反事实分析+过程追踪:社会科学因果推断的整合进路  

Counterfactual+Process Tracing:An Integrated Approach to Causal Inference in Social Science

作　　者：王利君 于文轩[2] 黄英 Lijun Wang;Wenxuan Yu;Ying Huang

机构地区：[1]华东师范大学公共管理学院 [2]厦门大学公共事务学院 [3]广东药科大学医药商学院

出　　处：《公共行政评论》2024年第4期177-194,M0008,共19页Journal of Public Administration

基　　金：国家自然科学基金面上项目“社会创业生态系统:理论模型、生成过程及对社会企业可持续性的影响”(72174123);国家社会科学基金一般项目“数据主权视域下的数据跨境流动安全评估体系构建研究”(19BTQ069)。

摘　　要：因果推断存在多种途径,然而近来兴起的因果推断讨论却明显倒向了“反事实分析”。为了帮助形成更加完整的因果推断认识,论文从因果本体论、认识论出发,结合因果推断的形式与类型,梳理出反事实分析与过程追踪两种因果推断途径,论证它们的因果推断比较优势及其互补性,指出反事实分析和过程追踪分别在识别因果关系和挖掘因果机制上占据比较优势,只有将二者结合,才能对因果形成较全面的理解。对此,文章以中国的治理场景为例,选取制度创新与制度效能转化、政策创新生成两个研究情境,论述了反事实分析和过程追踪的结合何以帮助理解中国之治。论文有助于完善因果推断三角研究,讲好中国故事,同时对于推进社会科学研究方法的纵深思考也具有参考价值。Multiple approaches can lead to a causal inference,but recent discussions have relied heavily on the“counterfactual”approach.To form a more comprehensive understanding of causal inference,this article starts from the perspectives of causal ontology and epistemology,and then combines them with the forms and types of causal inference.We outline two approaches to causal inference:counterfactual and process tracing and discuss their comparative advantages and complementarity.Counterfactual and process tracing,respectively,hold comparative advantages in identifying causal relationships and exploring causal mechanisms.Only by combining the two approaches can truly understand causality.To illustrate this,the article takes the governance context in China as an example and selects two research scenarios:the transformation of institutional innovation and institutional effectiveness,and the generation of policy innovation,and discusses how the combination of counterfactual analysis and process tracing can help in understanding governance in China.This article contributes to the improvement of causal inference cognition and storytelling about China,and also provides reference value for the indepth reflection on social science research methods.

关 键 词：因果推断三角 反事实分析 过程追踪 中国故事 

分 类 号：D63[政治法律—政治学]