Behavioralism (or behaviouralism) is an approach in political science, which emerged in the

1930s in the United States as a result of dissatisfaction of the then existing approaches. The
origins of behavioralism is often attributed to the work of University of Chicago professor
Charles Merriam, who emphasized the importance of examining political behavior of individuals

Prior to the "behavioralist revolution", political science being a science at all was disputed.
Critics saw the study of politics as being primarily qualitative and normative, and claimed that it
lacked a scientific method necessary to be deemed a science. Behavioralists used strict
methodology and empirical research to validate their study as a social science. The behavioralist
approach was innovative because it changed the attitude of the purpose of inquiry. It moved
toward research that was supported by verifiable facts.

Behavioralism seeks to examine the behavior, actions, and acts of individuals – rather than the
characteristics of institutions such as legislatures, executives, and judiciaries – and groups in
different social settings and explain this behavior as it relates to the political system.
Behavioralism studies how individuals behave in group positions realistically rather than how
they should behave. For example, a study of the Pakistan’s National Assembly might include a
consideration of how members of the house behave in their positions. The subject of interest
constitutes their behaviors because the state has no behavior of its own but reflects the behavior
of the individuals who run it. Attention is focused on the individuals (public officials) who act in
the name of the state, and are believed to be and movers of most national and international
actions.

BEHAVIOURAL OR SCIENTIFIC APPROACH: MEANING AND

EXPLANATION
What Do We Mean By Behavioural Approach?
This is one of the main approaches to the study of political science. For better
comprehension, let us critically look at the meaning of the word ‘behavior’ it
means someone’s attitude or the way one behaves, especially towards other
people. According to Oxford Advanced Learners Dictionary, it means the way a
person behaves or functions in a particular situation. Behaviouralism as an
approach was driven by an extreme impatience with people’s speculation or
with what people say or thought, armed with the newly developed tools of
survey research, it turned away from the study of constitutions and from saying
how states ought to be the study of the behavior of political actors and to
statements about how states actually were ruled. It refers to the body of
knowledge that aspires to provide verified principles of human behavior through
the use of methods similar to those of natural science.

According to David Easton (1998; 10) “Behavioural research seeks to elevate

the actual human being to the centre of the attention. Its premise is that the
traditionalists have been focusing on institutions and virtually looking at them
as entities apart from the components”. The behavioural approach is an attempt
to improve understanding of political science using systematic method with
emphasis on empirical data, so that political process could be interpreted
scientifically. Behaviouralist adopt a science oriented approach in studying
political science and try to favor an interdisciplinary approach in analyzing and
predicting political phenomena. This study stand in studying political situation
can be justified by observing the ubiquitous nature of political science.

Behaviorists argument is based on the explanation that individuals run the

state and in order to understand state behavior one needs to understand the
behavior of these individuals that run the state: their reasons, emotions and,
prejudices. An important consideration of behaviouralism has been the study
of political behavior, as an area of study within political science. Its focus is on
the individual as voter, leader, revolutionary, party member, etc., and the
influences of the group or the political system on indvidual’s political behavior.
The growth of behavioural movement in political science is one of the
important landmarks in the history of political science. The rise of
behaviouralism clearly introduced a scientific vigor in the study of political
science.

Features
According to one of the notable behaviouralist David Easton, there are some
salient features of behaviouralism which are regarded as its intellectual
foundations. Viz;

 Regularities: This approach believes that there are certain uniformities in

political behavior which can be expressed in generalization or theories in order
to explain and predict political phenomena. In a particular situation the political
behavior of individual may be more or less similar. Such regularities of
behavior may help the researcher to analyze a political situation as well as to
predict the future political phenomena. Study of such regularities makes
political science more scientific with some predictive value.
 Verification: The behaviouralist do not want to accept everything as
granted. Therefore, they emphasize testing and verifying everything. According
to them what cannot be verified is not scientific.
 Techniques: The behaviouralist put emphasis on the use of those research
tools and methods which generate valid, reliable and comparative data. A
researcher according to them must make use of sophisticated tools like sample
surveys, mathematical models, simulation etc.
 Quantification: This is simply the express or measure of the quantity of
data. After the collection of data, the researcher should measure and not just
measure but also quantify those collected data.
 Values: This is the standards of behavior. The behaviouralist put heavy
emphasis on separation of facts from values. They believe that to do objective
research one has to do be value free. This means that the researcher should not
have any pre conceived notion or a biased view.
 Systematization: This simply has to do with considering the importance
of theory in research. But according to the behaviouralists, research in political
science must be systematic. Theory and research should go together.
 Pure Science: Another characteristic of behaviouralism has been its aim
to make political science a ‘pure science’. It believes that the study of political
science should be verified by evidence.
 Integration: According to the behaviouralists, political science should not
be separated from other social science disciplines like History, Sociology, and
Economics etc. This approach believes that political events are shaped by
various other factors in the society and therefore, it would be wrong to separate
political science from other social science disciplines.
MERITS AND DEMERITS OF BEHAVIOURALISM
Merits:
With the emergence of behaviouralism a new thinking and method of study
were evolved in the field of political science. Therefore, we can list the merits of
behavioural approach as follows:

1. It attempts to make political science scientific and brings it closer to the

day to day life of the individuals.
2. Behavioural approach affords the opportunity to analyze and explain
different political phenomena. It offers explanatory tools for studying the
different political system of the world, especially in developing countries, based
on the peculiar circumstances prevalent in each country.
3. It facilitates comparative politics. This is done by comparing the different
political institutions and systems in different countries and their handling of
issues. For instance, it could compare the actions taken by the military regime in
Nigeria over a seditious publication with the actions of the United States
government on a similar issue.
4. This approach helps in predicting future political events.
5. Behaviouralism has first talked about bringing human behavior into the
arena of political science and thereby makes the study more relevant to the
society.

Demerits:
The behavioural approach has been appreciated by different political thinkers
for its merits as mentioned above. However, the behavioural approach has been
faced with various criticisms. The main criticisms leveled against this approach
are:

1. Ambiguous Claims: this has been criticized its dependence on small

issues, rather than tackling problems from a general perspective. The
behaviouralists usually apply themselves to particular circumstance and so the
result of their exercise may not be applied generally to solve similar problems.
For its dependence on techniques, and methods ignoring the subject matter.
2. The advocates of this approach were wrong when they said that
humans beings behave in similar ways in similar circumstances.
3. As human beings are subject to changes, it is a difficult task to
study human behavior and get a definite result.
4. Most of political phenomena are unquantifiable. Therefore it is
always difficult to use scientific method in the study of political science.
5. Moreover, the researcher being a human is not always value neutral
as believed by the behaviouralist.
6. The claim of behaviouralist that their approach has an
interdisciplinary bent is not entirely peculiar to them. This is because the
traditionalist equally borrow the contributions of scholars from other field of
study including; psychology, philosophy and sociology in explaining
contemporary political problems. Also their emphasis on making the discipline
of political science more mathematical than descriptive should be approached
with caution. It has been challenged by some other scholars based on the
premise that the political man cannot be reduced to a mere mathematical
formula.