Learning from each other: causal inference and American political development

Abstract

Within political science, a movement focused on increasing the credibility of causal inferences (CIs) has gained considerable traction in recent years. While CI has been incorporated extensively into most disciplinary subfields, it has not been applied often in the study of American political development (APD). This special issue considers ways in which scholars of CI and APD can engage in mutually beneficial ways to produce better overall research. As the contributions to the symposium demonstrate, clear scientific gains are to be had from greater CI–APD engagement.