The article is devoted to the study of the question concerning the possibility of empirical analysis and, on this basis, the assessment of the contribution of emigrant scientists to the development of Russian political thought, including scientists-passengers of the “philosophical steamer”. The research was carried out on the basis of a comparative analysis of the materials of two anthologies containing texts of Russian political thinkers. Two directions (Soviet and emigrant) in the development of domestic political thought in 1920s–1950s were compared. At the same time, the author of the article proceeds from the assumption that the compilers of the anthologies were the most competent experts assessing both the quality of the political texts of certain researchers and the ability to give a more or less complete picture of the state of political thought in a given period through a set of selected texts. Based on the analysis of empirical material, the article concludes that the contribution of emigrant researchers to the development of Russian political thought in the 1920s–1950s prevailed, both in quantitative and qualitative terms.