Contemporary political science : a survey of methods, research and teaching

The project "Methods in Political Science" was one of the first to be under taken by Unesco. This decision to begin with political science, rather than with another branch of the social sciences, was due to several factors. Political science, as a distinct branch from speculation concerning politi cal phenomena or the history of these phenomena, is of fairly recent development, more recent, certainly, than other social sciences such as law, political economy and sociology. As many authors have often pointed out, because of the close relations which exist among all the social dis ciplines, a certain lack of balance in their development is a drawback to the understanding of social phenomena. Social life is a prism the nature of which is not clearly perceived so long as some of its facets are highly polished while others remain crude and coarse-grained. Hence the need for an effort to raise political science as quickly as possible to the same level as other studies.

We must also recognize the fact that the development of political science has been very uneven in different parts of the world. While it is true that numerous branches of political science continue to arouse increasing interest among qualified specialists in the United States, and that politi cal science occupies a position of the first importance in higher Soviet studies, there remain vast regions of our planet where interest in politi cal phenomena is only just beginning. Inquiry into the factors on which these differences depend permits us to draw particularly interest ing conclusions concerning the forms assumed by political activity among the different nations. Aside from considerations due to the relative newness of political science and to the uneven character of its present development, distinct trends are to be observed in the manner in which specialists envisage the study of political phenomena. Here again analysis of the factors with which the characteristic features of each trend are associated can (aside from its purely academic interest) add to our knowledge of the different elements distinguishing social groups, and bring to light causes of international as well as internal tension which might otherwise have remained unknown. The comparative study of trends in political science plays the part of a mirror in which are reflected the manifold aspects of social phenomena: social structure, economic activity, and intellectual systems, to mention only a few.