William J. Kelleher, Ph.D.

Presented at the University of Havana, Cuba
Eighteenth International Conference for a New Political Science
November 17 to November 20, 2015
                                                       
For more than a century, conflicting interpretations of Karl Marx have left the world in a quandary. Was he a hard line communist? An idealistic tyrant? A misanthrope? Or, a Western style humanist? What was Marx’s non-economic theory of values?
In this essay I show how Formal Axiology can clarify these questions. Used as an interpretive framework, Formal Axiology will show beyond question that Marx’s Marxism was person-centered, and anti-collectivism.  "Communism" was not primarily an economic system for Marx, but a society of humane social relations among fully developed individuals.

Robert S. Hartman is the founder of Formal Axiology, which makes a true science of values possible. His value science has the potential to rival the natural sciences in all the good they have done for humanity. But the so-called biography of Hartman discussed in this essay is not to be trusted. It is an anti-value science tract.  The corrections I make will clarify Hartman’s vision for the future of Formal Axiology, and explain the Value Calculus w/o the need of math.

In an essay on the methods currently in use in political science, Professor Dvora Yanow observes that there are three primary approaches. She classifies these methodologies as the 1) quantitative, 2) positivist-qualitative, and 3) interpretivist.*

In this essay I will offer three primary arguments.  The first is that David Easton’s systematic political theory is axiom centered. I will reconstruct the presentation of his axiom that Easton gave in The Political System to show how it unifies his systematic political theory, which includes his theory of the political system.  (The axiom is well known to political scientists – “politics” consists of that human activity done in relation to the authoritative allocation of values for society). Secondly, I will show that Easton’s axiom centered systematic political theory is squarely within the “interpretivist” category of methodology, as Yanow defines it. Because he is widely classified as a “behavioralist,” indeed, as a founder of that approach, the uniqueness of Easton’s own approach, and its interpretivist characteristics, is under appreciated. My third point will be that Easton has succeeded in his declared aim of defining the scope and methods of political science as a science, and that he has thus defined the profession as, in Yanow’s words, an interpretive empirical political science.
* Interpretive Empirical Political Science. Qualitative Methods, Fall 2003

Surveying the field in mid-20th century, David Easton observed that political science primarily lacks "a conceptual framework or systematic theory to give meaning, coherence, and direction to ongoing research." In his most prominent work, The Political System, he writes, "In political science there has been little deliberate effort to formulate a conceptual framework for the whole field." The problem he undertakes, then, is that of "defining political science," and thus to "define the core of the field." This was Easton's heroic mission.

Applying the Hartman-Easton Synthesis this paper illustrates how the goodness of China’s political system can be assessed. Using David Easton’s theory of the political system as if it were an automotive engineer’s blueprint for the expected operation of a motor, the operational goodness of any political system can be assessed as an empirical, rather than moral, matter. Robert S. Hartman, the founder of the science of values (“value science”), has shown that goodness can be assessed in three dimensions. As those pertain to political science, they are, the systemic, or constitutional; the extrinsic, or operational; and the intrinsic, or public sentience. The conclusion addresses the challenge of rendering an over-all, or general, assessment of a political system’s goodness.

New research reveals that Human Beings evolved from a strand of Hominids who survived by Food Sharing. This evidence suggests that humanity’s earliest “nature” was to cooperatively gather and share food as their primary means of adaptation. If true, then sensationalist claims about a supposed aggressive and selfish nature, while profitable, are teaching the species a false self-image. Food sharing was likely the basis for the first political system.

In their book A Model Discipline (Clarke 2012a), Clarke and Primo characterize and criticize the corporate culture of the contemporary US political science profession. Employing qualitative methods, they write as participant observers in the field. In this essay, I will draw attention to one of the central arguments in their book; viz., that the current conception of good work in the profession is too constraining, and that their proposal for a more liberating conception of good work should be adopted. While calling for more methodological openness, this is not the usual appeal for toleration of mixed methods in political science.  As we will see, Clarke and Primo take the debate in a new direction by including descriptions of the deleterious effects of the dominant methodological paradigm on the profession.

In this review I will discuss what I take to be four of the most prominent problematic claims (which I’ll call fallacies) made in this new book.  While, in my opinion, Dawkins performs a needed service for atheism by calling attention to the oppressive and discriminatory milieu in which American atheists now live (esp. pp. 43-45), as one of atheism’s current elites, his intellectual contribution offers little for atheists to be proud of.

RE: Matthew Desmond’s new book, Evicted

Sanford Schram has commented that “Desmond’s ethnographic skills are remarkable,” and Schram then deems the book “good Political Science research.”  While I completely agree with his first comment, I strongly disagree that Desmond’s book merits membership in the literature of what Dvora Yanow calls “empirical interpretive political science.”  Indeed, that work is irrelevant to the defining concerns of such a political science.

How can we determine when an interpretive study is relevant to our political science, as opposed to being just another study in social science generally? Is there any way to distinguish political science interpretivism from sociology, or any other social science, interpretivism? David Easton has given us the answer.

This essay takes a new look at Frans de Waal’s classic, Chimpanzee Politics: Power and Sex among Apes, and asks, Can Chimpanzee Politics Constitute a Political System?
Measuring the behavior of these clever creatures by David Easton’s definitions of “politics” and the “political system,” will result in a conclusion that some readers may not find palatable.

As is well known, David Easton defines the political system as emerging from those social interactions undertaken in relation to the authoritative allocation of values for a society. This paper explains two normative services that Easton’s definition can provide for political science; one is explanatory, the other evaluative. The explanatory service is to show both the distinctiveness of political science as a social science and to serve as a standard, or norm, by which to set the boundaries of the profession’s subject matter. Secondly, Easton’s theory of the political system as an input/output model can serve as a standard by which to assess the “goodness” of a political system, and for comparing the goodness of systems. Assessing such goodness is not a matter of moral approval or approbation, but more like the taxonomist assessing the goodness of a specimen, as to both its categorical fit and its health.

David Easton, political scientist, and Robert S. Hartman, founder of Formal Axiology and the Science of Value, were probably unknown to one another, although they were contemporaries.
As is well known, Easton defines the “political system” as emerging from those social interactions undertaken in relation to the authoritative allocation of values for a society.
This paper explains two normative services that Easton’s definition can provide for political science; one is explanatory, the other evaluative. The explanatory service is to show both the distinctiveness of political science as a social science and to serve as a standard, or norm, by which to set the boundaries of the profession’s subject matter.
Secondly, Easton’s theory of the political system as an input/output model can serve as a standard by which to assess the “goodness” of a political system, and for comparing the goodness of systems. Using Hartman's definition of “good” as that which fulfills the definition of its concept, assessing the goodness of a political system is not a matter of moral approval or approbation, but more like the taxonomist assessing the goodness of a specimen, as to both its categorical fit and its health.

Using David Easton's theory of the political system, this paper shows exactly how to measure the goodness of any political system. The theory of the political system has five specific parts -- inputs, conversion (to), outputs, feedback loop, political environment. Using this as the standard, by comparing it to the empirical facts constituting a particular political system, the goodness of that actual political system can be measured with mathematical precision.<div><br></div>

Clyde Barrow concludes his informative 2008 account of the intellectual origins of New Political Science with the question “Which way do we go now?” On this 50th Anniversary of the Caucus for a New Political Science, this article will directly engage that question. First, it will be shown that Barrow’s discussion of the intellectual positions informing the founding moment of the CNPS has some serious misconceptions which may obscure the formation of a clear vision of the Caucus’s options for future endeavors. Among the points to be discussed are: certain misunderstandings of David Easton’s systematic political theory; a lack of clarity about what the fact-value distinction means for the conduct of political science as a “profession;” and, Easton’s vision of political science as constituted by three distinct levels. This discussion will further clarify the current context in which Caucus members may make their plans for future action organizationally, intellectually, and politically.

Physics envy is a malady that distorts perceptions and understanding in political science today, according to Clarke and Primo.  On the assumption that Reason can heal this instance of misguided commitment in our profession, I review the last book written by the renowned biologist Ernst Mayr (1904-2005), which he intended as his final statement on the nature of biology. His clear thinking on the same malady in biology provides a therapeutic orientation from which we political scientists can learn much.

Presidential elections in the United States are dominated by the two-party system.  Yet, there are no provisions for such a system in the US Constitution.  In fact, the Framers of that document explicitly provided for a very distinct presidential election procedure, which they intended to be free of party domination.  This essay provides a comprehensive statement of those original intentions.

This paper will present a social science paradigm for critically evaluating the security concerns most often expressed by opponents of Internet voting. In 2003, these concerns were so effectively expressed that they resulted in the US government ceasing all efforts to even experiment with voting from overseas via the new technology. However, when examined within a context of social scientific reasoning, the arguments that stopped the progress of Internet voting in the US appear as mere appeals to fear, bereft of rationality. First, the problem of how to think about e-crime in general will be discussed. Secondly, the framework that emerges from that discussion will be applied to the arguments against Internet voting. The conclusion will suggest that Internet voting can be conducted with a degree of security similar to an online purchase, a million dollar bank transfer, or a secret military communication. As shown in the essay, the technology already exists, and has been honed over many years of use. While there are differences between the military uses of the Internet, e-commerce, and Internet voting, this paper will argue that the degree of security for each need not vary significantly.

David Easton understood that the political system is an emergent property of political behavior. But, when did the first political behavior emerge in human evolution? How did that happen? How can this be known? Political theory finds itself looking way back, and answering these, and other, questions.

Bernie Sanders and AOC have called for national rent control w/ a 3% cap on rent increases. But this leaves outrageously high rents in place.
This article shows how CA Prop 21 can lead to a 3% cap on Landlord Profits.
That would enable Roll Backs of rent, and Claw Backs of excess profits from the past. This would make rents affordable, and give victimized tenants some of their money back.