The Spectrum of Comparisons: A Discussion

At the contested analytic core of this special issue of Pacific Affairs lie two different ways of linking enlargement to assessment. Southeast Asian studies, as a spatially limited instance of Area Studies (AS), are focused wholly or mainly on one part of the world and on phenomena occurring in it or directly relevant to it. In contrast, no toponym constrains the scope of Comparative Area Studies (CAS). The editors of this issue recommend the expansion of AS into CAS. Does a convincing case for such enlargement from AS to CAS require only a nominal or taxonomic expansion—subsuming more space in which comparisons can be made—without necessarily privileging one method over another? Or does the case for CAS presuppose a negative assessment of AS as less hospitable to systematiccomparison, and thus methodologically inferior to CAS? The discussion that follows is not epistemologically agnostic. Nor is it promiscuous as to methods. But it emphasizes the need for methodological pluralism and the virtues of openness and ecumenism thereby implied. A segue from AS to CAS will multiply the opportunities for comparison along with the scale and complexity of the items, changes, and interactions that could be compared. It may be tempting to simplify all these empirics by filtering them through the lens and format of a systematically reductive technique. It would however be ironic if that understandable temptation were to reproduce in method the narrowness of scope that warranted CAS in the first place. If and as scholars expand their analytic horizons in the hope of making more sense of a globalizing world, the notion of unwanted or uncontrolled comparison may seem less demonic—a “spectral” invitation to chaos—than creative—an intellectually refreshing way of thinking outside of any box whose efficacy depends disproportionally on closure.

比較的光譜：對特刊論文的討論

本期《太平洋事務》特刊爭議的分析核心存在著兩種路徑，將東南亞研究的擴展與不同的評價聯系在一起。作為區域研究的一個特定空間內的個案體現，東南亞研究完全或主要關注世界的一部分，關注發生於其空間內部或與它直接相關的現象。相比之下，比較區域研究的范圍就不受地名學的局限。本特刊的編輯們建議將區域研究擴展到比較區域研究中去。如果從區域研究擴展到比較區域研究的主張具有任何說服力，是否隻需要在名義上或分類學意義上的擴張–納入更多空間，以便於其中進行比較–而未必要認定一種方法優於另一種方法？抑或，主張比較區域研究是否本身就已預設了對區域研究的消極評價，認定其較不適於系統性的比較，並因而在方法學意義上遜色於比較區域研究？下文對這些問題的探討並非抱持認識論上的不可知主義，也非主張方法上的雜合主義，但它強調需要方法論的多元主義，由此也意味著需要開放性和大公主義。從區域研究到比較區域研究的發展會大為提升可比較的事項、變化以及互動方面的規模和復雜性，極大增加比較研究的機會。或許透過一種系統性簡化技術將所有這些經驗內容加以過濾並簡化的做法會很有吸引力，盡管這種誘惑可以理解，但結果卻是在方法上復制出分析范圍上的狹隘性，就頗具諷刺意味了，因為正是這種狹隘性才使得比較區域研究從一開始就具有了存在的理由。當學者們為能夠更好理解一個全球化的世界而擴展他們的分析的視界，那麼所謂的多余的或是不受控制的比較的概念聽起來可能也就不再那麼邪惡，而是具有創造性了——不再是“幽靈”式的通往混亂的邀約，而是一種智識上令人耳目一新的打破常規思維的方法，不論這種常規思維的效能如何不成比例地依賴於其思維框架的封閉性。

Translated from English by Li Guo