Introduction: Designing Research in Political Science — A Dialogue between Theory and Data

Abstract

Quick-and-dirty number-crunching ‘quantoids’ face them. Carefully describing and interpreting ‘smooshes’ face them (Hatch, 1985). No matter where they stand on ontological and epistemological grounds and how we stereotype the respective ‘other side’, all researchers face similar challenges posed to core issues of research design. How you deal with theses challenges defines the research design for your individual projects. A research design is a plan that specifies how you plan to carry out your research project and, particularly, how you expect to use your evidence to answer your research question.¹