Politics is a very emotive word and is used by different people to mean different things. There is no unifying theory of politics and hence no set boundaries of what can and cannot be said to be political. It is this ambiguity that makes it impossible to argue that politics is the preserve of government. This is so since preserve is such a precise word and there is always going to be a perspective that can illustrate an example of politics that is outside the governmental sphere.
In order that a meaningful conclusion to this question can be gained it is essential to initially define what the question is asking by laying down what definitions of the terms within are to be used. The key word in the debate that the question encompasses is “preserve;” although this could be taken to mean, does politics maintain the existence of government, in the context of the question the use of “preserve” that fits more fully is whether politics is solely found within government. Government in this case being taken to mean the specialised leading component and institutions of a society that are responsible for the decision making processes of that society as a whole. (Hague et al, 1992, p.20) It is however the definition of politics that poses the greatest difficulty in the question because, as McLean states, the definition: “is highly, perhaps essentially contested.” (1996, p.388) This contested nature of politics is key in respect to the question because the conceptual model of assumptions and beliefs with which a person tackles politics will influence the interpretation of politics that they attain. (Hague et al, 1992, p.3) Therefore an individual who uses one model, and hence definition of politics, will come to a different conclusion about whether politics is the preserve of government to someone who utilises a different model. It is then essential that the perspectives from which politics is viewed be outlined so that the debates between them can be analysed in respect to their strengths and weaknesses and a conclusion formed over whether indeed politics is the preserve of government.
The important area of debate in the definition of politics is where the political world ends and the other areas of the world start; if it is made clear where each perspective views this barrier to occur then by evaluating a perspective against its competitors a conclusio...
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...the preserve of government can be said to be incorrect due to the definition of preserve. If preserve, in the context, is taken to mean that government has the monopoly on politics then anyone arguing to prove this point will fail as even one example where politics can be found outside government will destroy the argument as a monopoly is all encompassing. As it has been concluded that such an example can always be found then subsequently it can also be concluded that politics is not the preserve of government as there is always another area where politics exists as perceived by another theory.
Bibliography
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McLean, I. (Editor), (1996), Oxford Concise Dictionary of Politics
Hague, R. Harrop, M. Breslin, S. (1992), Comparative Government and Politics: An Introduction
Edited Books:
Marsh, D. Stoker, G. (1995) Theory and Methods in Political Science – Rhodes R. The Institutional Approach - Ward, H. Rational Choice Theory (MacMillan)
Web-sites:
Cloonan, M. (1997) What is Politics? http://www.york.ac.uk/depts/poli/casestud
Mintz Eric, Close David, Croc Osvaldo. Politics, Power and the Common Good: An Introduction to Political Science. 2009. Toronto: Pearson Canada. 15,147,183.
Political ideologies (P.I) have existed since the dawn of human Civilization; they have been fought over, discredited, re-approached, and fought over again. Many exist and have been tried over thousands of years. Still the question that plagues humanity is, how best do we manage governmental affairs? It is best to understand that different political ideologies serve different purposes, and that governments must remain ideologically flexible depending on current national conditions.
Shapiro, Ian, Rogers M. Smith, and Tarek E. Masoud, eds. Problems and Methods in the Study of Politics. Cambridge ; Cambridge University Press, 2004.
The author I am going to talk about is Stone. Stone uses the approach Rational Decision Making. Rationality means choosing the best means to obtain a goal. Stone stated in her article how the rational decision model portrays a policy problem as a choice factoring a political actor (pg. 249). Under the rational decision making, there are four steps the actor goes
However, politics is not just limited to what most people would consider politics. These same forces that are present in institutions such as Congress are also present in places like the home, school, churches, hospitals, and private businesses. At the core of politics are relationships. When a political candidate is able to connect with voters on a certain level, the bond that is established can mean all the difference between being victorious or being crushed by an opponent.
Dowding, K. (2011). Rational choice theory. In M. Bevir (Ed.), The SAGE Handbook of Governance (pp. 36-40). Retrieved from http://books.google.com/books?id=dU8BNNYnZesC&printsec=frontcover
Throughout this course I have developed my political philosophy to be stronger, by heeding examples from the great philosophers we have discussed, however I have yet to fully peace all of it together in a flowing coherent text quite yet. I do know one thing however, and that it to remain open. While I realize that some of my ideas are radical, over my experiences and how I clicked with the political thinkers words, this is what I have created as my own political philosophy as of now. Given the current world today this is where I stand. Something may happen tomorrow and make me realize how wrong or right I have been, but for now this is me, as radical and all over the place it is. I can only hope that my logic makes an inkling of sense. To keep on track, the philosophers we have studied this semester deserve respect in their own light. Each one of them is right, and I feel like none of them are necessarily wrong. The world is a different place to every person, and for that reason I personally do not believe that we will ever have a political system with which everyone agrees with. We can merely do the best we can to grow, and take into considerations the words of those who have come before us, and maybe one day, we will arrive upon a system of government worth waiting
Comparative politics is the empirical comparative study of political systems. It involves the classification and comparison of institutions - ‘a rule that has been institutionalised’ (Lane and Ersson, 1999: 23) - in order to determine the nature of political regimes. The study of comparative politics has come to be guided by three major research schools: rational choice theory, culturalist analysis and structuralist approaches; each of which spearhead a distinctive notion over what about institutions affects the nature of the political process. Rationalists are methodological individualists who assert that ‘collectivities have no status apart from the individuals who comprise them’ (Lichbach, 1997: 245). Rational choice theory is guided by the principle that individuals ‘act as maximisers of benefits over costs’ (Bara and Pennington, 1997: 17), and whilst there is scope for the acceptance of the role played by culture and institutional structures in conditioning individual action, it is still primarily maintained that an understanding of social structures is fundamentally driven by ‘the incentives and beliefs of individual actors’ (Bara and Pennington, 1997: 33). However, an overlap between the rationalist and culturalist train of thought has been forged by political scientist Herbert Simon with his theory of ‘bounded rationality’ - individuals cannot always ‘assimilate and digest all the information’ (The Economist) required to maximise their benefit from a particular course of action, and instead ‘resort to habits, traditions and rules of thumb’ (Lichbach, 1997: 34); ‘satisficing’. Culturalists ar...
Political Philosophy is typically a study of a wide range of topics such as, justice, liberty, equality, rights, law, politics and the application of a codified law. Depending on what the philosophy is, it usually tends to be a very sensitive and a personal ideology that an individual holds within the reality of their existence. Several of the fundamental topics of political philosophy shape up the society that we live in as these specific topics and their implementation by the state ensures a legitimate government. In Political Philosophy, the aforesaid concepts or topics are evaluated and analyzed with tremendous depth in context to their history and intent. Furthermore, in a rather colloquial sense, political philosophy is generally a point of view which after some deep thinking asks questions such as, what are the government’s duties? Is it legitimate? What makes it legitimate? What are the duties of its citizens? What are their rights? Are they protected? So on and so forth. In the following paper, I will canvass my political philosophy and elaborate on my reasoning behind it.
Green, Donald P. and Ian Shapiro. 1994. Pathologies of Rational Choice Theory: A Critique of Applications in Political Science. New Haven: Yale University Press
According to the Homeric traditions the philosophical definition of politics was the identification, maintenance, and transformation of community core values from the old to the young generation. Over time civilizations have developed a political system in order to achieve organization, equality, justice, and stability within a community. A political community helps manage laws, distributes power, and plays a crucial role in the development of a virtuous life in citizenry; which is imperative in the term of it’s existence. Contrary to politics, philosophy teaches us to become rationalized beings and to think for ourselves rather than imitating or listening to other people. It also allows us to reason and use logic to make sense of things for
In this essay I will be arguing about 2 political ideologies; this essay will be highlighting the comparison and contrast between the 2 ideologies and their elements. The 2 ideologies that will be discussed are liberalism and conservatism, the essay will explain what ideology is, a brief explanation of their elements and the comparison between them. In my opinion the best between both ideologies is liberalism, the reason I think that is because liberalism places an ontological supremacy upon the individual and has no value more important than freedom because man’s natural state is when he is free unlike conservatism that has a very pessimistic view of humans and claims that individuals are morally corrupt.
From the beginning of ancient history the main question for political philosophy is how a human being exists in society, who should govern the society, how should the society be governed, who are the best rulers and how should they behave themselves, what is just and what is unjust, is better to be governed through just or not, how should the states be structured? These are main questions in political philosophy, that until today are strictly discussed. The major tasks of political philosophers are to analyze the nature of human being and to evaluate the ways in which an individual relates with society he lives in. The study of human nature is one of the most important aspects of political science and philosophy. In the process of creating a form of governance it is essential to understand the innate characteristics of human nature in order to avoid a bad government for all society and to achieve the ways how people should be governed most effectively. From the ancient time the roots of justification of political power were tied to sights of human nature.
Garner, R., Ferdinand, P. and Lawson, S. (2009) Introduction to Politics. 2nd edition. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
...ot function properly. Politics and administration should be seen as very interconnected. It is worth reiterating just as the structure of governments has changed over the years, the structure and role of public administration have also changes dramatically. Furthermore, it is important to state that public administration has grown from its traditional role of merely implementing policies adopted by the “political” branches of government to playing very significant role in the formation of public policies. This is definitely more evident in regards to professional expertise bureaucratic officials provide during problem identification, agenda setting, policy formulation, and evaluation that shape the content of public policy today. Overall, the idea that Wilson has proposed gives an accurate idea of what the relationship should be between politics and administration.