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A Plain English Guide to Political Terms. a.ieISBN: 978-1-907171-25-3National Adult Literacy Agency, 2015The copyr. ght in this guide belongs to the National Adult Literacy Agency. his guide is intended only as a guide for members of the public. Please note that the descriptions are only a guide to p. are not strict legal or scientific ...
36 Understanding Comparative Politics Defining Democracy Let’s look at a more formal definition of democracy 2 and work through its three central elements. Democracy is a political system in which 1. all adults are empowered as citizens and have the ability to hold officials accountable
fresh perspective on the fundamentals of political science. Its central theme is the enduring political significance of the modern state despite severe chal-lenges to its sovereignty. There are three main sections to the book. The first traces the origins and meaning of the state and proceeds to explore its relation-ship to the practice of ...
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- Chapter Objectives
- Differences between Politics and Political Science
- History
- Establishing a Discipline
- Twentieth-Century Political Science
- The Role of Political Theory
- Is Political Science a Science?
- Major Concepts of Political Science
- Career Guidance
- Public Goods, the Tragedy of the Commons, and Free Riders
- States
- Government
- Power
- Ideology
- Civil Liberties, Civil Rights, and Human Rights
- CHAPTER SUMMARY
- KEY TERMS
- DISCUSSION QUESTIONS
Distinguish between politics and political science. Develop an understanding and appreciation of the history of political science. Examine the extent to which political science is a science. Identify and discuss major concepts in political science, including the state, government, power, and ideology Political science is the systematic and scientif...
Perhaps the easiest way to talk about the differences between politics and political science is to look at a few examples. Take immigration, something we often hear about in the news. Some politicians complain about illegal immigration and express a desire to build a wall on the Mexican American border, while former president Barack Obama issued sw...
Debates over the history and nature of political science are not new. (For readings on these topics, see the For Further Reading section at the end of this chapter.) Most everyone can agree that the roots of the discipline go back to ancient Greece with the philosophy of Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle. While Socrates himself is well known for his a...
Given the importance of such ideas to movements including the American and French revolutions, no one could deny the significance of political philosophy and theory. However, as the nineteenth century progressed and the role of the state grew, there was a clamor in the American academy to establish some sort of area of study that encompassed not on...
Most of the political science research carried out in the first half of the twentieth century was primarily observational, comparative, and categorizing in its intent. But as political scientists watched other social sciences, particularly psychology, develop (this was the time of Freud, after all), a movement arose to bring more scientifi-cally ba...
The history of political science, detailed here, began with a discussion of political philosophy ranging from Plato to Montesquieu with Machiavelli and St. Augustine in between. Once political science as a discipline was formed, it would appear to a casual observer that political theory had been relegated to the dustbin of history. It is certainly ...
One of the basic questions of political science that permeates the field today is whether political science is a science or can ever be a science. Science is defined as a systematic search for knowledge through observation, experiments, and tests and is associated with the scientific method. The scientific method (see box) is a series of steps that...
Before moving on to look at the individual fields of study that can be found within political science, we will examine some of the primary ideas and concepts that are found throughout. These include things such as states, forms of government, civil liberties and civil rights, power, represen-
The use of the scientific method is not exclusive to science, whether it is a hard science or political science. The scientific method can also be seen as a way of critical thinking or analysis, which many employers find useful. You can transfer this way of thinking to solve problems, analyze markets, or consider strategy for a future employer. Thi...
One of the key reasons often cited for the need for a govern-ment is the provision and protection of what are called pub-lic goods. Public goods are goods that are “available for, and consumed by, all individuals. Their consumption by any one person does not diminish their consumption by others. People cannot (easily) be excluded from sharing in th...
When we think of the term state in America, we usually also think of the fact that the country is called the United States of America. Although some political scien-tists may debate the true meaning or conceptualization of the term state, in general, states refer to groups of people living under a single governmental system.15 Often, the term denot...
Where states are groups of people living under one governmental system, the very term government means the style and structure of the institutions that make author-itative decisions for a society. Governments come in many different styles, from dem-ocratic republics of the American type or authoritarian regimes under dictators. One way to think abo...
In both of the previously given concepts, the idea of power is central to defining a state and a government. Both have the authority and legitimacy to wield power over their citizens, yet the concept of power is not easily defined or measured. Many scholars define power as the ability to get one to do something they otherwise would not do. For exam...
In the same way state, nation, and country are often confused, so are the ideas of ide-ology and government, and political party. An ideology is a consistent and coherent set of ideas concerning any number of things from religion and morals to theories about politics and how states should be run. Some of the ideologies that interest us most include...
The twin concepts of civil liberties and civil rights are inherent in the ideologies of liberalism and conservatism; they are the natural rights of which liberals speak and believe government should expand to enforce, particularly when it comes to civil rights. They are also those rights and liberties that conservatives believe are best protected w...
Political science is the scientific study, analysis, and understanding of political processes and behavior. People have been studying politics since ancient Greek and Roman times. Only in the nineteenth century did political science become a formal field of study. Political scientists can study politics from a variety of angles, including from the ...
behavioralism: The concept that all human action, and therefore political action, can be observed, quantified, and explained in an objective, scientific way civil liberties: Natural rights or our ability to do certain things that must be protected from government civil rights: Freedoms to be treated fairly and equally, which must be enforced by gov...
What does political science mean to you? Can you think of any real-life examples of political science that you’ve encountered? Come up with a research question that relates a topic you’re interested in to politics. How political science: The systematic and scientific study of politics, including institutions, behaviors, and processes politics: The ...
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Specifically, politics is seen as a particular means of resolving conflict: that is, by compromise, conciliation and negotiation, rather than through force and naked power. This is what is implied when politics is portrayed as ‘the art of the possible’. Such a definition is inherent in the everyday use of the term.
- Ahlexandre Olermo
Abstract. This chapter discusses the nature of politics and political analysis. It first defines the nature of politics and explains what constitutes ‘the political’ before asking whether politics is an inevitable feature of all human societies. It then considers the boundary problems inherent in analysing the political and whether politics ...
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The POLITICS of. POLICYMAKINGan IntroductionPublic policy textbooks that provide insight in how public programs are actually crafted, negotiated, implemented, adjusted and terminated are extremely rare, but Boin. and Lodge have pulled it off. This earthy and at times gritty gem provides its users with penetrating insights into how the cookies ...
