Chapter 1: Power and Citizenship in American Government
Harold Lasswell defines politics as
"who gets what, when, and how." Politics is a way of determining, without recourse to violence, who gets the power and resources in society, and how they get them.
On a scale of social order from most to least government control there are three levels. What are they?
- Authoritarian system - Non-authoritarian system - Anarchy
What are the tools of politics?
- Compromise and cooperation - Discussion and debate - Deal making, bargaining, storytelling - Even sometimes, bribery and deceit
What are the mixed economic systems?
- Democratic-socialism - Social democracy - Regulated capitalism
Authoritarian governments can take many forms. What are they?
- Dictatorship or monarchy: sovereignty is vested in an individual - Theocracy: power lies in God - Fascism: power is in the state itself - Oligarchy: power is in a ruling class
Democratic narratives vary in how much active control they give to individuals. these levels are:
- Elite democracy - Pluralist democracy - Participatory democracy
What are the different political economies?
- Socialism - Democratic-socialism - Social democracy - Regulated capitalism - Laissez-faire capitalism
The products of politics:
- a strong national defense - good relations with other countries - student loans - economic prosperity - favourable mortgage rates - secure streets and neighbourhoods - cheap and efficient public transportation - affordable health care - family leave protections
There are two main branches of capitalism. What are they?
- capitalist economy - laissez-faire capitalism
Citizens possess certain rights, or powers to act, that the government cannot limit. These rights vary in different democracies but they usually include:
- freedoms of speech and the press - the right to assemble - certain legal protections guaranteeing fair treatment in the criminal justice system.
Citizens of democracies also possess obligations or responsibilities to the public realm. Such obligations include:
- obeying the law, once they have consented to the government - paying taxes - serving in the military - sitting on juries
A less extreme form of nonauthoritarian government is democracy. hat is a democracy?
A government that vests power in the people. In democracies, government is not external to the people, in a fundamental sense, government is the people.
Why are political narratives important?
A major part of politics is about competing to have your narrative accepted as the authoritative account. Creation and dissemination of political narratives were the prerogative of authoritative sources like priests, kings, and their agents.
What is social democracy?
A mixed economy that uses the democratic process to bend capitalism toward socialist goals.
What are political narratives?
A persuasive story about the nature of power, who should have it, and how it should be used.
What is an advanced industrial democracy?
A system in which a democratic government allows citizens a considerable amount of personal freedom and maintains a free-market (though still usually regulated) economy.
When a system combines an authoritarian government with a socialist economy, we say that the system is totalitarian. What is totalitarianism?
A system in which absolute power is exercised over every aspect of life.
An authoritarian state may also limit its own power. We call this authoritarian capitalism. What is meant by this?
A system in which the state allows people economic freedom but maintains stringent social regulations to limit noneconomic behaviour.
Pluralist democracy
A theory of democracy that holds that citizen membership in groups is the key to political power. As a way of trying to influence a system that gives them a limited voice, citizens join groups of people with whom they share an interest.
Participatory democracy
A theory of democracy that holds that citizens should actively and directly control all aspects of their lives. In this view, democracy is more than a way to make decisions; it is a way of life, an end in itself.
Elite democracy
A theory of democracy that limits the citizens' role to choosing among competing leaders. In this view, elections are merely symbolic to perpetuate the illusion that citizens have consented to their government.
What is a communist democracy?
A utopian system in which property is communally owned and all decisions are made democratically.
What is the difference between 'politics' and 'government'.
American 'politics' is what happens in the halls of Congress, on the campaign trail, etc. It is the making of promises, deals, and laws. American 'government' is the Constitution and the institutions set up by the Constitution for the exercise of authority by the American people.
What is a capitalist economy?
An economic system in which the market determines production, distribution, and price decisions, and property is privately owned.
In nonauthoritarian systems, ultimate power rests with the individuals to make decisions concerning their lives. the most extreme form of this is...
Anarchy
What is authority?
Authority is power that citizens view as legitimate, or right - power to which we the people have implicitly consented.
What is capitalism?
Capitalism is a procedural economic system based on the workings of the market - the process of supply and demand.
How does democratic socialism differ from social democracy?
Democratic socialists keep socialism as their end goal while social democrats are happy to keep the capitalist economy as long as they use the democratic process to attain some of the goals a socialist economy is supposed to produce.
What is a socialist economy?
Economic decisions are made not by individuals through the market, but rather by politicians, based on their judgement of what society needs.
What are mixed economies?
Economic systems based on modified forms of capitalism tempered by substantive values. Most real-world economies fall somewhere in-between the idealized points of socialism and laissez-faire capitalism.
Who would primarily be concerned with how society's wealth is distributed?
Economists
What are substantive guarantees?
Government assurance of particular outcomes or results.
What are procedural guarantees?
Government assurance that the rules will work smoothly and treat everyone fairly, with no promise of particular outcomes.
What is government?
Government is a system or organization for exercising authority over a body of people.
How are government and rules related?
Government is shaped by the process of politics, but it in turn provides the rules and institutions that shape the way politics continues to operate. The rules and institutions of government have a profound effect on how power is distributed and who wins and who loses in the political arena.
What happens in a socialist economy?
In a socialist economy, they emphasize substantive guarantees of what they believe to be fair outcomes, rather than procedural guarantees of fair rules and process.
What is the difference between procedural and substantive systems?
In procedural systems, the means (processes) justify the ends. In substantive systems, the ends justify the means.
What are institutions?
Institutions can be thought of as the 'where' of the political struggle. They are the organizations in which government power is exercised.
Who were the gatekeepers of information?
Journalists and the media elite who determine which news stories are covered and which are not.
The informal, unwritten expectations that guide behaviour and support formal rule systems are?
Norms
What are norms?
Norms are informal, unwritten expectations that guide behaviour and support formal rules systems; often most noticeable when broken.
How does politics relate to social order?
Politics provides a process through which we try to arrange our collective lives in some kind of social order, so that we can live without crashing into each other at every turn, provide ourselves with goods and services we could not obtain alone, and maximize the values and behaviours we think are important.
What is power?
Power is the ability to get other people to do what you want them to do. The resources in question here might be government jobs, tax revenues, laws that help you get your way, or public policies that work to your advantage.
The processes of politics and economics can be engaged in two ways. What are they?
Procedurally or substantively
What is regulated capitalism?
Regulated capitalism is also a hybrid system. It is a market system in which the government intervenes to protect rights.
What are the directives the specify how resources will be distributed or what procedures govern collective activity?
Rules
How are rules and norms related?
Rules can be official and largely recognized. Norms are less visible but no less important; they are the tactically understood rules about acceptable political behaviour and ways of doing things.
What are rules?
Rules can be thought of as the 'how' in the definition, "who gets what,... and how." They are directives that specify how resources will be distributed or what procedures govern collective activity.
What is an example of a society that engages in authoritarian capitalism?
Singapore
What are authoritarian governments?
Systems in which the state holds all power over the social order. By 'authoritarian governments' it is usually meant by those in where the state chooses the exercise its power, the people have no choice but to submit to its will.
What is a major political resource that helps people to gain and maintain power?
The ability to control the media, not just the press and television, but the multiple channels created by companies like Google, Facebook, and Apple, through which people get information about politics and that may actually affect the information we get.
What is anarchy?
The absence of government and laws. Anarchists would do away with government and laws altogether because they value freedom more than the order and security that governments provide.
What is the media?
The channels - including television, radio, newspapers, and the internet - through which information is sent and received.
What happens in substantive political and economic systems?
The legitimacy of the outcome depends on how widely accepted the narrative is, that the government tells about who should have what. The outcome is based on the decision of a powerful person or people, not a process that people believe is impartial.
What happens in procedural political and economic systems?
The legitimacy of the outcome is based on the legitimacy of the process that produced it.
Social contract
The notion that society is based on an agreement between government and the governed, in which people agree t give up some rights in exchange for the protection of others.
What is the purpose of rules?
The point of rules is to provide a framework for solving - without violence - the problems generated by our collective lives.
What is economics?
The production and distribution of a society's material resources and services.
What do the tools of politics NOT include?
The tools of politics do not include violence. The threat of violence may be a political tool used as leverage to get a deal, but when violence is employed, politics has broken down.
What is social order?
The way we organize and live our collective lives
How do democratic socialism and social democracy differ from pure socialism?
They combine socialist ideals that empower government with a commitment to the political democratic principle of popular sovereignity and the economic principle of market capitalism that empowers individuals.
What happens in laissez-faire capitalism?
This is an economic system in which the market makes all decisions and the government plays no role.
What is the difference between regulated capitalism and the other hybrid systems (democratic socialism and social democracy)?
Unlike the socialist hybrids, regulated capitalism does not often prioritize political and social goals as much as it does economic health.
How are the tools of politics used?
We use those tools to agree on the principles that should guide our handling of power and other scarce resources and to live our collective lives according to those principles.
What is democratic socialism?
a mixed economy that combines socialist ideals with a commitment to democracy and market capitalism, keeping socialism as its goal.
In ______________ systems, the people are subjects of their governments. In __________ systems, the people are citizens.
authoritarian; democratic
Subjects
individuals who are obliged to submit to a government authority against which they have no rights
Citizens
members of a political community who have both rights and responsibilities.
What is one way people can increase their chances of getting what they want?
paying attention
Democracies are based on the principle of popular sovereignty which is...
the concept that the citizens are the ultimate source of political power. The central idea here is that no government is considered legitimate unless the governed consent to it, and people are not truly free unless they live under a law of their own making.
John Locke declared that the social contract has broken once...
the government fails to protect their rights. The people are then free to form a new government, or not, as they please.
The book understands politics as:
the struggle over who gets power and resources in society, and the fight to control the narrative that defines each contestant.
The Greek philosopher Aristotle stated that:
we are political animals, and political animals we seem destined to remain
