention which used the Stone Age discourse as an organising idea to constitute differences in women’s and men’s health through references to women as gatherers and men as hunters, thereby positioning men as the physical, emotional and mental ideal and women as the problematic and lacking ‘other’. Conclusion: The paper concludes by discussing the implications of such ideas about health and gender for interventions aimed at changing behaviour and lifestyles.

Remembering Our Roots

2011 ◽  
Vol 43 (3) ◽  
pp. 388-388
Author(s):  
Nathan J. Brown
Keyword(s):  
Middle East ◽  
Social Science ◽  
Political Science ◽  
Voting Behavior ◽  
Regime Change ◽  
Political Change ◽  
Middle Eastern ◽  
Regional Analysis ◽  
The Past ◽  
Science Disciplines

Scholars of the Middle East based in social science disciplines—especially my own, political science—are likely to feel a bit more welcome by their colleagues as a result of recent events in the Middle East. Not only will we be informative conversationalists in the hallways for a while because of our regional expertise, but also, far more profoundly, the sorts of things that political scientists study, from voting patterns to regime change, are suddenly interesting subjects in the region. This is not to say that Middle East elections were not studied in the past or that research on political change was not undertaken—far from it. But the questions posed, the terms used, and tools employed were often different from those more prevalent in the discipline. Political scientists focusing on the Middle East are therefore likely to find this a gratifying time, ripe with opportunities for comparative and cross-regional analysis. And those nonregional specialists whose interests lie in a wide variety of topics from voting behavior to revolutions may work harder to incorporate Middle Eastern cases into their own work.

scholarly journals A Comprehensive Evolutionary Theory Deduced from Thermodynamics

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ji-Ming Chen
Keyword(s):  
Amino Acids ◽  
Origin Of Life ◽  
Evolutionary Theory ◽  
Driving Force ◽  
Sympatric Speciation ◽  
Human Society ◽  
Significant Progress ◽  
Animal Group ◽  
Evolutionary Theories ◽  
Group Evolution

Studies on evolution have made significant progress in multiple disciplines, but evolutionary theories remain incomplete, controversial, and inadequate in explaining origin of life and macroevolution. Here we create the concept of carbon-based entities (CBEs) which include methane, amino acids, proteins, bacteria, animals, plants, and other entities containing carbon atoms. We then deduce the driving force, the progressive mechanisms, and the major steps of CBE evolution from thermodynamics. We hence establish a comprehensive evolutionary theory termed the CBE evolutionary theory (CBEET), which suggests that evolution is driven hierarchy-wise by thermodynamics and favors fitness and diversity. The CBEET provides novel explanations for origin of life (abiogenesis), macroevolution, natural selection, sympatric speciation, and animal group evolution in a comprehensive and comprehensible way. It elucidates that collaboration, altruism, obeying rules with properly increased freedom are important throughout the CBE evolution. It refutes thoroughly the notion that negative entropy (negentropy) leads to biological order which is distinct from thermodynamic order. It integrates with research advances in multiple disciplines and links up laws of physics, evolution in biology, and harmonious development of human society.

scholarly journals Metaphor and Meaning in the Teleological Language of Biology

2020 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 5-24
Author(s):  
Annie L. Crawford
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Evolutionary Theory ◽  
Explanatory Power ◽  
Ernst Mayr ◽  
Describing Function ◽  
Physiological Processes ◽  
Early Twentieth Century ◽  
Short Hand ◽  
Biological Explanations ◽  
Conceptual Language

In the early twentieth century, neo-Darwinian evolutionary theory replaced traditional teleological causality as the accepted explanatory basis for biology. Yet, despite this rejection of teleology, biologists continue to resort to the language of purpose and design in order to define function, explain physiological processes, and describe behavior. The legitimacy of such teleological language is currently debated among biologists and philosophers of science. Many biologists and educators argue that teleological language can function as a type of convenient short-hand for describing function while some argue that such language contradicts the fundamentally ateleological nature of evolutionary theory. Others, such as Ernst Mayr, have attempted to redefine teleologyin such a way as to evade any metaphysical implications. However, most discussions regarding the legitimacy of teleological language in biology fail to consider the nature of language itself. Since conceptual language is intrinsically metaphorical, teleological language can be dismissed as decorative if and only if it can be replaced with alternative metaphors without loss of essential meaning. I conclude that, since teleological concepts cannot be abstracted away from biological explanations without loss of meaning and explanatory power, life is inherently teleological. It is the teleological character of life which makes it a unique phenomenon requiring a unique discipline of study distinct from physics or chemistry.

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