Structural Approach: Key Concepts To Understand
Structural Approach: Key Concepts To Understand
Structural Approach: Key Concepts To Understand
Structural approach
Excerpted from: Hague, R., Harrop, M. & McCormick, J. [2016]. Comparative government and politics: An introduction. 10th
Edition. USA: Palgrave. Retrieved from: Comparative%20government%20and%20politics%20an%20introduction%20by
%20Hague,%20Rod%20Harrop,%20Martin%20McCormick,%20John%20(z-lib.org).pdf
This module introduces you to the structural approach. Three countries experiencing different levels of
poverty were chosen for you to read, understand, and analyze using the principles laid down by the structuralists.
Therefore, after reading the excerpted materials, you should be able to:
a. demonstrate your understanding of the structural approach
b. apply structural approach in explaining political issues
particular families to the bottom of the hierarchy. This point, and the overall thrust of
structuralism, is summarized by Mahoney (2003: 51):
At the core of structuralism is the concern with objective relationships between groups
and societies. Structuralism holds that configurations of social relations shape, constrain
and empower actors in predictable ways. Structuralism generally downplays or rejects
cultural and value-based explanations of social phenomena. Likewise, structuralism
opposes approaches that explain social outcomes solely or primarily in terms of
psychological states, individual decision-making processes, or other individual-level
characteristics.
The best-known structural work in politics has adopted an explicitly historical style,
seeking to understand how competition between powerful groups over time leads to specific
outcomes such as a revolution, democracy, or a multi-party system. The authors of such studies
argue that politics is about struggle rather than equilibrium, and they favour comparative
history, giving us another contrast with xxx the sometimes static descriptions of the
institutionalists.
One of the leading figures in the field – who not only exemplifies the structural approach
but helped to define it – was the American sociologist Barrington Moore. His 1966 book Social
Origins of Dictatorship and Democracy: Lord and Peasant in the Making of the Modern World
did more than any other to shape this format of historical analysis of structural forces. In trying
to understand why liberal democracy developed earlier and more easily in France, Britain, and
the United States than in Germany and Japan, he suggested that the strategy of the rising
commercial class was the key. In countries such as Britain, where the bourgeoisie avoided
entanglement with the landowners in their battles with the peasants, the democratic transition
was relatively peaceful. But where landlords engaged the commercial classes in a joint
campaign against the peasantry, as in Germany, the result was an authoritarian regime which
delayed the onset of democracy.
Although later research qualified many of Moore’s judgements, his work showed the
value of studying structural relationships between groups and classes as they evolve over long
periods (Mahoney, 2003). He asked important comparative questions and answered them with an
account of how and when class relationships develop and evolve.
The structural approach asks big questions and, by selecting answers from the past, it
interrogates history without limiting itself to chronology. Many authors working in this tradition
make large claims about the positions adopted by particular classes and groups; specifically,
interests are often treated as if they were actors, leading to ambitious generalizations which
need verification through detailed research. Even so, the structural approach, in the form of
comparative history, has made a distinctive contribution to comparative politics.
Structural approach 3
Enhancement Activity:
Before you read the country case studies, answer first the following questions
to test your understanding of the arguments of structuralism.
1. Define structuralism
3. What is structuralism’s explanation for “groups matter”? And what is the relevance of
this in their analysis of political issues?