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Geographic and Other Scientific Techniques for Political Science

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 September 2013

S. Whittemore Boggs
S. Whittemore Boggs
Affiliation:
U. S. Department of State
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Extract

In the times of George Washington and Thomas Jefferson, there were no world problems, and there never had been; nor were any anticipated. But today the range of subject-matter dealt with in international conferences and treaties and by the United Nations, its commissions and the specialized agencies, is almost as all-inclusive as the domestic legislation of any nation, and the problems in some respects are even more complicated. Mankind did not plan it that way. Science and technology have given new meaning to the Chinese proverb, “All people are your relatives; therefore expect troubles from them.”

The greatest evils that afflict and threaten mankind spring from political conflict. The lag of the social sciences behind the physical and biological sciences is in part responsible for these unprecedented problems and for two indescribable world wars in a generation. The fear of other's bombs and ideas has led many nations to enter political struggles that had developed into a state of war in distant regions, impoverishing the whole human race and squandering the patrimony of the world's unborn generations. And the fear of more horrendous wars is strongest among those best equipped to wage them.

Type
Research Article
Information
American Political Science Review , Volume 42 , Issue 2 , April 1948 , pp. 223 - 238
Copyright
Copyright © American Political Science Association 1948

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References

1 Preamble of Constitution of the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO).

2 Bartlett, John, Familiar Quotations, 11th ed., p. vii.Google Scholar

3 Conant, James B., On Understanding Science (New Haven, 1947), pp. 30 and 36–37.Google ScholarPubMed

4 See d'Abro, A., The Decline of Mechanism [in Modern Physics] (New York, 1939), Chap. 13Google Scholar, “Psychological Differences among Physicists.”

5 See Mayo, Elton, The Social Problems of an Industrial Civilization (Harvard School of Business Administration, 1945)Google Scholar for suggestions for application of the methods of the clinic and the laboratory to social and political problems. “The one method informs and develops the other—simple logic and complex fact, simplified fact and complex logic” (pp. 34–35).

6 See Neff, Emery, The Poetry of History (New York, 1947), p. 212.Google Scholar

7 See Latourette, Kenneth Scott, The Chinese: Their History and Culture (2nd ed. rev., 1934), espec. Vol. II, Chap. 14.Google Scholar

8 See Department of State Bulletin, May 18, 1947, pp. 971 ff.; Nov. 16, 1947, pp. 953 ff.

9 For example, a New Mexico cattle-grower, in OPA days, wrote to Washington asking permission, as he was required to do, to slaughter about 110 steers for market; he was advised that he must keep fifty for breeding purposes.

10 An example of a concrete study of a specific problem is the Conference on Local Government Units with Special Reference to Highways, held in New York City, April 28 and 29, 1933, under the auspices of the Social Science Research Council. The chairman was Dr. Luther Guliek, director of the Institute of Public Administration.

11 See Millett, John D., “The Use of Visual Aids in Political Science Teaching,” in this Review, Vol. 41 (June, 1947), pp. 517–527.Google Scholar Millett says: “Everyday relationships are far more numerous and important than the official channels illustrated in the customary chart”; and “we need more experimentation.”

12 See the symbols developed in connection with German “geopolitics” in Whittlesey, Derwent, German Strategy of World Conquest (New York, 1942), pp. 130–139.Google Scholar None of these may be useful in themselves, but some of them may suggest effective and appropriate symbols for the present purposes.

13 Multilateral treaties might well be studied geographically, with geo-diagrams combining studies of many treaties. If n countries sign one multilateral treaty, its contractual arrangements are equal to n(n–1)/2 bilateral treaties.

14 There appears to be real need of a cartographic staff and laboratory to conduct experiments in devising new types of maps, more effective means of presenting data on maps adapted to comprehension by laymen, and means to facilitate the compilation and drafting of maps and cartograms without starting from scratch in most cases and without unnecessary copyright difficulties. Such developments are especially to be desired in relation to the whole field of the social sciences.

15 Toynbee, Arnold J., A Study of History (London, 1934–1939), Vol. IV, p. 39.Google Scholar

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