Browsing by Subject "statistical techniques"

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    The Uneven Development of Quantitative Social Science in South Africa
    (Taylor & Francis, 2001) Seekings, Jeremy
    One of the most striking contrasts between journals in South African studies. (or African studies more broadly) and journals in the social sciences in the USA or Europe is the balance between quantitative and qualitative research. In the USA, especially, a high proportion of contemporary research in political science and sociology as well as economics and development studies entails the analysis of quantitative data using ever more complex statistical techniques. In South Africa (and Africa) this kind of social science remains significantly underdeveloped. Since the mid-1990s, however, there has been a marked resurgence of quantitative research in South African social sciences, fuelled by the availability of new data, ready access to personal computers and more user-friendly statistical software, policy-makers' urgent requests for quantitative analysis and scholars' reimmersion in global academic networks. Economists have taken the lead in this new scholarship, but some political scientists, sociologists, criminologists and others have moved in a similar direction. Much of the new work has, however, been slow to cross disciplinary boundaries.