Fields in Political Science: American Development and Croatian Issues

The new Ordinance of Scientific Areas enacted by the Ministry of Science of Republic of Croatia specifies Politology as a scientific discipline of social sciences: 1. Political Science, 2. Theory and History of Politics, and 3. Political Philosophy. Following the objections of the academic community, that division was revised as follows: 1. Theory, History and Doctrines of Politics, 2. Foreign and National Policy, 3. Other. The author describes a different structuring, corroborated by IPSA\u27s and APSA\u27s documents. Also, the author reviews the two centuries of the development of political science in America and in Croatia. In hundred years of the globally prevailing American development of Political Science and of the professions of political scientists, a new global standard was set. It structures include approximately a hundred fields and subfields of science and expertise in Political Science in 8 basic fields: 1. Political Institutions, 2. Political Behaviour, 3. Comparative Politics, 4. International Relations, 5. Political Theory, 6. Public Policy and Management, 7. Political Economy, and 8. Political Methodology. The author emphasizes that any ungrounded intervention in the division of scientific fields might heavily harm the progress of this science, organisation of research, staff renewal at the University, academic education of political scientists, as well as the internationally comparable competence of Croatian experts and Croatian democratic political thought and political culture in general