In recent years, there is a surging demand for and interest in data-driven research in the realms of liberal arts, humanities and social sciences. Research methodology has emerged as a distinct subfield touching upon computational methods, survey experiments, and data science. Nevertheless, the study of human values and behaviours has continued to be inspired by other theoretical traditions and methodological approaches including historical, qualitative, and ethnographic methods. In response to the above trends and to foster interdisciplinary collaborations in today’s academia, the College of Liberal Art and Social Sciences (CLASS) of CityU has set up CLASS Advanced Methods School (CAMS) to serve as an avenue to equip researchers and students of CLASS and beyond with conceptual and technical competency deemed essential for theoretical and empirical inquiries.
This summer, CAMS will organise a series of events which include modules, seminars, and publication seminars to incorporate three components emphasising on research design, method training, and practical toolkits. A keynote speech entitled “In Praise of Skepticism: Trust but Verify” was held on 6 June 2022 to kick start the summer school. Internationally renowned scholar Professor Pippa NORRIS of Harvard University was invited as the keynote speaker to share her conceptualisation of “trust” and research findings with more than one hundred local and overseas scholars and students online.
Prof Christian WAGNER, Provost of CityU, welcomed the participants at the opening of the keynote speech, making a remark on the importance of using rigorous methodology to address serious questions for the survival of humankind amid today’s challenges. Next, Dean of CLASS Prof Richard M WALKER introduced the background of setting up CAMS to undertake a variety of advanced research methods training for PhD students. Following Dean’s remarks, Prof Christine HUANG Yi-hui, Associate Dean (Faculty and Research) of CLASS shared with the audience the highlights of 14 CAMS events and introduced the background of the keynote speaker, Prof Pippa Norris, who is a distinguished political scientist specialising in comparative politics, elections, political culture, gender politics, and political communication across the globe.
Photo: Professor Pippa Norris used “The Scorpion and the Frog” fable as an introduction to present the concept of trust.
Prof Norris used a famous animal fable “The Scorpion and the Frog” in the beginning to illustrate it is part of human nature to trust others. The concept of trustworthiness can be understood to involve an informal social contract where principals authorise others to act on their behalf in the expectation that the agent will fulfil their responsibilities, despite conditions of risk and uncertainty. When evaluating the trustworthiness of political institutions, public judgments are expected to reflect the quality of government procedures, especially the principles of competency, impartiality and integrity, and institutional guardrails. The theoretical framework presents the benefits and problems of “trust”, and the erroneous beliefs involve both cynical mistrust and credulous trust. To collect public opinion data, Prof Norris has conducted a cross-national empirical research by using World Values Survey (WVS)/European Values Survey 7-wave (EVS) between 1981-2021, covering 115 diverse open and closed societies. WVS-EVS measures interpersonal trust, institutional confidence and trust in global governance.
Photo: Prof Pippa Norris’ new book with the same title of the keynote speech will be released in August 2022.
A three-layered analytical strategy is adopted by Prof Norris to analyse how far confidence in political institutions is strengthened by subjective perceptions about the quality of governance. Levels of public trust in diverse agents and societies are measured to gauge subjective perceptions and objective indices of agency performance. Then a comparison of whether public trust correlates with performance is made. The research findings show that sceptical trust in government is positively linked with a plurality of information and good governance in open societies, whereas cynical mistrust and credulous trust are commonly found in closed societies with poor public administration and limited information access.
The keynote speech ended with a Q&A session moderated by Convenor of CAMS Dr Edmund CHENG who is also Associate Professor in the Department of Public Policy. PhD students and scholars from different disciplines around the world were enthusiastic to have in-depth discussions with Prof Norris about her theoretical approach, research methodology, and how she deals with response bias, geocoding, and cross-sectional data. The event is a good example of research excellence, which has given inspiration and insightful ideas on the advanced methods of research.
For the schedule and details of upcoming CAMS events this summer, please click here for more information.
