Conjunctural Causation in Comparative Case-Oriented Research: Exploring the Scope Conditions of Rationalist and Institutionalist Causal Mechanisms

This paper highlights one of the major benefits of qualitative comparative methodology as applied within a “small-N” research design, namely its potential use for specifying the scope conditions of (theoretically competing) causal mechanisms. It is argued that the identification of set-theoretic relationships, multiple paths, and analytic efforts in typological mapping can make valuable contributions to the elaboration and further development of middle-range theory.