Research Design on Causes of War: take Waltz’s ‘Man, the State and War’ as example
Research Design

You need to write a research design on the topic of Causes of War based on Kenneth Waltz’s book Man, the State and War. It should be 5000 words long.
You can focus on Waltz’s ‘levels of analysis’ approach on explaining causes of war and argue whether or not the neo-realism school’s ‘third level’ (the international anarchy) being an adequate causal explanation on the real cause of war. If yes, how so. If no, which alternative level(s) shall we turn our focus on in seeking for a better explanation for the cause(s) of war.

Due in Sunday, 15 May 2016

Your research design should cover the following topics:

1. Title and choice of specific topic

Explain your general field of interest and the specific topic you are seeking to research within that field. Here you should identify and explain the main terms and concepts used in your title; give some indication of the problem you want to pose, the background to your topic and why it is important. You should also explain strategies that you are using to limit the scope of your study.

2. Literature review

Here you need to reflect critically on the literature you will be using in the dissertation. You need to evaluate your sources by demonstrating how they help you to answer your field and particular topic. You also need to show here that you have a good enough grasp of academic knowledge to develop and justify your research question and argument. To begin with then you will need to identify the key journal articles and books relating to your dissertation topic. In the literature review you will need to situate your research within your broader field of study. Here you might want to consider how your topic has been covered in the existing literature, the kinds of debates that have predominated, the areas of dispute or sustained criticism, and so on. In addition, you should indicate how you are planning to build on this work or challenge it or develop an alternative line of argument.

3. Methodology and your research questions and argument

Central to any good research design is a sound methodology which justifies why you are doing what you are doing in the particular way proposed here. In this context well formulated researchable questions are also important. So, in setting out the design for your dissertation you need to identify the research questions by differentiating the ‘big question’ that drives your research project, questions that guide the writing of your chapters and questions that will guide your data collection. Typically, these will be the kinds of what, why, when, where and how questions. Make sure that the questions you are asking help you to make the argument you want to defend in the dissertation.

4. Research sources

Here you need to reflect on the sources that you are planning to use. Are you using mainly academic sources? You need to show that you can identify which are primary and secondary sources for your project and that you have thought about the availability and accessibility of primary and secondary source materials. Inevitably, your discussion in this section will have to show reflexivity regarding your overall methodology.

5. Research methods

Here you need to consider not only what information (data) you need to collect in order to answer your research questions in light of your argument but how you are planning to collect that data (from where or whom). Part of your research design should be devoted to identifying the methods you have chosen in order to generate the data that you will be using to answer your research question(s). In your research plan, therefore, you need to provide a justification of why you have chosen these particular methods in light of ontological/epistemological and practical requirement as set out above and not others and how they link to your research question. You should also think about the potential difficulties that you might encounter in finding/assembling this evidence or in endeavouring to demonstrate whatever it is that you are trying to demonstrate.

6. Outline plan of the dissertation

Provide a skeleton outline of what the written-up research project would look in terms of its structure and chapters. Indicate the titles of each chapter and any sections within the chapters. Also provide a broad outline of what each chapter will cover. In other words, you are asked to provide an annotated chapter outline. You are further asked to provide a realistic timeline that you can work towards in order to hand in your dissertation in time (on 14 September 2016).
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Posted on May 2, 2016Author TutorCategories Question, Questions