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Cited from Oxford Dictionary of Sociology, p543. 544

qualitative comparative analysis (QCA) The name given by Charles Ragin
(The Comparative Method, 1987) to his proposed technique for solving the
problems that are caused for comparative macrosociologists by the fact that they
must often make causal inferences on the basis of only a small number of cases.
The technique is based on the binary logic of Boolean algebra, and attempts to
maximize the number of comparisons that can be made across the cases under
investigation, in terms of the presence or absence of characteristics(variables) of
analytical interest. Thus, for example, 18 cases(say, nation-states) involving 7
independent variables(presence or absence of economic recession, of an external
threat to state security, and so on) might be examined in order to identify the
casual factors involved in the emergence of revolutions, in this example yielding
no fewer than 128(2りdifferent combinations of causal conditions. Ragin claims
that the technique combines the strengths of case-oriented(qualitative) and
variable-oriented(quantitative) approaches to *comparative sociology. Critics
argue that it allows only for logical rather than statistical representativeness;
makes no allowance for missing variables or error in the data; that not all
variables of interest have only two values; and that the method is therefore highly
sensitive to the way in which each case must be coded in a binary fashion. For
example, the choice between'presence of economic recession versus absence of
economic recession'makes no allowance for intermediate conditions, or for the
length and severity of recession itself. These *coding problems are heightened
where(as is often the case) the researcher is dealing with continuous variables­
such as income and the degree of inequality in its distribution-which can
obviously be collapsed in different ways.
epistemologies underpinning the different types ofa data are so divergent that
any attempt at combination or reconciliation is impossible, and those who have
attempted to devise frameworks of analysis incorporating both types of data. An
example of the latter is Norman Denzin's strategy of *triangulation. Practising
researchers have recently suggested that the distinction between the two types of
data is considerably more blurred than is suggested in the theoretical debate. It
has also been pointed out that different methodologies are not necessarily tied
to particular epistemological positions, and that there are an increasing number
of techniques of analysis that defy classification into a simplistic dualist typology.
The debate is paralleled in part-but only in part-by the distinction between
*macrosociology and microsociology. Some researchers adopt the position of there
being a substantive difference between observing and analysing regularities and
associations at the macro-level of social structures, institutions, and aggregate
data, and obsering
v
or analysing interactions and causal processes at the micro­
level of human actors. The former tends towards quantitative analysis while the
latter encourages interpretive understanding.
In an important recent intervention, Gary King et al. (Designing Social Inquiry:
Scientific Inference in Qualitative Research, 1994)have restated at length and in
detail the observation made by Mann, pointing out that although there are
various styles of social-scientific research there is only one logic of scientific
inference. The logic of good quantitative and good qualitative rese紅chdesigns
does not therefore differ.

qualitative versus quantitative�ebate A *methodological issue in

sociology with arguments for and agamst a fundamental distinction between
qualitative and quantitative studies. The debate arises from the distinction drawn
between sociologies arising from different *epistemological positions.
Quantitative methodology, generally associated with *positivist epistemology, is
usually regarded as referring to the collection and analysis of numerical data.
Qualitative methodology, generally associated with interpretative epistemology.
tends to be used to refer to forms of data collection and analysis which rely on
understanding. with an emphasis on *meanings. The debate became prominent in
the 1970s and arose through a backlash against the priority attached to scientific
or positivist methodology in sociological textbooks. In these works, sections on
qualitative or'soft'techniques-if they were included at all-usually referred to
them as being of interest only in respect of providing intuitions or hunches for the
formulation of *hypotheses, which could then be tested more rigorously using
quantitative or'hard'data. Growing interest in *phenomenological approaches in
the 1970s led to scepticism about the relevance of the natural scientific model of
research for the *social sciences.
An early attempt at reconciliation was made by Michael Mann(in the
journal Sociology, 1981), who claimed that all sociological research could be
subsumed within the same broad framework of'socio-logic', but since then the
debate has been conducted primarily between those who believe that the