The answer to this question must be determined by a careful analysis of the properties of each discipline. In our discussion we will investigate some particular properties of what Aristotle considered science to be. We will also concurrently examine politics to see in what aspects the properties of science may be applied, and in what aspects they may not.

By science, we mean knowledge in an organized general sense. We gather from The Metaphysics, more specifically that science has to satisfy the following four features:

1. It offers causal knowledge.
2. It is dianoetic. (it uses reason instead of feelings to reach a conclusion)
3. It has one kind of genus.
4. It demonstrates the properties of its genus but not its essence.

Let us inspect the above four, starting with the third, and most simple property, genus. By genus we mean divisions that we make in the class of science. Aristotle distinguishes three genera in The Metaphysics. In a productive science the scientist deals specifically with what he produces, and what he produces is something external to him. An example of this is technology, or tekhne and the arts. Theoretical sciences deal with truth in its own sake that is contemplated in the mind of the scientist. Examples of this encompass math, physics, theology, and metaphysics. Aristotle’s view on theoretical science is extremely interesting, but outside of the scope of our discussion on politics as a science.

Practical sciences deal with actions and choices that are not separate from the agent. An example of this is ethics and politics. By politics, we mean that which pertains to the city. Politics is concerned with who governs the city and to what extent. It is a practical science because it influences the question, "what should I do?" for a person. By this we mean, that if a person is governed then their action is going to be affected to varying degrees by the political system they live under.

Now that we have classified political science in its proper genus, we must show how it satisfies the fourth property of science. In other words, how it demonstrates the properties of its genus but not its essence. The essence of a thing is its definition. Later we will discuss how a definition must contain the cause, but for now we will focus on the way to demonstrate the essence of a science. An essence is not demonstrated by reason but by induction. By induction we mean proving the universal through the particular. This technique is used in mathematics to prove that a theorem applies in all cases. This is done by proving the first case, assuming that it is true for any n cases, and then proving symbolically that if it is true for n cases, then it must be true for n + 1 cases. The path to a principle of science is an inductive one. We start with specific particulars that we notice from our sense perception, and we look for patterns so that we can make general statements about them, and arrive at a principle. Let us first define a city and then try to use the above mentioned inductive process to explain how we might have arrived at our definition.

If we want to consider politics to be a science, then we must first define it. Since we know from our discussion on genera, that politics is that which pertains to the city, we must first ask what a city is. In the beginning of The Politics, Aristotle indicates that a city, or polis is a political partnership of free human beings. He also stresses, that in this political partnership, that only the virtuous should rule. We will better understand this at the end of our discussion, when we are talking about dianoetic reasoning and architectonic science. For now, let us continue with a simple definition of a city, and we will try to use an inductive process to explain how a city might come into being.

We will start with a city’s components, specifically people. There are two natural strivings in a person, reproduction and preservation. In order to carry out these natural desires, people form families, and families can unite into villages, or ethnos. But a village of this type is not a city. A family may fulfill a man’s primary needs, but it cannot fulfill his secondary needs. By these needs we mean living with intentional choice and happiness, or eudaimonia. People need virtue and leisure to be truly happy. Man needs to think more about just where his next meal will come from, or how he will survive from day to day. The city however was not created by people with this in mind, because they would not have known to create what could only be known after its creation. Instead, the city developed naturally, and then "the good life" was discovered.

But, there is more to understand about city than just partnership and the essence of our science is still incomplete. Aristotle says in The Physics, "men do not think they know a thing till they have grasped the 'why' of it (which is to grasp its primary cause)." By ‘the why’, he means the definition of a thing, and the definition of a thing must include its cause. To define the tide as "the periodic variation in the surface level of the oceans" is incomplete. To make this definition complete we must add that it is "caused by gravitational attraction of the moon and sun". These examples illustrate that causal knowledge is simply knowing the cause of something. This property of science lets us distinguish that scientific knowledge is not just knowing that something, it is knowing why.

If we are searching for causal knowledge to give us an answer to this ‘why’, we must first ask what a cause is. That which permits a thing to be, is called a cause, or aitia. The word itself implies what is responsible, or even guilty for a thing. Causes can exist which are close to a thing and far from it as well. Consider a child whose cause is both his parents and nature itself. According to Aristotle there are four types of causes. We will now consider them in terms of a bed:

1. Material cause: the matter that makes something. (The wood of the bed, its potential.)
2. Efficient cause: the thing that made it. (The workers who made the bed.)
3. Formal cause: the form of something. (The blueprints of the bed.)
4. Final cause: the intention of the creator. (To give someone a place to sleep.)

A misinterpretation of these cause types, is to say that a cause is just a description of a situation from a particular point of view; for if cause were just description, then the amount of cause types would be infinite, given the many different viewpoints. Aristotle, however, seems to deny the previous statement’s antecedent when he says, "this then perhaps exhausts the number of ways in which the term 'cause' is used". It is also important to note that not everything has to have all of these causes.

With the understanding from our previous discussion of what might have caused a city to be, we should now be able to classify the polis in terms of the four causes. The efficient cause of the city is the people who make the city, but this does not say enough. Nature is also an efficient cause of the city, and when people who have the potential to live politically are in nature they advance to form the city. The final cause of the city would have to imply the intention of the creators, but we have just demonstrated above that the creators could not have any intention of creating a place where one could live "the good life". For this reason the city might not have a final cause, in the sense of the people as its creator, but we have demonstrated in our discussion of efficient causes, that people are not the sole cause of the city. Aristotle held that nature does nothing in vain, and he would have to agree that the city is also caused by nature, whose final cause is to create a place where one could be political so that they could live a fully developed life. Since men form partnerships for what is good, it does seem fair to say that this is the final cause, and this will become more apparent if we consider the city’s formal cause.

Aristotle demonstrates in The Politics that there are six types of regimes. By Regime, or politeia we mean the government of the city. Each regime has its own constitution, which can be seen as a "social blueprint". The form that is in this constitution is instantiated by the government and the way of life in a city is reflected by those governing it. Thus, when an atrocity occurs, we blame the constitution of the regime that allowed it to happen. If political science were a genus, then Aristotle would divide the types of regimes into six species. This division would be done according to how many rule and whether or not they rule for the common advantage of the people, or for their own personal gain. By rule we mean to dominate, or kratein, which means to conquer through force, master, or control. This word comes from kratos, which means bodily strength, and kreitton, which means superior. Domination implies the suffix archy, which pertains to principle power, or office. The names of the regimes are derived in an organized science, from a combination of this term and the number who rule.

Tyranny means that one person rules for his personal advantage and is free to abuse his subjects. Monarchy means that one person rules for the common advantage. The prefix mon means one. In this system the ruler’s power to abuse is limited. Oligarchy is the rule of the rich who are few, or oligoi, in their own interest. This type of regime usually rules for economic prosperity, and not necessarily for the common advantage. Aristocracy is the rule of the few who are best, or aristoi, on the basis of virtue, and the common good. Democracy is a regime where the people, or demos, who are usually the poor majority rule in their own interests, but not always for the goal of virtue. This is because a democracy can be like a tyranny if the majority oppresses the minority to the point that there is no common advantage. Polity, or politia is a regime that combines oligarchy and democracy, to reach the common good. Aristotle did not have a favorite form of regime because the virtue of a regime is contingent upon its political setting. It is most important to note that each of these regimes is a formal cause of a city.

The material cause is the matter that makes something, like the bronze of a statue, but a city is not something that exists in matter. It is evident from our discussion so far that a city is a partnership, and a partnership is not tangible like a statue. To say that the material cause of a city is the stone and wood of the places where the people live would be to miss the city’s political nature. The components of a city are theoretical, the closest they get to being material is when they are carried out by the people. But the activity of people should not be considered matter, so a city does not have a material cause.

We now see that scientific knowledge, or episteme implies the state of knowing subject’s knowledge of the cause, the genus, and essence. But since science must offer an explanation, we must consider how this explanation is to be performed. In the Posterior Analytics, Aristotle explains the second property of science. Dianoetic implies using reason instead of feelings to reach a conclusion. The roots of the word are dia, which means sense feeling and noetic, which means grasped via intuition. Aristotle uses these terms to explain how we get from non-knowing to knowing. If all intellectual learning comes from already existing knowledge, then science must be a body of truth based on theorems and the connections between them. The connections within such an axiomatic system are syllogisms. From this we may conclude the following:

1. Not all things can be learned.
2. All things in science must be expressible in propositions.
3. A scientific question must be able to be predicated.

Since the demonstration of causal knowledge is based on primitives, it follows that not all things can be demonstrated. The truth of a primitive itself can only be immediately grasped by the knowing subject, and it is prior to and more knowable than the conclusion. For this reason, knowledge of the conclusion rests on knowledge of the primitives, but knowledge of the primitives is irrelevant to the conclusion.

The causal connections between a thing can exist irrelevant of a knowing subject, but a subject can reason to these connections through the process of deduction or induction. We have already talked about induction in our discussion of essences. By deduction we mean proving the particular through the universal such that the posits result from the necessity of their being the case. An example of this is statements of the form: "All men are mortal and Socrates is a man, thus, Socrates is mortal". Universals can exist prior to a subject, but a subject must first reason to a universal with induction.

A demonstration through deduction cannot occur until an inductive process has occurred. In our previous example we used an inductive process to reason to the essence of the city and then established certain forms that a city might take in terms of its regime. In The Politics, Aristotle plays the role of a political scientist when he gives demonstrations of how one should rule. These demonstrations are similar to a deductive process based on the principles of what is good for a city. The demonstrations themselves are an example of an architectonic science. By architectonic science, we mean the science of ruling. In our next example we can see politics behaving like a science, an architectonic science specifically, that is based on principles that we know inductively from The Politics and from The Nicomachean Ethics.

Aristotle holds that all partnerships are formed for the good, and because of this he would have to say that power should be given only to the citizens who have virtue. This is because virtue causes its possessors to be in a good state, it implies that they will perform their functions well without excess or deficiency. How a city is ruled is such an important assignment that we would only want those who perform their functions well to do it.

Only when a man possesses virtue can he participate in the political virtues of being a citizen. By citizen, or polites we mean only those who hold deliberative and judicial office. A partnership that gives power, or a citizenship that is not based on virtue is deviated. For example, craftsmen are led by wealth, not virtue, so they will not be as concerned for the common advantage of the people as much as the virtuous citizen would be, hence craftsmen should not rule. There are several other examples of dianoetic reasoning similar to the above found in The Politics, where Aristotle gives advice to tyrants, gives a critique of Plato’s Republic, and in general, analyzes any political system.

From all of the examples in our discussion, it seems clear that politics can be considered a science. Given the four properties of science discussed in The Metaphysics, we have found an interpretation of The Politics that satisfies its criteria. Those who do not consider politics to be a science would have to disagree with the interpretations given above. Politics is not a science in the sense that physics or math is, but this is just a property of its genus. Since politics is related to ethics, and since ethics must be considered a science, it seems reasonable to say that politics is a science as well.