Social Science Perspectives to Peace and Conflict

  • Copyright © Social Sciences Unit, School of General Studies, University of Nigeria, Nsukka. All rights reserved; reproduction, storage, retrieval, or distribution prohibited without permission, excluding reviews or citations.
  • First published March 2017; ISBN: 978-978-956-790-4.
  • Published by PARAKLETOS.
  • Notes on Authors, Foreword, Preface, and Contents are included.

Chapter 1: Universe of the Social Sciences

  • Authors: Peter-Jazzy Ezeh and Chukwuemeka Q. Chukwu
  • Introduction:
    • Halloran's definition (2010): Social sciences encompass psychology, sociology, anthropology, economics, and political science for the systematic study of society and human behavior with verifiable knowledge.
    • Systematic approach and scientific techniques are applied to study humans and their interactions.
    • Worsely (1980): Social sciences observe human activities like working, talking, and physical actions.
    • Commonalities:
    • Focus on humans as social and group beings, interacting within groups.
    • Scientific endeavor using organized techniques to investigate human interaction with the environment and society.
    • Science defined: Any rule-governed and evidence-driven knowledge production process.
    • Accommodates physical and social sciences.

Origins of the Social Sciences

  • Traceable to the Age of Reason or Enlightenment in 18th century Europe.
    • Replacement of religiosity with rationality.
    • Led by French philosophes who reacted against intellectual stagnation after the fall of Rome.
    • Church explanations of social phenomena were challenged.
    • Enlightenment thinkers advocated for empirical evidence and rational analysis.
    • Denis Diderot's Encyclopédie exemplified this approach.
  • Emergence of sociology: August Comte, considered the founder, aimed for objectivity akin to physics, initially considering the name "social physics".
    • Read Ezeh (2016) for more details.
  • Three key contributions of Comte & early sociologists:
    • Developed social research methods and theories, freeing inquiries from common-sense or sentiments.
    • Believed progress was attainable through appropriate knowledge in societal organization and management.
    • Excluded supernatural agencies, emphasizing human actions as the source of progress or failure.

Growth of the Social Sciences

  • Social/cultural anthropology shares concerns with sociology, originating from Comte.
    • Specialization: social anthropology focused on non-Western societies, sociology on industrialized Euro-American societies.
    • While interests were explored by classical Greek writers like Plato and Aristotle, disciplines evolved after the Enlightenment from sociology.
    • Linguistics grew out of social anthropology and is considered a branch of general anthropology, along with physical anthropology and archaeology.
  • Social sciences listed: anthropology, archaeology, economics, human geography, linguistics, mass communication, political science, psychology, sociology.
    • Some classifications include education and law.
    • Sub-specializations evolved into disciplines (e.g., international relations, public administration from political science) and criminology, police science (sociology).
    • Religion is studied as a social institution, not theologically.
    • Public administration and social work are full disciplines at the University of Nigeria.
    • Psychology, anthropology, and geography are partly social/natural sciences.
  • Disciplinary locations & identities:
    • Placement varies across universities (e.g., religion, philosophy in social sciences at University of Nigeria).
    • Some universities combine arts and social sciences administratively.
    • Placement doesn't determine inherent identity.
  • Defining a social science: studies human aggregates systematically using research methods based on scientific principles and explanatory models to describe and predict behavior; disciplinary boundaries are blurred.

Anthropology

  • Originates from Greek words anthropos (human) and logos (study).
  • Studies humans from four dimensions: biological/physical, archaeology, linguistic, and social/cultural perspectives.

Archaeology

  • Combines geology, biology, geography, chemistry, and social anthropology to study the past of human cultures and related life forms.
    • Focuses on hominids, with human being the only surviving species.
    • Recoveries mainly in eastern, southern Africa.
    • In Nigeria, cultural history recovered in Ife, Igbo-Ukwu, Lejja, Afikpo, Jos areas.
    • Data obtained via digging includes fossils (natural life remains) and artifacts (human-made objects).

Economics

  • Concerned with production, distribution, and consumption of goods/services, originating from Greek oikonomia (household management).
  • Studies labor, land, investments, money, income, production, taxes, and government expenditures.
  • Aims to measure well-being, its increase over time, and evaluates rich vs. poor.

Geography

  • Derived from Greek geo (earth) and graphe (writing).
  • Examines man-environment interaction.
  • Divisions:
    • Human/cultural: Man's immediate environment and relationship, focusing on enhancement/depletion.
    • Regional: links between regions (soil, vegetation, resources).
    • Transportation: landscapes, population, city structure (partly human, economic, and urban).
    • Physical: study of natural features and links to human life (part of natural sciences).

Linguistics

  • Scientific study of human language.
  • Language is central to human society and culture.
  • Branches:
    • Sociolinguistics: language in relation to social factors (class, education, age, sex, ethnicity).
    • Psycholinguistics: psychology and linguistics interface.
    • Anthropological/linguistic anthropology: language variation/use related to cultural patterns/beliefs.
    • Applied linguistics: application of linguistics to social needs, especially language teaching.

Mass Communication

  • Grew out of sociology, combining specializations dealing with sending messages to anonymous, dispersed audiences via mass media.
  • Mass media: film, television, radio, newspapers, pamphlets, magazines, handbills, billboards.
  • Sub-fields: journalism, public relations, advertising, cinematography, divided into print/electronic and skill-based specializations.
    • Training shifted from hands-on to academic.
    • Studies effects of mass media, roles in society using methods from social sciences (sociology, psychology, economics, anthropology, political science).
    • Psephology in advanced democracies utilizes mass communication and other fields to understand voting patterns.

Political Science

  • Systematic study of politics employing the scientific method.
  • Politics involves acquisition and utilization of power.
  • Studies political behavior of individuals, groups, societies, conditions affecting political actors, events, and institutions.
  • Subfields: public administration, government, comparative politics, political theory, international relations, peace/conflict studies, migration/refugee studies, human security studies.
International Relations
  • Studies interactions between nations, including law, organizations, economic relations, foreign policy, and conflict.
Public Administration
  • Studies implementation of governmental policies by bureaucracy, focusing on intergovernmental relations and efficiency.
Political Theory
  • Also known as political philosophy; Questions good government, citizen obedience, justification of revolution, and the good life.

Psychology

  • Studies human/animal behavior development, learning, problem-solving, and motives.
  • The definitions emphasize science, behavior study, and solution prediction.
  • Partly biological/social science.
  • Concerns itself with mental processes, behavior, dreams, thoughts, feelings, images, speech and physiological states.
    • Social, cross-cultural, and industrial psychology apply to social aggregates.
    • Social psychology: humans in social milieu.
    • Cross-cultural psychology: Impact of culture on behavior.
    • Industrial psychology: strategies applied to work environments/organizations.
    • Even branches focused on individuals aims to reconcile them with the larger society.

Sociology

  • Derivative of Latin socius (companion) and Greek logos (study); study of society as a group, its people, and interactions.
  • Covers all institutions, social processes, and phenomena, using objective methods.
  • Aims to understand why phenomena occur for knowledge/solutions.
  • Branches: sociology of medicine/religion/law/development, military sociology, urban sociology, criminology/penology, industrial sociology, political sociology, sociology of education/population/demography, gerontology, race/ethnic relations.
    • Criminology/penology: relation between social factors and crime; studies correctional systems.
    • Gerontology: studies societal dimensions of aging.
    • Population/demography: social dimensions of population growth/decline and its implications.

Conclusion

  • Social sciences study humans as social aggregates/collectivities, using detached research methods and data analysis.
  • Traceable to the 18th century Enlightenment, advocating understanding human society free from religiosity for progress in social institutions, processes, and technology.

Chapter Two : Research Methodology in the Social Sciences

  • Focuses on human beings as its focus of analysis.
  • Debate had raged over the scientific status of the Social Sciences.
  • Need to expose budding social researchers to the techniques and processes of knowledge generation in the social sciences.
Research
  • The process of arriving at a dependable solution to a research problem through the planned and systematic collection, analysis and interpretation of data.
  • Research seeks to find explanations to unexplained phenomena, to clarify propositions, and to correct misconceived facts.
  • Scientific method is a systematic, rational approach to seeking fact.
Science
  • Derived from the Latin word scientia, meaning knowledge.
  • Science refers to a systematic and organized body of knowledge in any area of inquiry that is acquired using the scientific method.
  • Scientific disciplines may be categorized as a natural or social science.
Scientific Research
  • A body of systematized knowledge as well as a method of gathering such knowledge.
    -Scientific research therefore is "the production of systematic explanations based upon empirical data joined logically to form regular patterns"
  • Scientific method is not one thing; it
    -is a collection of ideas, rules, techniques, and approaches used by the scientific community.
  • It grows out of a consensus formed within the community.
Types of Scientific Research
  • Exploratory research is often conducted in new areas of inquiry, where the goals of the research are
    making careful observations and detailed documentation of a phenomenon.
    explanatory research. attempts to ''connect the dots'' in research, by identifying causal factors and outcomes
Characteristics of the Scientific method
  • The scientific method involves a logical, empirical, systematic and integrated process of collecting and analysing data with the aim of providing understanding, explanation and prediction.
  • Replicability
  • Precision
  • Falsifiability
  • Parsimony
Type of Social Science Research
  • Social science research is a systematic method of exploring, analysing and conceptualizing human life
  • Verifying old fact
  • Social research tries to establish causal connection between various human activities.
Functions of Social Science Research
  • Discovery of facts and their interpretation, diagnosing problems and their anlysis, systematization of knowledge, etc.
Theory in Social Research
  • A theory is a logically interrelated set of propositions about empirical reality.
  • A statement of the suspected relationship between and among variables.
  • Frameworks of empirical evidence used to study and interpret social phenomena.
    -Functions of the theories: Help us classify things, understand why already observed regularities occur, preict as yet unobserved relationships, Guide research in useful directions, etc.
Quantitative and Qualitative Research in the Social Sciences
  • Quantitative studies approach social phenomena through quantifiable evidence. It often relies on statistical analysis of many cases.
  • Qualitative research emphasizes understanding of social phenomena through direct observation, communication with participants, or analysis of texts.
  • The qualitative approach often stresses contextual subjective accuracy over generalizability.
Methods and Methodology of Social Science Research
  • Method refers to those range of approaches used in research to gather data which are to be used as a basis for inference and interpretation for explanation and prediction.
  • Methodology is the worldview-influenced lens through which the research is understood, designed, and conducted.
Steps in Conducting Scientific Research
Steps in the Quantitative Research Process
  1. Select Topic
  2. Focus Question
  3. Design Study
  4. Collect Data
  5. Analyze Data
  6. Interpret Data
  7. Inform Others
Qualitative Approach to Social Research
  1. Acknowledge self and context
  2. Adopt a perspective
    3-6. Design a study and collect, analyse, and interpret data
  3. Inform others
Types of Research designs
  • Exploratory
  • Descriptive
  • Experimental
Norms of the Scientific Community
  • Universalism.
    ii. Organized scepticism.
    iii. Disinterestedness
    . iv. Communalism. v. Honesty.