Political science is, in one sense, an ancient discipline and, in another sense, one of the most recently developed social sciences. . . . much of political science taught today communicates a different scholarly focus that has been developed primarily in the United States in the past sixty years. During this period many scholars have moved from philosophical observations about politics to scientific observations about politics. This movement has been marked by a widespread effort to collect data about politics and governments using relatively new techniques developed by all the social sciences. Its goal has been to describe and explain political phenomena with greater accuracy. In short, political science today is constantly seeking to make itself rigorous in its standards of scholarship, more demanding in its standards of proof... (Careers and the Study of Political Science: A Guide for Undergraduates, 5th ed., 1992, p. 1).