General Political Science Flashcards
What is Socialism? Why do you believe Socialism is necessary?
SEIZING THE MEANS OF PRODUCTION
A political and economic theory of social organization which advocates that the means of production, distribution, and exchange should be owned or regulated by the community as a whole.
POWER DICHOTOMY BETWEEN PROLETARIAT AND RULING CLASS REVERSED
There is an unquestionably unethical power divide between the proletariat (working-class) and the Bourgeoisie (wealthy capital hoarders, top 0.1%). Socialism aims to give power back to the people through owning the means of production, and breaking the cycle of exploitation in the workplace.
WEALTH INEQUALITY ADDRESSED FUNDAMENTALLY
In contemporary capitalism, there are the workers and there are the hoarders who reap the rewards of the blood and sweat of the proletariat.
Socialism aims for fair compensation to the workers. Full ownership of their labour and their business.
Socialism aims to give workers owners rights of businesses.
What political system does the United Kingdom have? How do UK politics work? How does one gain power in the UK?
The UK has a Democratic parliamentary system.
UK Parliament has 3 structures, House of Lords, House of commons which contain the elected representatives which discuss laws and issues of the people, and the Monarch.
The leader of a political party becomes the Prime Minister if their party wins the UK election. After this they choose a cabinet of 20 senior cabinet minsters which are allocated to different Government departments.
Parties which are not in power after the election are called the opposition, and it is their job to question policies enforced by the leading party in the House of Commons.
Who signed the Magna Carta? How many rules did it contain? When was this signed? How does this affect UK politics today?
Magna Carta was signed to abolish monarchy, so that not even the monarchs were above the law. Signed by King John of England.
How many members of UK parliament are there?
There are 650 Members of Parliament, or MPs, who each represent a constituency in the UK.
They either represent a political party or are independents.
They are elected by the constituency of the area they want to represent.
What are the critiques of contemporary capitalism?
WEALTH INEQUALITY. Unequal distribution of capital and the disproportionate rewards of exploitative behaviour. The work value of the proletariat is devalued, and so we believe that this is the best that we can get. The wealth distribution is radically skewed and disproportionate, and the working class are unaware of the sheer magnitude of their exploitation. The bourgeoise has enough wealth to afford clothing, education, healthcare and housing for every single person in America, but this fact is swept under the rug to preserve their elitist interests.
MONOPOLIES AND LOBBYISTS. Private corporations lobbying and monopolising. Gaining power by bribing and buying the support of politicians who are supposed to be impartial and represent the working class.
MARKET FAILURE. Market failure occurs when there is an oversupply or undersupply; or, where full costs are not incorporated into the final price. Therefore, a third party may have a cost imposed on them. In economic jargon, we say there is an inefficient allocation of resources.
ENVIRONMENTAL CONCERNS.
Capitalism also leads to the pollution of our air and water, soil degradation, deforestation, and the destruction of biodiversity. According to one study, the size of vertebrate populations has decreased by an average of 60 percent between 1970 and 2014.
CLASS DIVISION, POVERTY, ALIENATION AND CRIME. The main classes in capitalism are the bourgeoisie and the proletariat. However, other classes such as landlords, petty bourgeoisie, peasants, and lumpen proletariat also exist, but are not primary in terms of the dynamics of capitalism.
FUNDAMENTALLY UNDEMOCRATIC/POWER TO THE HIGHEST BIDDER
MATERIALISM
CONNECTIONS AND INHERITANCE OVER HARD WORK AND FAIR COMPENSATION
How would Socialism be realistically implemented into Capitalism?
MARKET SOCIALIST POLICIES
Unionisation, emphasis on workers rights in the workplace. Fair compensation which is proportionate to labour of each small worker.
IMPLEMENTATIONS OF WORKPLACE DEMOCRACIES where each worker has a voice in what goes on in their workplace and distribution of labour, as apposed to complete capitalist autocracy where the “big boss” has total authoritarian control of the livelihoods of their workers.
ADVOCACY FOR PROGRESSIVE IDEOLOGIES which can be used to bridge the gap between progressivism and conservatism. It raises openness and makes it more likely to vote progressive and support Socialist ideals. Progressives vote progressive, so the undying support of the marginalised is necessary to induce support for the working class.
ADVOCACY FOR CLASS CONSCIOUSNESS, where the marginalised and the oppressed become increasingly more aware of the boot on their backs.
A capitalist claims capitalism breeds innovation. He claims that property rights are essential for individuals to encourage more innovation. Is he correct?
No. The opposite is true. The innovation in question only emerges through the workers, not exploitative capitalists. Capitalists make money off the backs of the real innovators, while Capitalism itself is a net negative for the progress of humanity and innovation. Socialism is evidently superior for innovation, as under Socialism the workers would own a proportional segment of the business which would encourage higher quality of output far more than a soulless contract under Capitalism
Socialism and individual property rights are not mutually exclusive. You can have both, through property rights benefitting the labour workers.
Elon Musk and Bill Gates are businessmen who hire engineers and manage them, but they themselves are not innovating much of anything at all. Of course they’ve done some things especially during the beginning of their careers, but they should only be paid proportionately for their individual contributions. Since then, they’ve effectively been sitting back and letting the ingenious work of others build their wealth. This doesn’t even acknowledge the poor working conditions of their factories.
Capitalism disincentivizes work and innovation as it keeps people under control through debt. It leaves people feeling trapped and
A capitalist claims modern Russia is an example of a failed Socialist state. Is he correct?
No. Modern day Russia post collapse of the Soviet Union is Capitalist and not Socialist. In Russia, private entities control the means of production and not the Proletariat.
Modern day Russia is an Oligarchy controlled by capitalists.
No characteristics of modern day Russia even remotely resemble the ideals of Socialism. It is only misleading.
What do Left Wing Moderates believe in?
Moderate-left politics, are political views that lean to the left-wing on the left–right political spectrum, but closer to the centre and corporatism than other left-wing politics. Those on the centre-left believe in working within the established systems to improve social justice.[1] The centre-left promotes a degree of social equality that it believes is achievable through promoting equal opportunity.[2] The centre-left emphasizes that the achievement of equality requires personal responsibility in areas in control by the individual person through their abilities and talents as well as social responsibility in areas outside control by the person in their abilities or talents.[3]
Who is the leader of the Labour party in the UK?
Keir Starmer
What is a woman? How would a Right-Wing partisan answer this question? How would a Left-Wing partisan answer this question?
What arguments could they make in favour or against this issue?
Right-Winger: A woman is anyone who is biologically female, so anyone who is born with a vagina and has the XX chromosomes. This is a fact, not opinion, and females are necessary for reproduction. Women are naturally weaker and designed for domestic roles like cooking and cleaning, while men are designed to withstand physical pressures through manual labour and hunting. When men dress up as women, society collapses as men become weak and women can no longer look up to men as their leaders. Effeminate men and masculine women are an abomination, and are the root of our societal collapse as it goes against the natural order.
ANSWER: Our conception of womanhood, femininity and masculinity has little biological basis, and it is misleading. This is because traditional masculinity and femininity are demonstrably socialised, as opposed to being innate qualities of humans born with xx, or xy chromosomes. There is no biological basis for girls being allocated the colour pink to represent their personality, just like there is no biological basis for boys to be exceptionally interested in cars. Right-Wingers often make the IS ergo OUGHT fallacy, where they fail to see how something doesn’t necessarily have to be the case. There are roles for men and women and they are useful to society, but these gender roles are largely arbitrary and made up by us.
Right-Winger: It’s just common sense though. You’re a woman if you’re an xx, and a man if you’re an xy. It’s simple, you are the gender you are born as.
ANSWER: You are conflating gender and sex. No one is denying the biology of human beings, of course it is what it is- but gender is something we ascribe ourselves. What we expect of “women”, what we expect of “men” is mostly a cocktail of man-made theories which aren’t nearly as useful as you think they are. Besides, your outlook on sex is is reductive anyway, because there are genetic outliers to your examples. Some people are born with extra chromosomes, and some are born with both genitalia.
Right-Winger: See but that’s so complicated and unnecessary. Why change it if it ain’t broke. It just seems like a way to demonize men and cancel them
ANSWER: I agree. Gender politics is annoying, but not pointless. It is necessary for the thousands of people who undergo abuse for their self expression, and it seems like they are being abused for something which isn’t all that important.
REMEMBER: who cares? why do you care about something so insignificant (prove its insignificant)
What is Realism? What is Relativism? How do these concepts relate to contemporary politics?
Relativism argues that the world is created by the human mind, and the realism approach is ‘no more rational or trustworthy than ordinary thinking’ (Fletcher, 1996, pp. 410).
Conservatives tend to be realists and reject relativity which manifests in the rejection of progressive ideals such as the humanisation of LGBTQ and trans individuals.
What is Epistemic Antirealism?
Just as moral anti-realism asserts the nonexistence of normative facts, epistemic anti-realism asserts the nonexistence of facts in the domain of epistemology. Thus, the two are now sometimes grouped together as “metanormative anti-realism”.
