POLS 202 Lecture Notes - Lecture 1: Totalitarianism, Authoritarianism, Herd Mentality
4 Sep 2016
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The importance of being comparative: the distribution of authority, democracy: comes from the greek words demos kratein which mean rule by the people a. i. For the greeks, this meant direct democracy (athens"s thing) a. i. 1. However, only citizens could vote, so only male non slave landowners (may have only been 10% of the population) a. i. 2. We have direct democracy whenever there is a referendum on something counties voting to be wet or dry, recall votes, small town meetings a. ii. When we talk about democracy, we usually mean indirect democracy, where the citizenry elects representatives to make policy on our behalf a. iii. Roskin points out that aristotle had hesitations about democracy, thinking about mob mentality and not protecting certain people a. iv. A defined area of liberty: basic liberties (freedom of speech, religion). Freedom of speech is at the heart of democracy as it allows people to know all the alternatives (one party or way of thinking is not enforced) a. iv. 3.
