Some social scientists use one or another methodological toolkit; many favor either empirical or interpretive approaches, qualitative or quantitative methods. In my research, I adopt a methodologically pluralist and epistemologically fluid sensibility, choosing tools based on the problems I'm studying. I have variously used quantitative analysis, network analysis, content analysis, critical discourse analysis, case studies, process tracing, participant observation, ethnography and historical analysis. I am particularly interested in the qualitative reasoning behind quantitative data.

Some of my work has focused on how IR scholars know what we know and how researchers can simultaneously study the world through scientific tools while remaining part of the world through public engagement. I have explored the validity of virtual measurements, the politics of civilian casualty data, the ethics and practice of field research, and the perverse side effects of experimental survey methods. In addition, I have pioneered a multi-method approach for studying transnational spaces.

"Studying Transnational Spaces." Methods Appendix to Lost Causes, Cornell University Press, 2014 PDF

Transnational spaces and processes are notoriously difficult to study. This is because they are diffuse: constituted both in the fractured geographic localities of the physical world and the world of language and ideas, transnational ideas are both everywhere (that someone subscribes to or invokes them) and nowhere in particular. Given these dilemmas, I followed Patrick Jackson’s advice in The Conduct of Inquiry in International Relations to think carefully about “methodology” around this project before selecting “methods.” I accept Jackson's notion of science as the “systematic production of factual knowledge about political and social arrangements." Jackson suggests four ideal types of scientific research methodology in international relations that differ based on how they view the relationship of the researcher to her subject matter, and what kind of knowledge it is possible to access. From these two axes Jackson derives four sets of analytical positions. The structure of this inquiry into global issue networks suggests that rather than situating oneself in these kinds of boxes, methodological pluralism can involve crafting specific configurations of those four methodologies in ways tailored to specific projects.

Charli Carpenter, "'You Talk of Terrible Things So Matter-of-Factly In This Language of Science': Constructing Human Rights in the Academy." PDF

How does the everyday politics behind scientific inquiry impact what we come to know about the world? Here I consider this question in the context of my own fieldwork on the human rights response to children born of war in Bosnia-Herzegovina. First, I reflect on how the academy functions to direct researchers' attention and skill sets to certain types of human rights problems in certain ways, inevitably affecting what we can know about our subject matter. Second, I consider the practical politics by which human rights scholars interface with policy-makers, the media, and the public, and the extent to which members of the human rights scholarly community constitute nodes in the wider networks we are studying.

Carpenter, Charli, and Daniel W. Drezner. “International Relations 2.0: The Implications of New Media for an Old Profession.” International Studies Perspectives, vol. 11, no. 3, 2010, pp. 255–272 PDF

The International Relations (IR) profession has not fully taken stockof the way in which user-driven information technologies—including Blogger, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and Wikipedia—are reshaping our professional activities, our subject matter, and even the constitutive rules of the discipline itself. In this study, we reflect on the ways in which our own roles and identities as IR scholars have evolved since the advent of ‘‘Web 2.0’’: the second revolution in communications technology that redefined the relationship between producers and consumers of online information. We focus on two types of new media particularly relevant to the practice and the profession of IR: blogs and social networking sites.

R. Charli Carpenter And JOSE, B. (2012), Transnational Issue Networks In Real And Virtual Space: The Case Of Women, Peace And Security 12: 525-543. PDF

To what extent do online issue networks serve as a proxy for their real‐space counterparts in structure and substance?  We explored whether this assumption is valid by comparing the network composition and agenda composition of the advocacy network around ‘women, peace and security’, as operationalized through a web‐based survey of actual activists, and the network's online representations of itself, as measured through advocacy websites. We found that while hyperlink analysis is an effective tool for identifying the ‘hubs’ or ‘gatekeepers’ within a specific issue network, the nature of the World Wide Web makes it is a blunt tool with which to capture the broader network. This suggests that while the web poses important opportunities as a data source, scholars of transnational networks must pay closer attention to the methodological assumptions implicit in their reliance on this and other new media.

Charli Carpenter, Alexander Montgomery and Alexandria Nylen. "Manufacturing Complicity: How Survey Experiments Prime Americans For War Crimes." Forthcoming In Perspectives On Politics.

What explains American sensitivity to international laws and norms on the use of force? A wealth of recent IR literature tackles this question through experimental surveys using fictional scenarios and treatments to explore precisely when Americans would approve of government policies that would violate the laws of war. We test whether such survey experiments may themselves be impacting public sensitivity to these norms – or even Americans’ understanding of the content of the norms themselves. We show not only that certain survey questions can inflate American expressed preference for war crimes, but also that merely being permitted to express a preference for war crimes in survey settings has a negative impact on Americans’ understanding of US legal and ethical obligations in war. We conclude by discussing the value of a reflective approach in experimental IR and with suggestions for future experimental survey design in international law.

Studies Say Americans Don't Care About the Laws of War. Here's Why They're Wrong.

We should be cautious of making inferences about American attitudes on war from surveys that fail to mention civilians, or prime respondents to think in black and white. Our study confirms findings from other recent studies: when you mention civilian deaths, Americans overwhelmingly oppose military action. But push-pollsters interested in drumming up support for war crimes can easily manipulate responses do the opposite. The informed public and foreign policy analysts should be on the alert for such skewed polls, or for suggestions that bombing civilians is a legitimate policy option.

How Scared Are Folks of Killer Robots? How We Can Know and Why It Can Matter.

There is one question in this controversy that social scientists will agree is amenable to empirical inquiry: how do people feel about the idea of outsourcing targeting decisions to machines?