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Member rate £492.50
Non-Member rate £985.00
Save £45 Loyalty discount applied automatically*
Save 5% on each additional course booked
*If you attended our Methods School in the last calendar year, you qualify for £45 off your course fee.
Date: Monday 24 – Friday 28 March 2025
Time: 09:30 – 12:30 CET
This course offers a practical introduction to using Process Tracing (PT) methods in your research. It provides an interactive online teaching and learning environment, using state of the art online pedagogical tools. It is designed for researchers, professional analysts, advanced students , including those at the Master's, PhD, and postdoctoral levels. The course is capped at a maximum of 16 participants so that the teaching team can cater to the specific needs of all, and the individual research projects can be discussed in class.
This course provides an overview of the rationale and application of process tracing, and gives you the required knowledge and tools to use the methodology in your own research. Process tracing is a particularly suitable method to study causal mechanisms, i.e. how a trigger leads to a specific outcome, and allows us to open the ‘black box’ of causality.
By the end of this course, you will have the required insight into when process tracing can be used and how it can be applied most effectively. The aim of the course is to introduce you to the key aspects of process tracing through practical, hands-on advice and techniques that can be applied in your own research project. You will gain the practical research skills needed to navigate the intricacies of developing a process tracing research design. The course therefore requires active participation, and you’ll get most benefit by integrating aspects of your own research into the exercises.
3 ECTS credits awarded for engaging fully in class activities.
1 additional ECTS credit awarded for completing a post-course assignment.
Wouter Wolfs is a Lecturer and Senior Researcher at the Public Governance Institute of the KU Leuven. His research is focused on EU politics, political finance, the organisation of political parties and parliaments, and legislative capacity-building. He is an experienced tutor and has applied a process tracing methodology extensively in his own research.
The first part of the course focuses on the fundamental characteristics of process tracing methodology. You will be provided with the opportunity to discuss the ontological and epistemological foundations of the method, how process tracing differs from typical large N quantitative, frequentist methods and how it is related to other types of qualitative research methods (such as discourse analysis, congruence analysis and qualitative comparative analysis). You will learn about the different types of process tracing and when they can be applied.
You will explore how a causal mechanism can be best defined to be used in a process tracing design, and how such a mechanism should be conceptualised and operationalised in a way that can be studied empirically. You will examine how mechanisms differ from other types of causal theorisation.
This session is dedicated to the collection and use of evidence in a process tracing research design. You will explore how inferences can be made using mechanistic evidence following the operationalisation of mechanisms by utilising Bayesian logic. You will deepen your understanding of how the strength of the empirical evidence can be assessed.
You will study the characteristics of cases necessary for applying a process tracing methodology, determining which cases are (not) suitable to use in a process tracing research design. You will learn how process tracing can be embedded in a multi- and mixed-method research design.
Your research will take central stage. You will examine how process tracing can be applied in the research projects of fellow participants, and what the main pitfalls are in the development of a process tracing design. You will have the opportunity to explore contemporary debates on empirical tests and practical challenges of process tracing.
The course uses a combination of pre-class assignments, such as readings and pre-recorded videos, as well as daily interactive live sessions via an online platform. This also includes small-group work, short, focused tasks and troubleshooting exercises to ensure engagement with the course content.
The instructor will also conduct live Q&A sessions for one-to-one consultations.
Prior knowledge about the fundamentals of research design and an introduction to qualitative research are recommended but not required.
Each course includes pre-course assignments as well as daily online seminar-type lectures totalling at least three hours. The instructor will conduct live Q&A sessions and offer designated office hours for one-to-one consultations.
As a participant in this course, you will engage in a variety of learning activities designed to deepen your understanding and mastery of the subject matter. While the cornerstone of your learning experience will be the daily live teaching sessions, which total three hours each day across the five days of the course, your learning commitment extends beyond these sessions.
Upon payment and registration for the course, you will gain access to our Learning Management System (LMS) approximately two weeks before the course start date. Here, you will have access to course materials such as pre-course readings. The time commitment required to familiarise yourself with the content and complete any pre-course tasks is estimated to be approximately 20 hours per week leading up to the start date.
During the course week, you are expected to dedicate approximately two-three hours per day to prepare and work on assignments.
Each course offers the opportunity to be awarded three ECTS credits. Should you wish to earn a 4th credit, you will need to complete a post-course assignment, which will involve approximately 25 hours of work.
This comprehensive approach ensures that you not only attend the live sessions but also engage deeply with the course material, participate actively, and complete assessments to solidify your learning.
This course description may be subject to subsequent adaptations (e.g. taking into account new developments in the field, participant demands, group size, etc.). Registered participants will be informed at the time of change.
By registering for this course, you confirm that you possess the knowledge required to follow it. The instructor will not teach these prerequisite items. If in doubt, please contact us before registering.