you’ve entered … the skocpol zone!!!
Orgheads know that I [heart] Theda Skocpol. I [heart] her because she’s a rockin’ dean. And I [heart] her because she’s a rockin’ historical sociologist. Gosh, there’s so much to [heart].
What I like about Skocpol’s historical sociology is tha tshe manages to do two things that are fairly hard. First, she has a pretty good grasp of the literature on individual nations and their development. She’s very comparative but grounded. Few people can really do that, especially in sociology, where we don’t encourage graduate students to develop reading abilities in multiple languages. Second, she’s extremely strong in theory development and can make new concepts link to comparative observations. Without theory, a lot of comparativists get lost in endless detail and the conclusions feel mushy. Skocpol is disciplined as a writer, so even if you don’t agree, one can see how evidence was marshaled behind a certain argument.
That brings me to the Skocpol Zone: that’s when you reach an enlightened state where you use theory to tightly organize a mass of historical information and secondary sources in a convincing way.
Is it also when you can make claims that involve three or four times as many independent variables as cases? I kid, I kid… I agree with most of what you’ve said, and I also find her writing to be a real pleasure to read.
Trey
November 24, 2009 at 1:12 am
And she was denied tenure because she was a woman? Could the American University be the most discriminatory body in America?
Thorfinn
November 24, 2009 at 1:20 am
[...] book, but the damn thing is just so full of insights that I can’t help. Fabio can have his Skocpol Zone, I’ll take Prasad any day of the week! This one stems from her discussion of the French and [...]
Regime Uncertainty in British Steel « The Sociological Imagination
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