•  679
    Most contemporary political science researchers are advocates of multimethod research, however, the value and proper role of qualitative methodologies, like case study analysis, is disputed. A pluralistic philosophy of science can shed light on this debate. Methodological pluralism is indeed valuable, but does not entail causal pluralism. Pluralism about the goals of science is relevant to the debate and suggests a focus on the difference between evidence for warrant and evidence for use. I prop…Read more
  •  668
    Natural Experiments and Pluralism in Political Science
    Philosophy of the Social Sciences 45 (4-5): 424-441. 2015.
    Natural experiments are an increasingly popular research design in political science. This popularity raises a number of questions. First, what are natural experiments and why are they appealing? Second, what makes a good natural experiment? And finally, are natural experiments able to provide resources for knowledge production that other methodologies cannot or do not provide? Using Mary Morgan’s and Thad Dunning’s recent work on natural experiments, I offer answers to the first two questions a…Read more
  •  535
    Feminist Philosophy of Science: Values and Objectivity
    Philosophy Compass 8 (4): 413-423. 2013.
    Feminist philosophy of science appears to present problems for the ideal of value-free science. These difficulties also challenge a traditional understanding of the objectivity of science. However, feminist philosophers of science have good reasons for desiring to retain some concept of objectivity. The present essay considers several recent and influential feminist approaches to the role of social and political values in science, with particular focus on feminist empiricism and feminist standpo…Read more
  •  251
    Introduction to cluster of papers on feminist standpoint theory.
  •  185
    InScience as Social Knowledge, Helen Longino offers a contextual analysis of evidential relevance. She claims that this “contextual empiricism” reconciles the objectivity of science with the claim that science is socially constructed. I argue that while her account does offer key insights into the role that values play in science, her claim that science is nonetheless objective is problematic.
  •  174
    Science as Social Knowledge
    Hypatia 8 (3): 194-201. 1992.
    In Science as Social Knowledge, Helen Longino offers a contextual analysis of evidential relevance. She claims that this "contextual empiricism" reconciles the objectivity of science with the claim that science is socially constructed. I argue that while her account does offer key insights into the role that values play in science, her claim that science is nonetheless objective is problematic.
  •  173
    How natural can ontology be?
    Philosophy of Science 67 (1): 114-132. 2000.
    Arthur Fine's Natural Ontological Attitude (NOA) is intended to provide an alternative to both realism and antirealism. I argue that the most plausible meaning of "natural" in NOA is "nonphilosophical," but that Fine comes to NOA through a particular conception of philosophy. I suggest that instead of a natural attitude we should adopt a philosophical attitude. This is one that is self-conscious, pragmatic, pluralistic, and sensitive to context. I conclude that when scientific realism and antire…Read more
  •  85
    Political science research, particularly in international relations and comparative politics, has increasingly become dominated by statistical and formal approaches. The promise of these approaches shifted the methodological emphasis away from case study research. In response, supporters of case study research argue that case studies provide evidence for causal claims that is not available through statistical and formal research methods, and many have advocated multimethod research. I propose a …Read more
  •  84
    This collection showcases the work of 18 analytical feminists from a variety of traditional areas of philosophy. It highlights successful uses of concepts and approaches from traditional philosophy, and illustrates the contributions that feminist approaches have made and could make to the analysis of issues in key areas of traditional philosophy, while also demonstrating that traditional philosophy ignores feminist insights and feminist critiques of traditional philosophy at its own peril.
  •  80
    Review of Iddo Landau, Is Philosophy Androcentric? (review)
    Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews 2007 (2). 2007.
    of Iddo Landau, (from Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews).
  •  76
    Models and Reality: When Science Tackles Sex
    Hypatia 16 (3): 138-148. 2001.
    Through a discussion of the way science has been used to address intersexuality, I explore an idea about how to understand science as objective and yet influenced by social, historical, and cultural factors. I propose that the Semantic View of theories provides a means of understanding how science describes reality, and I look at the way science has been used to distinguish the sexes to provide an illustration.
  •  60
    Political science methodology: A plea for pluralism
    Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part A 78 (C): 40-47. 2019.
    Case study research was once the primary methodology of research in political science. The shift to other methodologies in recent decades suggests has led to a devaluing of these approaches. This article explores six roles for case studies in the social sciences and argues that an understanding of the multiple aims of research supports a methodological pluralism that includes case study research.
  •  40
    The Routledge Handbook of Feminist Philosophy of Science is a comprehensive resource for feminist thinking about and in the sciences. Its 33 chapters were written exclusively for this Handbook by a group of leading international philosophers as well as scholars in gender studies, women’s studies, psychology, economics, and political science. The chapters of the Handbook are organized into four main parts: I. Hidden Figures and Historical Critique II. Theoretical Frameworks III. Key Concepts …Read more
  •  37
    Process tracing in political science: What's the story?
    Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part A 62 6-13. 2017.
    Methodologists in political science have advocated for causal process tracing as a way of providing evidence for causal mechanisms. Recent analyses of the method have sought to provide more rigorous accounts of how it provides such evidence. These accounts have focused on the role of process tracing for causal inference and specifically on the way it can be used with case studies for testing hypotheses. While the analyses do provide an account of such testing, they pay little attention to the na…Read more
  •  32
    Coherence objectivity and measurement: the example of democracy
    Synthese 199 (1-2): 1207-1229. 2020.
    Empirical research on democracy depends upon data. The need for such data has led to the development of measures of democracy. Measurement models are evaluated in terms of their reliability and validity, both of which may be thought of as related to the objectivity of the measure. Using the Varieties of Democracy Project as an example, I consider how assessing reliability and validity of measurement models is challenging and argue that democracy might be understood as measured objectively when i…Read more
  •  23
    Philosophical Feminism and Popular Culture (edited book)
    Lexington Books. 2012.
    The eight essays contained in Philosophical Feminism and Popular Culture explore the portrayal of women and various philosophical responses to that portrayal in contemporary post-civil rights society. The essays examine visual, print, and performance media — stand-up comedy, movies, television, and a blockbuster trilogy of novel. These philosophical feminist analyses of popular culture consider the possibilities, both positive and negative, that popular culture presents for articulating the stru…Read more
  •  20
    Book review of Alexander Wendt's Quantum mind and social world: Unifying physical and social ontology. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015
  •  9
    Hasok Chang’s latest book is pragmatist in its focus on practice, but also in linking evaluation of science and its practices to the aims of those practices. Al.
  •  8
    Out from the Shadows showcases the work of 18 analytical feminists from a variety of traditional areas of philosophy: social and political philosophy, normative ethics, virtue theory, metaethics, philosophy of language, metaphysics, epistemology, and philosophy of science. The collection is unique both in its focus on analytical feminism and in its breadth across the subdisciplines within philosophy. The book highlights successful uses of concepts and approaches from traditional philosophy, and …Read more
  •  1
  • Feminist Science Studies Reasoning from Cases
    In Heidi Grasswick & Nancy Arden McHugh (eds.), Making the Case: Feminist and Critical Race Philosophers Engage Case Studies, Suny Press. pp. 73-98. 2021.
  • Feminist standpoint theory
    In Nancy Cartwright & Eleonora Montuschi (eds.), Philosophy of Social Science: A New Introduction, Oxford University Press. 2014.