| Abstract
| - The Challenges of Comparison in the Age of Globalization : A Geertzian, Contrast-Oriented Comparative Approach. This article analyzes the manner in which globalization has transformed the exercise of comparison in the social sciences and explores prospects for the method of contrast-oriented comparison developed by Clifford Geertz. The first part of the article examines the manner in which globalization is reflected in a series of specific social mechanisms. Taken together, these call into question the nation as the relevant framework of comparison, encourage greater attention to the various scales at which social phenomena occur and transform our understanding of the independence of particular cases. The second part examines the contrast-oriented method in the context of comparative approaches, giving attention to the forms of demonstrative reasoning they involve. The third part, finally, looks at how contrast-oriented comparative approaches respond to the challenges of globalization for comparison.
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