Introduction  

1. Empiricism  

Introduction  

Empirical Observation, Positivism, and the Unity of Science  

Legitimate Knowledge, Data, Operational Definitions, Facts,
  Causes, Correlations, Variables, and Explanation  

The Deductive-Nomological Model as the Analytical Imperative
  of Empiricism  

The Importance of the Deductive-Nomological Model  

The Dominance, Appeal, Prestige, and Legitimacy of Empiricist
  Social Science  

Study Questions  

2. Internal Tensions: From Empiricism to Hermeneutics  

Introduction  

Critical Scrutiny of Empiricism  

    Expectations of the Familiar and Unfamiliar  

    Underdetermination and the Duck-Rabbit Example  

    Paradigms  

Theory-posited facts, Rival Theories, and the Spectre of
  Relativism  

The Essence of the Critique  

The Bridge to Hermeneutical (or Interpretive) Inquiry  

Study Questions  

3. Hermeneutics: Subjective and Intersubjective Approaches to the
  Study of Meaning  

Introduction  

The Hermeneutical Meaning of ‘Constitute’  

The Hermeneutical Turn I: Action and Subjectivity  

Historical Interpretive Analysis: Three Dimensions of Context  

Examples of Verstehen Inquiry  

Subjectivity and the Social  

 Unintended Consequences and Reification  

The Empiricist Response to the Problem of Society: Social Facts  

The Hermeneutical Turn II: Practices & Intersubjective Meanings  

The Concept of Intersubjectivity  

Is Everything Subjective? On the Relation between Subjective
  and Intersubjective Meanings  

Conversational Inquiry  

Going General  

Going Local  

Languages of Perspicuous Contrast  

Examples of Conversational Inquiry  

Criteria for Understanding  

Limits and Questions  

Study Questions  

4. Scientific Realism and Critical Theory: Structure, Ideology, and
   Emancipation  

Introduction  

Realism and Empiricism: Real Causal Mechanisms  

Causal Mechanisms in the Social World  

Examples of Structural Causality  

Structures and Social Change  

Ideational Structures  

Marxian Realism  

The Realist Model of Interpreting Politics  

Contemporary Critical Theory  

Knowledge and Human Interests  

Empiricism and the Human Interest in Technical Control  

Hermeneutics and the Interest in Action-Orienting Mutual
  Understanding  

Autonomy, Responsibility, and Critical Social Science  

The Critique of Ideology in Social Science Research  

Inapplicable but Not Inoperative  

The Critique of Ideology and Political Life: Structural Violence  

Structural Violence: Sanctions or War  

“Deadly Silences” and Critical Race Theory  

Goals of Critical Theory  

Study Questions  

5. Discourse Analysis  

Introduction  

Discourse, Constituted Subjects and Subjectivities, Disciplinary
  Mechanisms  

Different Subjectivities  

Normalizing, Homogenizing, Domesticating, Totalizing,
  Colonizing, Hegemonic Power  

Discursive Violence: Discipline and the Production of Desire  

Discourse, Power, and Change  

Productive Power and Precautions  

Genealogical Analysis of Discourse, the Resurgence of Subjugated
  Ways of Life, and Possibilities for Creative Resistance  

Foucault and Resistance  

Example I: Desiring Fascism: The Modern Nation-State,
  Governmentality, and Biopolitics  

Example II: A Brief Genealogical Analysis of Discourses of Speaking
  and Listening  

Discourse, Freedom, and the Individual-as-Subject  

Conclusion: Discourse Analysis in Comparative Perspective  

Study Questions  

 

6. Postcolonial and Subaltern Inquiry  

Introduction: Colonial Violence, Past and Present  

Postcolonialism: Basic Terms and the Postcolonial ‘Prerogative’  

Colonial Power: Contradiction and Ambivalence  

Colonial Knowledge: Orientalism and Colonial Violence  

The Psychic Dynamics of Colonial Violence  

Mimicry and the Boundaries between Colonizer and Colonized   

Fanon on Colonial Violence in Algeria and Postcolonial Analysis
 as Psychoanalysis  

Anti-Colonialism and Mimicry  

Cautions Concerning Objectivist and de-Politicized
  Psychoanalysis  

Postcolonial Critique, an Example: The Coloniality of Western
 Immigration Management  

Subalternity: Discursive Erasure and The Subaltern  

“Can the Subaltern Speak?”  

The Subaltern and Ideology  

Subaltern Representation as Teaching  

Writing and the Metaphysics of Presence  

Difference in Repetition  

Deconstruction and the Subaltern  

Justice  

Catachrestic Model of Postcolonial-Subaltern Inquiry  

Identifying, Reconstructing, and Inhabiting Colonial
  Erasure  

Tracing Subaltern Traces and Teachings  

Renarrating and Rewriting Erased Lifeworlds and
  Experiences  

In the Eye of the Sun  

Signating Signs Beyond Subalternity  

Implications for Interpreting Politics  

Study Questions  

 

7. Conclusion: Openings  

Readings for Interpreting Politics  

Index