Acknowledgements
Preface

Section One
Introduction: Research Methods in the Social Sciences: An Overview
Bashir Omer Mohamed Fadlalla

Social Science Research in Africa: A Review of Methods and Ethics
D. K. Ndagala

The Recency and Immediacy of Political Science: Some Implications for Research
Akiiki B. Mujaju

The African Household in Socio-economic Change: A Conceptual Problem in Research
Edward K. Mburugu

Research Methodology and the Competence of Social Scientists in Depicting Reality: Some odd Facts from Rural Sudan
Mohamed A. Mohamed Salih

Section Two

Sampling Errors from Socio-economic Baseline survey in an Ethiopian Rural Setting
Asmerom Kidane

Village Surveys as a Primary Source of Data for Testing Hypothesis in Rural/Rural Migration in Sudan
Khalid Affan

An Approach to the use of Scaling in Sensitivity Analysis
Bashir Omer Mohamed Fadlalla

The Problem of Social Science Research in Developing Societies: With Examples from Survey of Zairean Refugees in Tanzania
B.C. Nindi

Section Three

Methodological Issues in Research on Public Administration in Uganda: Problems and Prospects of Documentation
George Washington Matovu

Methodological Issues in Administrative Research in Africa  
Walter Ouma Oyugi

Researching on the History of Labour
F.J. Kaijage

Abstract:

Compilation of papers that were presented at an OSSREA workshop on research methods in the social sciences and that address various aspects of the relevance of the different methodologies used for research on African societies while examining how these could be improved upon. The first group of papers deals with issues pertaining to fieldwork techniques, collection of ethnographic data for rural development purposes, and the relevance of the present techniques, which are largely' borrowed from non-African contexts, to the African realm. A common feature of the contributions to this section is the authors' critique of the prevailing methodologies and their plea for their reconsideration. The second section consists of four papers that deal with mathematical techniques in data analysis in the social sciences. The final section comprises three articles dealing with problems and methods in documentary research. The papers are titled: "Introduction: Research methods in the social sciences, an overview", "Social science research in Africa: A review of methods and ethics", "The recency and immediacy of political science: Some implications for research", "The African household in socio-economic change: A conceptual problem in research", "Research methodology and the competence of social scientists in depicting reality: Some odd facts from rural Sudan", "Sampling errors from socio-economic baseline survey in an Ethiopian rural setting", "Village surveys as a primary source of data for testing hypotheses in rural/rural migration in Sudan", "An approach to the use of scaling in sensitivity analysis", "The problems of social science research in developing societies, with examples from a survey of Zairian refugees in' Tanzania", "Methodological issues in research on public administration in Uganda: Problems and prospects of documentation", "Methodological issues in administrative research in Africa”, and “Researching on the history of labour”