Methods resources

In the course of this module we will be encountering a variety of empirical methods and research designs. Below is an indicative list of methodological resources offering a useful entry point to both qualitative and quantitative research designs and methods. Consulting and translating into practice relevant methodological resources – not constrained to the list below – is particularly important for the assessment.

Quantitative methods

Huntington-Klein, Nick. The effect: An introduction to research design and causality. Chapman and Hall/CRC, 2021. link

Imbens, Guido W. “Causal inference in the social sciences.” Annual Review of Statistics and Its Application 11 (2024): 123-152.

Spirling, Arthur, and Brandon M. Stewart. “What good is a regression? Inference to the best explanation and the practice of political science research.” The Journal of Politics 87, no. 4 (2025): 1587-1599.

Difference-in-differences

Roth, Jonathan, Pedro HC Sant’Anna, Alyssa Bilinski, and John Poe. “What’s trending in difference-in-differences? A synthesis of the recent econometrics literature.” Journal of Econometrics 235, no. 2 (2023): 2218-2244.

Callaway, Brantly, and Pedro HC Sant’Anna. “Difference-in-differences with multiple time periods.” Journal of Econometrics 225, no. 2 (2021): 200-230.

De Chaisemartin, Clément, and Xavier d’Haultfoeuille. “Difference-in-differences estimators of intertemporal treatment effects.” Review of Economics and Statistics 108, no. 4 (2026): 863-880.

Chiu, Albert, Xingchen Lan, Ziyi Liu, and Yiqing Xu. “Causal panel analysis under parallel trends: lessons from a large reanalysis study.” American Political Science Review 120, no. 1 (2026): 245-266.

Synthetic control

Abadie, Alberto. “Using synthetic controls: Feasibility, data requirements, and methodological aspects.” Journal of economic literature 59, no. 2 (2021): 391-425.

Arkhangelsky, Dmitry, Susan Athey, David A. Hirshberg, Guido W. Imbens, and Stefan Wager. “Synthetic difference-in-differences.” American Economic Review 111, no. 12 (2021): 4088-4118.

Abadie, Alberto, Alexis Diamond, and Jens Hainmueller. “Comparative politics and the synthetic control method.” American Journal of Political Science 59, no. 2 (2015): 495-510.

Regression discontinuity

Cattaneo, Matias D., and Rocio Titiunik. “Regression discontinuity designs.” Annual Review of Economics 14, no. 1 (2022): 821-851.

Stommes, Drew, P. M. Aronow, and Fredrik Sävje. “On the reliability of published findings using the regression discontinuity design in political science.” Research & Politics 10, no. 2 (2023).

Matching and weighting

Imai, Kosuke, In Song Kim, and Erik H. Wang. “Matching methods for causal inference with time‐series cross‐sectional data.” American Journal of Political Science 67, no. 3 (2023): 587-605.

Ho, Daniel E., Kosuke Imai, Gary King, and Elizabeth A. Stuart. “Matching as nonparametric preprocessing for reducing model dependence in parametric causal inference.” Political Analysis 15, no. 3 (2007): 199-236.

Hainmueller, Jens. “Entropy balancing for causal effects: A multivariate reweighting method to produce balanced samples in observational studies.” Political Analysis 20, no. 1 (2012): 25-46.

Imai, Kosuke, and Marc Ratkovic. “Covariate balancing propensity score.” Journal of the Royal Statistical Society Series B: Statistical Methodology 76, no. 1 (2014): 243-263.

Chernozhukov, Victor, Denis Chetverikov, Mert Demirer, Esther Duflo, Christian Hansen, Whitney Newey, and James Robins. “Double/debiased machine learning for treatment and structural parameters.” The Econometrics Journal 21, no. 1 (2018): C1-C68.

Ideal point estimation

Morucci, Marco, Margaret J. Foster, Kaitlyn Webster, So Jin Lee, and David A. Siegel. “Measurement That Matches Theory: Theory-Driven Identification in Item Response Theory Models.” American Political Science Review 119, no. 2 (2025): 727-745.

Peress, Michael. “Large-scale ideal point estimation.” Political Analysis 30, no. 3 (2022): 346-363.

Martin, Andrew D., and Kevin M. Quinn. “Dynamic ideal point estimation via Markov chain Monte Carlo for the US Supreme Court, 1953–1999.” Political Analysis 10, no. 2 (2002): 134-153.

Poole, Keith, Jeffrey B. Lewis, James Lo, and Royce Carroll. “Scaling roll call votes with wnominate in R.” Journal of Statistical Software 42 (2011): 1-21.

Instrumental variables

Felton, Chris, and Brandon M. Stewart. “Handle with care: A sociologist’s guide to causal inference with instrumental variables.” Sociological Methods & Research 55, no. 1 (2026): 3-50.

Mellon, Jonathan. “Rain, rain, go away: 194 potential exclusion‐restriction violations for studies using weather as an instrumental variable.” American Journal of Political Science 69, no. 3 (2025): 881-898.

Lal, Apoorva, Mackenzie Lockhart, Yiqing Xu, and Ziwen Zu. “How much should we trust instrumental variable estimates in political science? Practical advice based on 67 replicated studies.” Political Analysis 32, no. 4 (2024): 521-540.

Sovey, Allison J., and Donald P. Green. “Instrumental variables estimation in political science: A readers’ guide.” American Journal of Political Science 55, no. 1 (2011): 188-200.

Survey experiments

Hainmueller, Jens, Daniel J. Hopkins, and Teppei Yamamoto. “Causal inference in conjoint analysis: Understanding multidimensional choices via stated preference experiments.” Political Analysis 22, no. 1 (2014): 1-30.

Muñoz, Jordi, Albert Falcó-Gimeno, and Enrique Hernández. “Unexpected event during survey design: Promise and pitfalls for causal inference.” Political Analysis 28, no. 2 (2020): 186-206.

Random assignment of judges and cases

Frandsen, Brigham, Lars Lefgren, and Emily Leslie. “Judging judge fixed effects.” American Economic Review 113, no. 1 (2023): 253-277.

Chyn, Eric, Brigham Frandsen, and Emily Leslie. “Examiner and judge designs in economics: A practitioner’s guide.” Journal of Economic Literature 63, no. 2 (2025): 401-439.

Mixed methods

Humphreys, Macartan, and Alan M. Jacobs. Integrated Inferences: Causal Models for Qualitative and Mixed-Method Research. Cambridge University Press, 2023.

Lieberman, Evan S. “Nested analysis as a mixed-method strategy for comparative research.” American Political Science Review 99, no. 3 (2005): 435-452.

Rohlfing, Ingo, and Christina Isabel Zuber. “Check your truth conditions! Clarifying the relationship between theories of causation and social science methods for causal inference.” Sociological Methods & Research 50, no. 4 (2021): 1623-1659.

Humphreys, Macartan, and Alan M. Jacobs. “Mixing methods: A Bayesian approach.” American Political Science Review 109, no. 4 (2015): 653-673.

Qualitative methods

Gerring, John. “Qualitative methods.” Annual Review of Political Science 20, no. 1 (2017): 15-36.

Collins, Caitlyn, Megan Tobias Neely, and Shamus Khan. ““Which cases do I need?” Constructing cases and observations in qualitative research.” Annual Review of Sociology 50 (2024): 21-40.

Process tracing

Ricks, Jacob I., and Amy H. Liu. “Process-tracing research designs: A practical guide.” PS: Political Science & Politics 51, no. 4 (2018): 842-846.

Beach, Derek. “It’s all about mechanisms–what process-tracing case studies should be tracing.” New Political Economy 21, no. 5 (2016): 463-472.

Gonzalez-Ocantos, Ezequiel, and Jody LaPorte. “Process tracing and the problem of missing data.” Sociological Methods & Research 50, no. 3 (2021): 1407-1435.

Controlled comparisons

Slater, Dan, and Daniel Ziblatt. “The enduring indispensability of the controlled comparison.” Comparative Political Studies 46, no. 10 (2013): 1301-1327.

Gisselquist, Rachel M. “Paired Comparison and Theory Development: Considerations for Case Selection.” PS: Political Science & Politics 47, no. 2 (2014): 477-484.

Tarrow, Sidney. “The strategy of paired comparison: Toward a theory of practice.” Comparative Political Studies 43, no. 2 (2010): 230-259.

Case studies

Gerring, John. “What is a case study and what is it good for?.” American Political Science Review 98, no. 2 (2004): 341-354.

Seawright, Jason, and John Gerring. “Case selection techniques in case study research: A menu of qualitative and quantitative options.” Political research quarterly 61, no. 2 (2008): 294-308.

Beach, Derek, and Rasmus Brun Pedersen. “Selecting appropriate cases when tracing causal mechanisms.” Sociological Methods & Research 47, no. 4 (2018): 837-871.