This paper investigates the utility of Jackson’s (2011) analyticist methodology for studies exploring the role of “ideas” in institutional change. It discusses how analyticism enables an appreciation for both the view of ‘meaning as socially constructed’ and of ‘social science as able to enlighten through thick descriptions and understandings of time- and context-dependent social mechanisms and patterns’. This is exemplified by applying analyticism to a study, based on archival material, participant observation, and interviews, of “how a discursive institutionalist analysis can help explain, why the EU’s role as a global green leader is increasingly being challenged?” The paper then proceeds to shows how Schmidt’s (2014) discursive institutionalist framework can be operationalised to capture both its ‘descriptive’ and ‘explanatory’ dimensions by combining critical discourse analysis with qualitative content analysis (QCA). This is done in NVivo to increase the (often limited) transparency of the data reduction and analysis phases in qualitative studies.
