Hyperpolitics: Hypertext, concepts and theory-making

Political theory begins with respect for the complexity of its conceptual u niverse. Hypertext, a language for organizing knowledge on a modular rather than a sequential basis, provides an opportunity to unscramble this verbal mixture and to reconstitute it with new understandings and a new source of creative political discourse. This article reports on an experiment in com puter-assisted advancement of political theory. It presents the initial res ults of a hypertextual approach to the conceptual basis of the literature b y: (1) selecting the concepts most frequently employed in a sample of polit ical science dictionaries; (2) linking them to a number of textual and bibl iographical sources for in-depth analysis; and (3) developing multi-dimensi onal linkages by placing each concept in a matrix of logically consistent r elationships. Thanks to the Web, Hypertext opens the door to unlimited navi gation through wider and wider domains. The Hyperpolitics platform is an at tempt to make this compatible with the logical structure and informed guida nce of higher learning.