Olsen, Johan P.

Barbage cans, new institutionalism, and the study of politics - 2001

Bendor, Moe, and Shotts want to rescue some of the ideas of the garbage can model and the new institutionalism. Their rescue program, however, is alien to the spirit of not only our work but also some recent developments that may promise a climate of dialogue between different approaches in political science. Bendor, Moe, and Shotts place themselves closer to a tradition fo unproductive tribal warfare than more recent attempts to explore the limits of and the alternatives to (mean-end) rational interpretations of political actors, institutions, and change. By building on a narrow concept of what is valuable political science, they cut themselves off from key issues that have occupied political scientist for centuries