Chapter 1 - Introduction

Question 1

The processes through which modern nations and states arise and how political institutions and regimes evolve.

Answer 1

Political Development

Question 2

The transformation of poor agrarian societies into wealthy industrial societies, usually seen as the process by which postcolonial societies become more like societies in the West.

Answer 2

Modernization

Question 3

A regime in which citizens have basic rights of open association and expression and the ability to change the government through some sort of electoral process

Answer 3

Democracy

Question 4

A regime lacking democratic characteristics, ruled by a single leader or small group of leaders

Answer 4

Authoritarian Regime

Question 5

The sphere of organized, nongovernmental, nonviolent activity by groups lager than individual families or firms

Answer 5

Civil Society

Question 6

The study of the interaction between political and economic phenomena

Answer 6

Political Economy

Question 7

Political scientists who study comparative politics

Answer 7

Comparativists

Question 8

The process by which human communities make collective decisions

Answer 8

Politics

Question 9

One of the major subfields of political science, in which the primary focus is on comparing power and decision making across countries

Answer 9

Comparative Politics

Question 10

The systematic study of politics and power

Answer 10

Political Science

Question 11

The ability of one person or group to get another person or group to do something it would otherwise not do

Answer 11

First Dimension of Power

Question 12

The ability not only to make people do something, but to keep them from doing something

Answer 12

Second Dimension of Power

Question 13

The ability to shape or determine individual or group political demands by causing people to think about political issues in ways that are contrary to their own interests

Answer 13

Third Dimension of Power

Question 14

The study of politics among national governments and beyond national boundaries

Answer 14

International Relations

Question 15

An abstract argument that provides a systematic explanation of some phenomena

Answer 15

Theory

Question 16

An argument explaining what actually occurs; empirical theorists first notice and describe a pattern and then attempt to explain what causes it

Answer 16

Empirical Theory

Question 17

An argument explaining what ought to occur rather than what does occur

Answer 17

Normative Theory

Question 18

Systematic processes used to ensure that the study of a specific item or situation is as objective and unbiased as possible

Answer 18

Research Methods

Question 19

Research method that examines a particular political phenomenon in just one country or community and can generate ideas for theories or test theories developed from different cases

Answer 19

Single Case Study

Question 20

The means by which scholars try to mimic laboratory conditions by careful selection of cases

Answer 20

Comparative Method

Question 21

A common approach of the comparative method that are alike in a number of ways but differ on a key question under examination

Answer 21

Most Similar Systems Design

Question 22

A common approach of the comparative method that looks at countries that differ in many ways but that are similar in terms of that particular political process or outcome in which the research is interested

Answer 22

Most Different Systems Design

Question 23

Research method used for large-scale studies that reduces evidence to sets of numbers so that statistical analysis can systematically compare a huge number of cases

Answer 23

Quantitative Statistical Techniques

Question 24

Any person or group engaged in political behavior

Answer 24

Political Actor

Question 25

An explanation of political behavior that assumes that individuals are rational beings who bring to the political arena a set of self-defined preferences and adequate knowledge and ability to pursue those preferences

Answer 25

Rational Choice Theory

Question 26

Explanations of political behavior based on psychological analysis of political actors’ motives

Answer 26

Psychological Theories

Question 27

A set of widely held attitudes, values, beliefs, and symbols about politics

Answer 27

Political Culture

Question 28

The process through which people, especially young people, learn about politics and are taught a society’s common political values and beliefs

Answer 28

Political Socialization

Question 29

Theorists of political culture who believe that clear sets of attitudes, values, and beliefs can be identified in each country that change very rarely and explain much about politics there

Answer 29

Modernists

Question 30

A classification of some set of phenomena into distinct types for purposes of analysis

Answer 30

Typology

Question 31

A political culture in which citizens hold values and beliefs that support democracy, including active participation in politics but also enough deference to the leadership to let it govern effectively

Answer 31

Civic Culture

Question 32

Groups that hold partially different beliefs and values from the main political culture of a country

Answer 32

Subcultures

Question 33

A set of values in a society in which most citizens are economically secure enough to move beyond immediate economic concerns to “quality of life” issues like human rights, civil rights, women’s rights, environmentalism, and moral values

Answer 33

Postmaterialist

Question 34

An approach that sees cultures not as sets of fixed and clearly defined values but rather as sets of symbols subject to interpretation

Answer 34

Postmodernist

Question 35

The ways in which people speak and write about politics; postmodern theorists argue that political discourse influences political attitudes, identity, and actions

Answer 35

Political Discourse

Question 36

A systematic set of beliefs about how a political system ought to be structured

Answer 36

Political Ideology

Question 37

The ruling class’s ability to spread a set of ideas justifying and perpetuating its political dominance

Answer 37

Ideological Hegemony

Question 38

Approach to explaining politics that argues that political behavior is at least influenced and limited, and perhaps even determined, by broader structures in a society such as class divisions or enduring institutions

Answer 38

Structuralism

Question 39

Structuralist argument that says that economic structures largely determine political behavior; the philosophical underpinning of communism

Answer 39

Marxism

Question 40

In Marxist theory, groups of people with the same relationship to the means of production; more generally, groups of people with similar occupations, wealth, or income.

Answer 40

Social Classes

Question 41

The class that owns capital; according to Marxism, the ruling elite in all capitalist societies

Answer 41

Bourgeoiseie

Question 42

A term in Marxist theory for the class of free wage laborers who own no capital and must sell their labor to survive; communist parties claim to work on the _________’s behalf

Answer 42

Proletariat

Question 43

An approach to explaining politics that argues that political institutions are crucial to understanding political behavior

Answer 43

Institutionalism

Question 44

A set of rules, norms, or standard operating procedures that is widely recognized and accepted by the society and that structures and constrains political actions

Answer 44

Political Institution

Question 45

Institutionalist theorists who follow the assumptions of rational choice theory and argue that institutions are the products of the interaction and bargaining of rational actors

Answer 45

Rational Choice Institutionalists

Question 46

Theorists who believe that institutions explain political behavior and shape individuals’ political preferences and their perceptions of their self-interests and that institutions evolve historically in particular countries and change relatively slowly.

Answer 46

Historical Institutionalists

Question 47

Explanation of who has power that argues that society is divided into various political groups and that power is dispersed among these groups so that no group has complete or permanent power; contrast to elite theory

Answer 47

Pluralist Theory

Question 48

Top leaders mobilize political support by providing resources to their followers in exchange for political loyalty

Answer 48

Patron-client Relationships

Question 49

A theory that all societies are ruled by a small group that has effective control over virtually all power; contrast to pluralist theory

Answer 49

Elite Theory

Question 50

An elite who possess adequate resources to control a regime; in Marxist theory, the class that controls key sources of wealth in a given epoch

Answer 50

Ruling Class

Question 51

A relationship between postcolonial societies and their former colonizers in which leaders benefit politically and economically by helping outside businesses and states maintain access to the former colonies’ wealth and come to serve the interests of the former colonizers and corporations more than they serve their own people

Answer 51

Neocolonialism

Question 52

Rule by men

Answer 52

Patriarchy