We are pleased to announce the first annual conference of the Political Methodology Group of the Political Studies Association on the 27th of June 2016. The Department of Political Science at University College London have generously agreed to host it.

The local organiser is Nils Metternich (n.metternich@ucl.ac.uk) who will be able to advise participants in due course about accommodation for those who need an overnight stay. Registration fees to be determined but will be minimal to cover catering.

Details of the event are at: https://www.psa.ac.uk/events/first-annual-conference-political-methodology-group-political-studies-association

Please send proposals for papers or panels to: stephen.fisher@trinity.ox.ac.uk;andreas.murr@politics.ox.ac.uk; whiteley@essex.ac.uk by 15th April 2016.

Proposals on any aspect of quantitative or qualitative political methodology are welcome. The call is open but papers should address interesting methodological issues relevant to political scientists. Papers could be a purely methodological in focus, examining a new method, some new software, or provide a critique of an existing method. Alternatively a paper might focus on a substantive research question but one which has significant methodological content and which involves innovation in the approach. The focus of the presentation should be methodological aspects of the research even if future publications emphasise theory or findings. The Political Methodology group aims to help bridge the divide between qualitative and quantitative methods in political research and so there is no requirement that papers should only focus on advanced statistical methods, but such papers would be welcome.

We look forward to receiving your proposals and seeing you at the conference.

Best wishes and thanks,

Steve Fisher, Andreas Murr and Paul Whiteley