Semiotics and Comparative Politics

The purpose of this research note is to make clearer various forms of cooperation between semiotics and comparative politics. The note identifies three types (at least) of complementarity, which are examined after a short recall of the semiotic approach, referring essentially to the « Ecole de Paris »,marked by the substantial contribution of A. J. Greimas. The first two complementarities are linked with the type of explanatory process. First of all, the authors give for examples comparative studies proceeding by induction, from the figurative level up to the abstract level. Second, the authors refer to another kind of approach, of a hypothetico-deductive nature, where a semiotic model is used to explain reality. Examples of these procedures are taken from texts and images analysis (electoral posters), and electoral discourses. Finally, the note refers to a third complementarity where semiotics is used as a way to improve the quality of the questionnaire in survey analysis. The goal is to offer the better possible correspondance between the sense of the scales for the researcher and for the respondent- an important topic, among others, for the international comparative surveys.