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Introducing Master's Students to Area Studies: An Interdisciplinary Research and Skills Approach

Master's programs in area studies currently confront two distinct challenges: rigor and relevance. Last year, Harvard political scientist and Africa specialist Robert Bates characterized area studies as problematic for political science because of their lack of scientific rigor (Bates 1996). He charged that political scientists who work in area studies programs resist "rigorous methods for evaluating arguments" and consequently have "defected from the social sci-