ABSTRACT
Political scientists seem to know both too much and too little about their subject: too much because no one can be expected to keep track of so many alternative analyses; too little because there appears to be no pecking order among the studies. Political scientists have always borrowed concepts, hypotheses, theories, and methods from the other social sciences. The obvious links among the worlds of politics, economic and social relations, and the motives of individuals naturally induce political scientists to borrow from economics, sociology, anthropology, psychology, and the law. To the extent that political scientists work on contemporary events, their work is bound to be affected by the absence of relevant data. Propositions drawn from Karl Marx's theory and rational action theory rank higher on the dimension than those derived from the study of political attitudes and behavior and from Max Weber's analysis.
