Fuzzy-Set Social Science. By Charles C. Ragin

Papers Revista De Sociologia, 2006

2008

Many, if not most, social scientific statements, especially empirical generalizations about cross-case patterns, involve set-theoretic relationships: A. Religious fundamentalists are politically conservative. (Religious fundamentalists are a subset of politically conservative individuals.) B. Professionals have advanced degrees. (Professionals are a subset of those with advanced degrees.) C. Democracy requires a state with at least medium capacity. (Democratic states are a subset of states with at least medium capacity.) D. "Elite brokerage" is central to successful democratization. (Instances of successful democratization are a subset of instances of elite brokerage.) E. "Coercive" nation-building was not an option for "late-forming" states. (States practicing coercive nation-building are a subset of states that formed "early.") Usually, but not always (e.g., D), the subset is mentioned first. Sometimes, it takes a little deciphering to figure out the set-theoretic relationship, as in E. NECESSITY AND SUFFICIENCY AS SUBSET RELATIONS Anyone interested in demonstrating necessity and/or sufficiency must address settheoretic relations. Necessity and sufficiency cannot be assessed using conventional quantitative methods. CAUSE IS NECESSARY BUT NOT SUFFICIENT Cause absent Cause present Outcome present 1. no cases here 2. cases here Outcome absent 3. not relevant 4. not relevant CAUSE IS SUFFICIENT BUT NOT NECESSARY Cause absent Cause present Outcome present 1. not relevant 2. cases here Outcome absent 3. not relevant 4. no cases here Territorially Based Linguistic Minorities in Western Europe

Papers: revista de sociologia, 2007

Sociological Methods & Research, 2005

revistapuce, 2016

The literature questioning posi­tivist research in the social sciences is increasing. One promising alternative, which has been gaining momentum, is pragmatism. This discussion, however, has been carried out mainly at the le­vel of the philosophy of (social) science. Consequently, this paper seeks to con­tribute to the discussion on methods and puts forward Fuzzy Set Qualitative Comparative Analysis (fsQCA) as a re­search method useful for pragmatist inquiry. Beyond the quantitative-quali­tative divide, fsQCA is a set theoretical method that: i) can capture concept differences both in terms of kind (quali­tative) and degree (quantitative); and, ii) focuses on multiple conjunctural causa­tion. That is, it considers cases leading to an outcome as consisting of conditions (conjunctural causation). Moreover, different combinations of these con­ditions can lead to the same outcome (equifinality). Finally, the presence or absence of an outcome is explained by different reasons, not just t...

2006

One apparent limitation of the truth table approach is that it is designed for causal conditions that are simple presence/absence dichotomies (i.e., Boolean or "crisp" sets-chapter 3) or multichotomies (MVQCA--chapter 4). Many of the causal conditions that interest social scientists, however, vary by level or degree. For example, while it is clear that some countries are democracies and some are not, there is a broad range of inbetween cases. These countries are not fully in the set of democracies, nor are they fully excluded from this set. Fortunately, there is a well-developed mathematical system for addressing partial membership in sets, fuzzy-set theory (Zadeh 1965). Section 1 of this chapter provides a brief introduction to the fuzzy-set approach, building on Ragin (2000). Fuzzy sets are especially powerful because they allow researchers to calibrate partial membership in sets using values in the interval between 0 (nonmembership) and 1 (full membership) without aband...

European Political Science, 2016

In a recent article in this journal, Stockemer characterizes fuzzy-set Qualitative Comparative Analysis (fsQCA) in comparison with Ordinary Least Squares regression as a 'poor methodological choice' because of its 'suboptimal nature' for the study of descriptive female representation in national assemblies across the globe. This article seeks to demonstrate that his judgments are based on two misconceptions: first, a misunderstanding of set-theoretical thinking in general, and specifically Qualitative Comparative Analysis; and second, a misinformed application throughout various steps of the fsQCA, for example, the calibration process, the analysis of necessary and sufficient conditions, and the interpretation of the results. In pointing out the weaknesses of Stockemer's application of OLS, we argue in contrast to Stockemerthat fsQCA can be a valuable tool for the comparative study of social phenomena, which offers a fundamentally different analytical perspective from standard quantitative techniques. Keywords women's representation; qualitative comparative analysis; regression analysis; mixed methods T he descriptive representation of women in legislatures is a central topic of today's comparative political science research (for an overview, see, e.g., Wängnerud, 2009; Krook and Childs, 2010; Paxton and Hughes, 2014). While women constitute more than half of the world's population, as of 1 April 2015 the global average of female parliamentarians is only around 22.1 per cent (IPU,

Global Civil Society, 2006

Analysts who developed the set-theoretic comparative method (STCM) have formulated admirable goals for researchers who work in the qualitative and multi-method tradition. STCM includes above all Charles Ragin’s innovative approach of Qualitative Comparative Analysis (QCA). However, the analytic tools employed by STCM have in many ways become an obstacle to achieving these goals. For example, the system of fuzzy-set scoring appears to be problematic, poorly matched to a standard under-standing of conceptual structure, and perhaps unnecessary in its present form. Computer simulations suggest that findings suffer from serious problems of stability and validity; and while the choice of simulations that appropriately evaluate the method is a matter of some controversy, the cumulative weight of simulation results raises major concerns about STCM’s algorithms—i.e., its basic, formalized analytic procedures. Questions also arise about the cumbersome formulation of findings in what is often a remarkably large number of causal paths. Relatedly, some scholars question the STCM’s rejection of the parsimonious findings, in the form of “net effects,” routinely reported in other methodological traditions. Regarding applications, readily available software has encouraged publication of dozens of articles that appear to abandon key foundations of the method and rely far too heavily on these algorithms. Finally, STCM appears inattentive to the major, recent rethinking of standards and procedures for causal inference from observational data. These problems raise the concern that the set-theoretic comparative method, as applied and practiced, has become disconnected from the underlying analytic goals that motivated Charles Ragin to create it.

Jurnal Teknologi, 2004

A mathematical modelling based on the fuzzy sets theory is synonymous with the fields of engineering and computer science. Since the phenomena of fuzziness in the real world is also closely related with human beings, this paper discusses the application of fuzzy sets in social sciences. An overview of related research is presented, which focuses on an example of social research using a fuzzy model to measure the fuzzy data from a questionnaire. This paper also discusses the questionnaire that is used to collect data by many researchers in social sciences and the elements of fuzziness in it. The vague attributes and labels of a linguistic variable from the questionnaire would be transformed into standard mathematical values. This fuzzy model offers a substantial improvement in data analyses and gives more accurate conclusions. In short, this paper gives a new insight of the vast contribution of fuzzy sets in social sciences.