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The many roads to Rome: family resemblance concepts in the social sciences

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Abstract

What are the different ways in which family resemblance conceptual structures can be used in the social sciences? When should they be used and what are the specific advantages and challenges they pose? What are the descriptive and causal implications derived from their use? This paper advances our understanding of these conceptual structures by answering these questions and illustrating them with examples from established scholarship in political science. The paper first breaks down the broad category of family resemblance concepts into three types of structures, using set theoretic logic: individual sufficiency, INUS, and mixed structures. Second, we discuss when these alternative structures are more useful for concept formation, proposing three different prototypical situations to use them: when we seek to disaggregate an abstract attribute, when our concept relies on the negation of classic concepts, and when our concept rests on what we label as cumulative signification. Third, the paper introduces the logic of subtype formation in family resemblance and compares it with classical subtypes, showing that unlike the latter, subtypes in family resemblance do not require additional attributes; sufficient combinations of the main concept can at the same time be subtypes. Forth, the paper analyzes the descriptive and causal implications of using family resemblance conceptual structures, showing a trade-off between empirical differentiation and potential causal heterogeneity. A concluding section evaluates some misuses of family resemblance, highlighting the importance of avoiding empirical and theoretical pitfalls.

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Notes

  1. We refer specifically to research broadly in the behavioral tradition. On conceptualization from an interpretativist perspective, see Schaffer (2015).

  2. In the natural sciences, specifically in biology, the concept of “specie” is a good example of a concept that resists a classic definition. See Pigliucci (2003).

  3. An INUS condition is an Insufficient but Nonredundant component of a combination of conditions that is Unnecessary but Sufficient for an outcome (Mackie 1980; Ragin 1987).

  4. Alternatively, this level can be called the measurement level. On measurement, see Adcock and Collier (2001). Concepts can have the same logic of aggregation at the secondary and indicator level, or different ones.

  5. By using at least one necessary attribute, this structure may also reflect a common way in which we think about categories in our day-to-day lives, as demonstrated by some experiments in the field of cognitive psychology (Medin et al. 1987). We seem to favor firmer conceptual boundaries than those suggested by a pure family resemblance structure.

  6. Hicks does not explicitly engage in conceptualization of the welfare state, focusing mostly on measurement issues. His first dependent variable is early program consolidation (before 1920) as a measure of welfare-state formation; however, it is not totally clear that the relationship between both concepts is a constitutive one. And the four social programs listed refer to indicators, or Goertz’s (2006b) third level. In the present discussion, and following Goertz, we reinterpret and clarify Hicks’ conceptualization by moving the different programs to the attribute level.

  7. It should be noted that these conditions are constitutive attributes, not indicators for coding cases. The authors provide a full operationalization of these attributes in Appendix I, all of which also have a family resemblance structure at the indicator level.

  8. The concept of competitive authoritarianism could also be deployed as possessing a mixed structure, with “meaningful elections” being a necessary condition for membership in the overall concept. Here we treat meaningful elections as a scope condition for the application of the concept. The next section discusses mixed-structure concepts.

  9. Goertz and Mazur (2008) call this a hybrid structure, but they do not discuss it in detail.

  10. In this example, C1 and C2 are SUIN conditions—i.e., sufficient but unnecessary parts of an attribute that is insufficient but necessary for a concept (Mahoney 2008).

  11. In the following discussion, we only consider subtypes as full instances of the concept, leaving aside what Collier and Levistky (1997) call “diminished subtypes.” The latter are cases that are missing a necessary attribute of the concept, and as such, are not full instances of the phenomenon being analyzed.

  12. One could also form subtypes grouping two or more sufficient attributes.

  13. Both Lakoff (1987) and Collier and Mahon (1993) treat this concept as radial in nature. Following Goertz and Mazur, we recast it as a having a mixed structure.

  14. We are considering necessary attributes as those without which a case cannot have membership in a concept. One could also consider INUS attributes as necessary within combinations. In this scenario, we can think of Fig. 5 as a continuum going from none to full “necessariness,” measuring the extent to which necessary elements play a role in membership in a concept. We thank Gary Goertz for this insight.

  15. Gerring (2012, pp. 124–125) refers to a similar issue as “fecundity.”

  16. The analysis of the threshold for membership could be made more complex if we consider the relative trivialness or importance of attributes (Goertz 2006a). Arguably, structures with no necessary attributes could be more demanding for membership than the mixed and even the classic structure if the necessary attributes in the latter structures are relatively trivial (frequently found in both positive and negative cases) and the attributes are important ones in the former (not frequently found in negative cases). However, these considerations are not linked to the mode of aggregation of a concept.

  17. See the codebook for details http://www.systemicpeace.org/inscrdata.html, 13–14.

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Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank Laura Acosta, Mariana Borges, Daniel Encinas, Laura Garcia, Gary Goertz, Emilio Lehoucq, Alex Mierke-Zatwarnicki, Silvia Otero, and Diana Rodriguez for their helpful comments on previous versions of this article. We also thank participants at the 2017 meeting of American Political Science Association, and workshops at the Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile and Northwestern University. A special recognition goes to James Mahoney, who carefully read and commented on every draft and encouraged us to pursue this project every step of the way.

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  1. Department of Political Science, Northwestern University, 601 University Place, Evanston, IL, 60208, USA

    Rodrigo Barrenechea & Isabel Castillo

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  1. Rodrigo Barrenechea
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Correspondence to Rodrigo Barrenechea.

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Barrenechea, R., Castillo, I. The many roads to Rome: family resemblance concepts in the social sciences. Qual Quant 53, 107–130 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11135-018-0732-7

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