Political Science in Slovakia

This article examines quality of political science in Slovakia. It is based on recently published major reviews as well as some smaller reviews and reports on political science or science in general in Slovakia. Thus, this is a meta-review of political science in Slovakia. The article argues that there exists strong but not directly estabilished link between ethics of a formal scientific community. Therefore, although often in background, the ethics is important in science. Otherwise one can hardly speak about science. In this context it is suggested that there is serious problem with ethics in (but not only) political science in Slovakia. The author defines three criteria for evaluation of quality of political science: clear definition of the research subject, proper definition of profession and valid criteria for evaluation of achieved results. Following discussion suggests low level of political science in Slovakia. The authtor finds four major causes for low level of political science in Slovakia. Firstly, political science in Slovakia has been estabilished by sociologists, "scientific communists" abd various other former Marxists with often low level of truly scientific education. Secondly, there is high demand for academic papers. Even those scientists with better quality cannot cope with this demant under pressure. Thirdly, there is no interest in keeping or, indeed, estabilishing high quality professional political science among members of Slovak Political Science Association. Lastly, and crucially, neither state nor universities are by and large interested in quality of political science (or science in general) in Slovakia. In short, standards of political science have not been estabilished and there is still missing interest in this issue. In addition, there is overall low level of academic discourse (if there is any) in humanities and social sciences and low level ethics in society at large - including academic community.