Progress and Pitfalls in the Study of Political Violence

Abstract

The study of political violence has undergone dramatic changes in its orientation, scope, and empirical approach over the last twenty years. The increasing availability of micro-level data and the growing methodological sophistication of researchers have led to a proliferation of high quality studies on different types of political violence, such as genocide, ethnic cleansing, inter-state war, insurgency, civil war, and repression. However, the cost of this increased sophistication has been fragmentation of the field into highly specialized studies of types of political violence, themselves often divided by theoretical assumptions and methodological approaches. As a way of encouraging the cross-pollination of ideas across the study of political violence, this special edition has asked leading scholars in the field to produce ''state of the field'' survey pieces on each type of political violence and to identify directions for future research. This introduction lays out the rationale for this special edition, highlights some of the key themes and findings in the included articles, and identifies several insights from this literature that will also be applicable to the study of terrorism.

The politics-violence frontier

“…38 By contrast, and more prosaically, political scientists and political thinkers often treat violent action as one kind of technique or tactic which can be chosen and used according to the particular circumstance and the task in hand. 39 Such an instrumentalist, no-nonsense approach to violence is clearly articulated in the thinking of some activists, for whom the justification of violent engagement is couched in terms of tactics, and 'what works'. 40 According to such views of strategic political reasoning there is no need for myth or ideology.…”

Mixed Methods Research in the Study of Political and Social Violence and Conflict

“… 14. See the special journal issue edited by Boyle (2012) for a more general review of research agendas’ progress and potential in the study of political violence and conflict. …”