Microcredential komex Comparative Case Study Design
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This five-day in-person course teaches you how to design your qualitative comparative case study research, from defining research questions and concepts to selecting cases, choosing strategies for data collection and analysis, and addressing research-practical issues.
What Is This Course About?
A solid foundation in comparative case studies is essential for comparative social scientists. This five-day in-person course provides you with the skills needed to design your qualitative comparative case study research, based on your own and/or other applied research projects. The course covers the topics of causal complexity, concept formation, casing and case selection, logics and strategies of comparison, accounting for context and time, choosing data collection and analysis strategies, as well as conceptual and research-practical issues when drawing inferences in case-oriented research.
Learning Goals
- Be able to find a suitable comparative case study research design to answer your research question.
- Learn common techniques of structuring and defining concepts, defining and selecting cases, thinking about time and context in comparative case study research, and analysing and comparing cases depending on the inferential goal, and be able to apply them in your own research.
- Be aware of potential pitfalls of comparative case study research, such as limited empirical diversity and conceptual stretching, and ways of addressing them.
- Be familiar with some seminal texts about comparative case study research, covering both classics and recent innovations.
Recommended Readings for the Course
- Beach, D., & Pedersen, R. B. (2016). Causal case study methods: Foundations and guidelines for comparing, matching, and tracing. University of Michigan Press.
- Goertz, G. (2020). Social Science Concepts and Measurement. Princeton and Oxford: Princeton University Press.
- Thomann, E. (2019). Customized implementation of European Union food safety policy: United in diversity? Cham: Palgrave Macmillan, International Series on Public Policy.
Assignments for the Course
- Daily assignments (not graded).
- Final take-home paper.
Schedule
- 09:00-10:30h -Course
- 10:30-11:00h - Break
- 11:00-12:30h - Course
- 12:30-13:30h - Lunch break
- 13.30-14.30h - Course
Teaching sessions include:
- Foundations and research questions in case-oriented research,
- Theories and concepts,
- Defining and selecting cases,
- Choosing methods of data collection and analysis,
- Drawing inferences: good practices and pitfalls,
- Techniques of data collection and interpretive methods are not taught in this course.
Who Is Your Instructor?
Eva Thomann is a full professor at the Department of Politics and Public Administration at the University of Konstanz who specializes in case-oriented and set-theoretic research design and methodology, which she teaches at international method schools. She co-authored the textbook “Qualitative Comparative Analysis (QCA) Using R: A Beginner’s Guide” (2021, Cambridge University Press, with Carsten Q. Schneider and Ioana-Elena Oana) and “Designing Research with Qualitative Comparative Analysis (QCA): Approaches, Challenges, Tools” (2020, Sociological Methods & Research, with Martino Maggetti). Eva Thomann is the academic convenor of komex and a founding member of the Methods Excellence Network (MethodsNet).
www.linkedin.com/in/evathomann
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