"Some rational choice scholars do well according to this latter criterion and some do not; those who do not use rational choice distribute themselves in a similar fashion," Shepsle writes.

Over the past few years, tenured appointments have included Professors of Government Jeffrey Frieden and Lisa L. Martin, both of whom study international political economy wiht an emphasis on rational choice models.

One appointment that rational choice proponents point to as evidence of the continued pluralism of the department is that of Chinese scholar Elizabeth Perry.

"My sense is that it is a theoretically diverse department," says Perry, who joined the Faculty this fall after "ask[ing] a lot of questions" about whether they would accept her focus of scholarship.

Exploring the Differences

Associate Professor of Government Ashutosh Varshney said that he thought that it was not a question of which approach was better but rather which approach was better for a particular query.

"Rational choice is excellent at solving deductive puzzles. But rational choice has a lot of trouble explaining mass mobilization," says Varshney, who wrote his early book with a rational choice focus and a more recent work which seeks to generalize from largely empirical data about India.

In an article on this debate in the American Political Science Association Comparative Politics' summer newsletter, Varshney acknowledges the contributions of rational choice to the study of economics and institutions in comparative politics but very pointedly states the limits of rational choice explanations.

"Just as it is hard to explain--given rational calculations of cost and benefit, why people vote--it is also hard to understand--with tools of rational choice--why so many people in the world demonstrate ethnic fervor or embrace nationalism," Varshney writes.

Loeb Associate Professor of the Social Sciences A. Iain Johnston, who describes his own methods as an eclectic mix, says the primary difference between area specialists and those who believe in rational choice is a greater emphasis on the part of the former on the importance of tradition and culture.

"Certain sets of behaviors are so deeply internalized that they are taken for granted and not questioned. It is those kinds of behaviors that rational choice has traditionally not focused on," Johnston says.

Is It Generalizable?

Many scholars who employ rational choice have focused their criticisms on area specialists who do not generate supportable theories that are applicable across different cultures and nations.

Bates, who has obtained an initial grant to begin an Africa Studies center at Harvard, thinks the ability to generalize is at the center of well-done area-specific research.

"What's the payoff of our region? What can we learn there that is more powerful than what we can learn somewhere else? If so [foundations] should allocate resources. If not, then what are you doing?" Bates says.