Quiz #1 Bigger Questions

Question 1

From Max Weber: three sources of state authority/legitimacy (traditional, charismatic and legal-rational);
and the point about states possessing a monopoly on the legitimate means of violence; and about state authority deriving from some mix of coercion and legitimacy

Question 2

State capacity and autonomy (and competence)

Question 3

Aristotle’s straight (monarchy, aristocracy, democracy) and deviant (tyranny, oligarchy, ochlocracy)
forms of government

Question 4

What did the Framers of the U.S. Constitution mean by their warning that constitutions could be mere
“parchment barriers” to bad behavior?

Question 5

Attributes of a sovereign state (population, territory, government in control, capacity to enter into
relations with other states (and in some cases, recognition by other states)

Question 6

Arguments for free/liberalized (international) trade; reasons for states’ resort to protectionism

Question 7

sources of ethno-nationalist identity and conflict

Question 8

Reasons that religion, and especially religious fundamentalism, sometimes fuels hatred and conflict (with
examples)

Question 9

General policy preferences of: libertarians, conservatives, liberals, social democrats, socialists

Question 10

Diverse meaning of ‘liberal’: classical liberalism, political liberalism, liberal democracy

Question 11

The (many) attributes of a liberal democracy (see the outline on Bridges Resources)

Question 12

Extremist ideologies: general beliefs of: anarchists, communists, fascists

Question 13

General factors giving rise to political violence: institutional (i.e., conditions such as rising expectations,
governmental repression or corruption, etc.); ideational; individual

Question 14

General factors leading to political revolutions

Question 15

Basic tactics/strategies of insurgency (aka guerrilla) war

Question 16

Typical characteristics of upper and lower legislative chambers

Question 17

Meaning of and arguments for judicial review

Question 18

Important characteristics of fused (aka parliamentary) and presidential systems; their relative advantages
and disadvantages

Question 19

Electoral systems: a) single-member district (plurality, aka first-past-the-post; and majority, either two-
round run-off or instant run-off/ranked choice voting ); b) proportional representation

Question 20

The relative advantages and disadvantages of the above electoral systems

Question 21

Roles of political parties in democracies

Question 22

Federalist v. unitary systems: relative advantages/disadvantages of each

Question 23

Similarities and differences between populism of the left and populism of the right

Question 24

Reasons for deep partisan polarization in today’s advanced democracies (the U.S. in particular)

Question 25

Reasons for the fairly widespread (and seemingly growing) appeal of conspiracy theories