A comprehensive and accessible guide to learning and successfully applying QCA Social phenomena can rarely be attributed to single causes-instead, they typically stem from a myriad of interwoven factors that are often difficult to untangle. Drawing on set theory and the language of necessary and sufficient conditions, qualitative comparative analysis (QCA) is ideally suited to capturing this causal complexity. A case-based research method, QCA regards cases as combinations of conditions and compares the conditions of each case in a structured way to identify the necessary and sufficient conditions for an outcome. Qualitative Comparative Analysis: An Introduction to Research Design and Application is a comprehensive guide to QCA. As QCA becomes increasingly popular across the social sciences, this textbook teaches students, scholars, and self-learners the fundamentals of the method, research design, interpretation of results, and how to communicate findings. Following an ideal typical research cycle, the book's ten chapters cover the methodological basis and analytical routine of QCA, as well as matters of research design, causation and causal complexity, QCA variants, and the method's reception in the social sciences. A comprehensive glossary helps to clarify the meaning of frequently used terms. The book is complemented by an accessible online R manual to help new users to practice QCA's analytical steps on sample data and then implement with their own findings. This hands-on textbook is an essential resource for students and researchers looking for a complete and up-to-date introduction to QCA.

A comprehensive and accessible guide to learning and successfully applying QCA Social phenomena can rarely be attributed to single causes-instead, they typically stem from a myriad of interwoven factors that are often difficult to untangle. Drawing on set theory and the language of necessary and sufficient conditions, qualitative comparative analysis (QCA) is ideally suited to capturing this causal complexity. A case-based research method, QCA regards cases as combinations of conditions and compares the conditions of each case in a structured way to identify the necessary and sufficient conditions for an outcome. Qualitative Comparative Analysis: An Introduction to Research Design and Application is a comprehensive guide to QCA. As QCA becomes increasingly popular across the social sciences, this textbook teaches students, scholars, and self-learners the fundamentals of the method, research design, interpretation of results, and how to communicate findings. Following an ideal typical research cycle, the book's ten chapters cover the methodological basis and analytical routine of QCA, as well as matters of research design, causation and causal complexity, QCA variants, and the method's reception in the social sciences. A comprehensive glossary helps to clarify the meaning of frequently used terms. The book is complemented by an accessible online R manual to help new users to practice QCA's analytical steps on sample data and then implement with their own findings. This hands-on textbook is an essential resource for students and researchers looking for a complete and up-to-date introduction to QCA.

This is an Open Access book. Amid the growing debate about models of judicial governance and their relationship to democratic quality, this book offers a systematic and empirical study of this relationship. The book thereby contributes to filling in this gap for the European continent. Taking an interdisciplinary politics and law perspective, and combining empirical and theoretical considerations, the book addresses the important link between democracy and judicial governance. In particular, it provides for three interconnected contributions. First, the book provides for a comprehensive classification of European countries into different models of judicial governance. Second, the book analyses empirically the relationship between the design of judicial governance and the quality of democracy. Third, building on those findings, the book presents policy reflections for the reform and improvement of mechanisms for judicial governance in European countries. The book seeks to refine our knowledge about the relationship between judicial governance and democracy, making an important academic and social contribution. In an era in which many democracies backslide and deconsolidate, it assesses to what extent existing mechanisms for judicial governance have contributed to the stability and quality of democratic systems in which they are implemented. Furthermore, the book puts forward reflections to improve the role of organs for judicial governance in fostering the quality of democracy. Since the book introduces in an accessible form key concepts of Judicial Governance, it will be of interest for the general public as well as academics and students in the fields of Law and Political Science. The book also addresses policy makers, as based on our empirical knowledge about the interaction judicial governance and democracy it puts forward ideas for a design of judicial governance that is more capable of protecting democratic systems of government.