Exam #2, chapters 5-7 Flashcards
What is Demokratia?
a Greek word meaning “rule by the common people”
Review from last chapter: what is the state?
an entity that uses coercion and the threat of force to rule in a given territory
From a general perspective, what is the government?
the set of people who run the state or have the authority to act on behalf of the state at a particular point in time
Review from last chapter: what is a regime?
the set of rules, norms, or institutions that determine how the government is constituted, how it is organized, and how major decisions are made
According to Aristotle, what are the good forms of regime?
monarchy, aristocracy, and politeia
According to Aristotle, what are the bad forms of regime?
tyranny, oligarchy, and democracy
What are abstract concepts?
mental categories that capture the meaning of objects, events, or ideas
What is a measure or indicator?
a quantification of the thing we are interested in
What is operationalization?
the process by which abstract theoretical concepts are translated into concrete and observable measures or indicators
What is a substantive view of democracy?
a classification of political regimes in regard to the outcomes they produce
What is a minimalist or procedural view of democracy?
a classifies of political regimes in regard to their institutions and procedures
What is contestation?
the extent to which citizens are free to organize themselves into competing blocs in order to press for the policies and outcomes they desire
What do aspects of contestation include?
freedom to form political parties, freedom of speech, and the extent to which leaders are chosen in free and fair elections
What is inclusion?
who is allowed to participate in the democratic process
What major factor affects inclusion in a country?
who has the right to vote
What was Ronald Dahl’s new proposed name for democracy?
polyarchy
What is the concept of polyarchy?
a political regime with high levels of both inclusion and contestation
What was Ronald Dahl’s reasoning for preferring the term “polyarchy” over “democracy”?
he did not believe that any large country exhibited, or could exhibit, sufficient levels of contestation or inclusion to rightfully be considered a true democracy
What are the three measures of democracy and dictatorship?
the democracy-dictatorship (DD) measure, Polity IV, and Freedom House
What is fact-value distinction?
the distinction between factual evidence and evaluation, divided into the components of contestation and inclusion to measure political participation
How did Aristotle classify regimes?
Divided them into categories based on whether they have one, few, or many rulers, and whether they are “good” or “bad”
What is the modern definition of democracy?
regimes in which government offices are filled as a consequence of contested elections
Can democracy truly be defined?
no, it is considered an abstract theoretical concept
What are the four conditions for democracy under the Democracy-Dictatorship measure?
1) Chief executive is elected
2) Legislature is elected
3) More than one party competing
4) An alternation in power under identical electoral rules
What happens if a regime doesn’t meet all four DD requirements?
it will be considered a dictatorship
What are the five different attributes for ranking under the Polity IV measure?
1) Competitiveness of executive recruitment
2) Openness of executive recruitment
3) Regulation of political participation
4) Competitiveness of political participation
5) Executive constraints
How does Polity IV measure democracy?
Democracy and autocracy are measured on a scale of 0-10, with 10 being a full democracy
What are the two categories that the Freedom House Measure is based on?
political rights and civil rights
What are the three classifications for regimes under the Freedom House Measure?
Free, partly free, and not free
How is the political rights dimension of the Freedom House Measure determined?
Measured based on overarching categories of electoral process, political pluralism and participation, and function of government
How is the civil rights dimension of the Freedom House Measure determined?
it is measured under four categories:
1) Freedom of expression and belief
2) Associational and organizational rights
3) Rule of law
4) Personal autonomy/ individual rights
Which of the three democracy measures evaluate minimalist data?
Democracy-Dictatorship and Polity IV
Which of the three democracy measures evaluate substantive data?
Freedom House
What is the significance of the Glorious Revolution of 1688?
Parliament taking power and shifting Britain away from its dynasty-monarchy regime
What is a rentier state?
a state with a government relying more on external factors than the taxation of its own people
What is sovereign debt?
debt that a government owes
What are credible commitment problems?
occurs when (a) an actor who makes a promise today may have an incentive to renege on that promise in the future and (b) power is in the hands of the actor who makes the promise and not in the hands of those expected to benefit from the promise.
What are the three solutions to credible commitment problems?
1) Enforceable contracts
2) Repeated interactions
3) Institutions that alter the distribution of power
What is the political resource curse?
countries that rely heavily on revenue from natural resources are unlikely to democratize. They are also prone to corruption, poor governance, and civil war.
What is economic rent?
unearned income
What is modernization theory?
prediction that high income promotes both the emergence and the survival of democracy
What is survival story?
prediction that income has no effect on the emergence of democracy but does help democracy to survive once it is established
What is foreign aid?
is aid—in the form of money, food, technical assistance, military weapons, and the like—that people in one country give to another. This aid can come from national governments, intergovernmental organizations, or private donations.
What is a dependent variable?
an outcome or thing we want to explain
What is an independent variable?
what we think will explain, or determine the value of, the dependent variable
How do primordialist arguments view culture?
they treat it as something that is objective and inherited- something that has been fixed since “primordial” times
How do constructivist arguments view culture?
they view it as something that is constructed or invented rather than inherited
What is cultural modernization theory?
it argues that socioeconomic development does not directly cause democracy; instead, economic development produces certain cultural changes, such as the emergence of a civic culture, and it is these cultural changes that ultimately produce democratic reform.
What is a civic culture?
a shared cluster of attitudes that are thought to promote democracy and democratic performance.
What is social capital?
the collective value of social networks and shared norms that promote reciprocity, trust, and social cooperation.
What is the clash of civilizations?
an idea proposed by Samuel Huntingdon that the widespread Western belief in the universality of the West’s values and its insistence on imposing these values through democratization efforts will only antagonize other civilizations and lead to conflict. Essentially saying that the ideologies of some civilizations are incompatible with democracy.
Confucianism
Philosophy created by Chinese philosopher Kung Fu Tzu centering around the idea that everyone has an important role in society and they should strive to perfect it
What is the ultimatum game?
two people are paired together, a proposer and a responder, and the proposer is allotted a divisible “pie”, often money, that they offer a portion of to the responder. The responder, knowing both the offer and the total amount of the pie, can either accept or reject the proposer’s offer. If the responder accepts the offer, they get the amount offered and the proposer gets to keep the rest. If the responder rejects the offer, neither one gets anything.
What is the dictator game?
essentially the same as the ultimatum game, except that responders are not given an opportunity to reject the offer; they simply get whatever the proposer dictates.
