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Level
Level: IntermediateBuilds on
Member rate £572.50
Non-Member rate £1,145.00
Early bird discount available until 14 December 2026.
Save £45.00 Loyalty discount applied automatically*
Save 5% on each additional course booked
* If you attended a qualifying previous Methods School in 2026, you qualify for £45.00 off your course fee.
Date: Monday 22 – Friday 26 February 2027
Time: 09:30 – 12:30 CET
This interactive course uses advanced pedagogical tools and is designed for master's-level students and above. It runs as three-hour live sessions on Zoom over five days, with course materials and pre-course readings available on our Learning Management System at least two weeks before the start. Office hours are also available for one-to-one consultations on your own project.
The course is limited to 18 participants, ensuring that the teaching team can address the individual needs of each participant.
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.
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.
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.
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 sessions combine live instruction with interactive exercises. In addition, there will be voluntary try-at-home exercises between sessions. These exercises allow you to try out the techniques you have learnt on your own data and discuss your findings and challenges in the next class. Literature for additional reading is provided but not required to complete the course.
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.
Prior knowledge about the fundamentals of research design and an introduction to qualitative research are recommended but not required.
The course includes three hours of live teaching each day for five days, alongside readings and other learning activities.
Once you have registered and paid, you will receive access to our Learning Management System (LMS) approximately two weeks before the course start date. Course materials, including pre-course readings, will be available here. Allow approximately 20 hours per week before the course to review the materials and complete readings and any pre-course tasks.
During the course week, you should allow approximately two to three hours per day for preparation and assignments, in addition to the live teaching sessions.
The course offers the opportunity to earn three ECTS credits. To earn a fourth credit, you will need to complete a post-course assignment involving approximately 25 hours of work.
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 prerequisite items. If in doubt, please contact us before registering.