POL 221 Midterm: Notes for exam 1
Document Summary
Political science: the systematic study of government, politics, and power relations. Boundary disciplines include political economy and psychology. Antecedents: constitution, federalism, political culture, civil liberties, civil rights. Processes: public opinion, voting and participation, elections, campaigns. Actors: political parties, interest groups, mass media. Other aspects: state and local governments, regional(south)/state politics: comparative politics. Looks at countries/regions outside the home country . Most similar systems approach breaks the world into regions: w. europe, e. europe/russia (former ussr, latin america, e. asia, s. asia, n. africa/middle east, central/s. Most different systems approach: international relations (ir) Examines interactions between nation-states and other actors in the international system. Ir includes: economic actions (i. e. sanctions, awarding most favored status, trade agreements (i. e. nafta, international organizations (i. e. eu, nato, etc. , national security actions (i. e. arms races, nuclear, etc. , disaster relief, terrorism, actions/agreements to combat climate change, political theory. Examine and draw conclusions from the writings of political thinkers (i. e. plato,
