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Lowi's Critique of Political Science: A Response

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 September 2013

Randall L. Calvert
Randall L. Calvert*
Affiliation:
University of Rochester
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Extract

Sometimes an emotional irritant can be intellectually productive and provocative. For me, this was the case with Theodore Lowi's APSA presidential address, reprinted in the American Political Science Review (Lowi 1992). While disagreeing at many points with Lowi's account of the development of political science and with his critiques of the currently “hegemonic” subfields of “public opinion, public policy, and public choice,” I am led ultimately to clarify my own understanding of the relationship between politics, ideology, and science. This response to Lowi's address is intended to sketch a different view of the relation between science, especially social science, and government; to argue with Lowi's assessment of the value of reductionist paradigms such as those employed by the three hegemonic subfields; and to say that many of the rest of us are passionate about politics too. In particular, it is intended to indicate how “public choice,” my own favored member of that holy trinity, is in fact well suited to address issues critical to the matters of social value with which Lowi is concerned.

Type
Research Article
Information
PS: Political Science & Politics , Volume 26 , Issue 2 , June 1993 , pp. 196 - 198
Copyright
Copyright © The American Political Science Association 1993

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Footnotes

*

The author is grateful to all his colleagues in the Department of Political Science, University of Rochester, for their helpful comments on an earlier draft. This essay makes no effort, however, to represent any opinion except that of the author.

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