We still lack practical answers to one of the most basic questions in empirical research: How should researchers interpret meanings? The contributors take seriously the goals of both post-modernist and positivist researchers, as they offer detailed guidance on how to apply specific tools of analysis and how to circumvent their inherent limitations.

Autorentext
BROOKE ACKERLY Associate Professor at Vanderbilt University, USA SAMUEL BARKIN Associate Professor at the University of Florida, USA JEFFREY T.CHECKEL Professor of Political Science at the University of Oslo and Adjunct Research Professor at the International Peace Research Institute, Oslo, Norway GAVAN DUFFY Associate Professor at Syracuse University, USA KEVIN C.DUNN Associate Professor at Hobart and William Smith Colleges, USA HUGH GUSTERSON Professor of Cultural Studies at George Mason University, USA MARGARET G. HERMANN Gerald B and Daphna Cramer Professor of Global Affairs and Director of the Daniel Patrick Moynihan Institute of Global Affairs at the Maxwell School of Syracuse University, USA MATTHEW J.HOFFMAN Assistant Professor at the University of Toronto, Canada ANNA LEANDER Associate Professor in the Department of Intercultural Communication and Management at the Copenhagen Business School, Denmark IVER B.NEUMANN Professor of Russian Studies at Oslo University and Research Professor at the Norwegian Institute of International Affairs, Norway JERROLD M. POST Professor in the Elliot School of International Affairs at George Washington University and Director of its Political Psychology program, USA.

Inhalt
Introduction; A.Klotz PART I: RESEARCH DESIGN Thinking Tools; A.Leander Feminist Methodological Reflection; B.Ackerly Case Selection; A.Klotz PART II: CLASSIC QUALITATIVE TOOLS Discourse Analysis; I.B.Neumann Historical Representations; K.C.Dunn Ethnographic Research; H.Gusterson Process Tracing; J.T.Checkel PART III: BOUNDARY CROSSING TECHNIQUES Political Personality Profiling; J.M.Post Content Analysis; M.G.Hermann Pragmatic Analysis; G.Duffy Agent Based Modeling; M.J.Hoffmann PART IV: IMPLICATIONS 'Qualitative' Methods?; S.Barkin Practicing Pluralism; D.Prakash