Retrospective voting in American national elections
Retrospective voting in American national elections
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DOI：
10.2307/2149903
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发表时间：
1981-01
期刊：
影响因子：
--
通讯作者：
M. Fiorina
中科院分区：
文献类型：
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作者：
M. Fiorina
对美国读者介绍欧洲历史社会研究很有用。大多数论文集中在数据的可用性和存档、测量和计算机化等技术问题上。三个章节直接涉及复杂数据文件的生成、保存、存储和访问以及新数据库等问题。其余6章中有5章围绕处理时间序列、文档内容、个人网络、生活史以及行政和人口普查数据等主题的技术问题进行组织。在他们的介绍中，编辑们认识到欧洲历史社会研究的局限性和初始特征，指出这些论文并不代表更成熟的研究领域。然而，人们不能完全满足于这些公认的局限性。利用定量数据和社会类别的历史实证研究似乎没有内在的原因，需要以如此机械的方式组织起来，由数据的性质和组织它的技术问题所塑造。它也可以很好地形成，虽然不那么容易，围绕概念化问题，其中选择要检查的数据和并置分析的方法可以更多地由历史问题本身的实质决定。这里提出的只有一个主题接近这种研究模式，即海因里希·贝斯特（Heinrich Best）对1848年和1849年向法兰克福国民议会提交的请愿书的分析。贝斯特明确表示，他试图用他的数据来检验之前的理论，这些理论是关于这两年发生的事件中不同经济群体之间政治关系的走向。他的数据为进一步梳理19世纪中期德国经济和政治的领先和落后部门提供了机会。但在这里报道的项目中，似乎很少有这样的概念潜力。美国历史社会研究在概念相关性方面经历了一些严重的限制，因为它的调查在很大程度上是由使定量数据易于管理的技术方面的关注所塑造的。因此，到目前为止，它对更广泛地分析美国历史的影响很小。如果围绕定义明确的历史概念化问题组织起来，它可以发挥更重要的作用。从这本书中，人们想知道欧洲的历史社会研究是否也会受到同样的限制。
a useful introduction for an American audience to European historical social research. Most of the papers focus on technical problems of data availability and archiving, measurement and computerization. Three chapters are directly concerned with problems such as the generation of complex data files, preservation, storage and access, and new data bases. Five of the remaining 6 chapters are organized around the technical problems of dealing with themes such as time series, document content, personal networks, life histories, and administrative and census data. In their introduction the editors recognize this limited and initial character of European historical social research by pointing out that the papers do not represent more mature fields of inquiry. Yet one cannot remain wholly satisfied with these recognized limitations. There seems to be no inherent reason why historical empirical research utilizing quantitative data and social categories needs to be organized in so mechanical a fashion, shaped by the nature of the data and the technical problems of organizing it. It could be shaped equally well, although not as easily, around problems of conceptualization, in which choices of data to be examined and methods of juxtaposing it for analysis could be determined more by the substance of historical problems themselves. Only one of the topics presented here approaches this mode of research, an analysis by Heinrich Best of the petitions to the Frankfurt National Assembly in 1848 and 1849. Best makes clear that he seeks to use his data to test previous theories about the course of political relationships among varied economic groups as the events of those two years unfolded. And his data provide an opportunity to go even further to sort out leading and lagging sectors of economy and politics in mid-nineteenth-century Germany. But few of the projects reported here seem to have such conceptual potential. American historical social research has experienced some severe limitations in conceptual relevance because of the very high degree to which its inquiries have been shaped by preoccupation with the technical aspects of making quantitative data manageable. As of yet, therefore, it has had only minor impact on larger analyses of American history. If organized around well-defined problems of historical conceptualization, it could play a far more significant role. From this volume one wonders if the same limitations cannot be predicted for historical social research in Europe as well.