- Claims
- Society
- Politics
- Government
- Sovereignty(citizenship)
- The stats
- Power
Claims
- Empirical = factual claims pointing to actual evidence
- Normative = evaluative (moral evaluation)
- Combination of both in all claims about politics, etc. Make a balance of both
Society
- 2 or more people developing/having a social relationship with each other
- voluntary & spontaneous you create societies with people around you
- self-sufficient; self generating societies that generate the society again and again and make it pass on to next generation
- common rules of conduct
- enforceable commands; a common set of rules that are set by people in the society
- predictable behaviour
- Individual: one human being
Politics
- Is pursued through Coalitions — collective configurations: personal relationships, family, formal alliances, mass politics, etc. Small groups formed from coalitions change the world
- Idea of the Common Good:
- Socrates, Plato, Aristotle
- “polis” = “city-state” in Greece
- common political community
- pursuing the “idea of the common good” — not self-interest(s) what is best for all of us
- Human Projects:
- Bertrand de Jouvenal: “activity of gathering and maintaining support for human projects”
- Modernists: progress, individual achievements in a community
- These are projects that are made for the good of people for example the soviet union and democracy
- When these system don’t perform results they fail and end as people look for other systems
- Management of Conflict:
- JDB Miller: “disagreement or conflict”
- Alan Ball: “reconciliation of disagreements”
- Karl Marx: economic production; the state is needed to deal with problems using economic powers
- Distribution of :
- Lasswell: “the good things …[in] life” (material & non-material); we distribute things such as education to all it is all available and its a matter or choosing.
- Easton: “authoritative allocation of values” (desires, etc.) how much do you want to get it, do you deserve it?
- Foucault: subjectivity/identity — body, mind, legal. We are assigned identities by the society that protect us or go against us
- Pateman: male sex-right = women’s role and services — reproduction, sexual access, marriage [add now: men’s] patriarchal-heterosexist system. It’s a system of how men set womens roles and rights. Its a sexual system, it all comes down to the women ie. Bill Clinton is remembered for his Monica L. Case rather then all his initiatives.
- Bernard Crick: “not unity, but harmony” — really? Its creating these configurations of ideas and beliefs.
Government
- specialized activity within a society; the structures within the society
- enforce binding decisions on all individuals in a society
- functions:
- protection
- enforce rules of conduct
- settle disputes
- provide services
- force: selective use of power, but monopoly of use.
- States aren’t universal eveyrones different but everyone has a government with a different structer
Sovereignty
- Modern concept developed in Europe, but broader history as a general idea
- Bodin: “in any community there ought to be a single highest authority who is not subject to other human authority”
- Establish right of kings
- Pateman: (Filmore v. Locke, etc.) head male of family — trans-historial and trans-cultural
- Family is the base of sovereignty, the man is the power in this system
- Leader is the head of the family
- authority to over-rule and not be subject to other authorities
- bundle of powers given to governments:
- enforce rules
- make laws
- control government functions
- ownership of all lands, they own all the property
- deal with other sovereigns
- non-interference by other sovereigns
- two main types:
- William Blackstone: parliamentary sovereignty = representative government; people give you the power to take control
- Jean-Jacques Rousseau: popular sovereignty = direct democracy
- may be delegated: militaries, bureaucracies, private groups, leaders, judiciary (judicial review), etc.
The State
- Organized society
- General elements:
- (identifiable) population; your Canadian
- (demarcated) territory
- (defensible) sovereignty
- European socio-eco-political institution-Treaty of Westphilia, 1648 a European treaty
- “universal” = accepted as the only legitimate or recognized collective organization by whom?
- collective subjectivity = identity — above, beyond, overriding others
- Tribal systems in South America
- Native confederacies in North America such as Caledonia
- Citizenship: official membership in a particular state allowing certain privileges and rights (as compared to non-citizens) it gives us an identity
- by birth
- jus soli (soil) = born in the state
- jus sanguinis (blood) = children of citizens
- by naturalization
- by identity?
- by birth
Power
- in general, two patterns [Nig’s approach]:
- dominance & control = “the capacity to achieve what one wants” + the ability to make others do what one wants them to do
- empowerment & emancipation = the capacity to empower people to achieve their wants + ability to remove obstacles preventing this achievement
- in politics, power is:
- a medium of exchange
- a means and an end
- pursuit or goal in relationship to other wants (domination, liberation, sex, race, etc.)
- used for “good” and “evil”
- Influence = persuade/convince
- emotion = supportive
- persons believe it is right, justified, or gain benefit through appeals to intellect/reason, passions, self-interest, group solidarity
- Coercion — force/control
- emotion = fear
- persons believe violence or threat of violence will occur
- Authority — accept/follow
- leadership
- power is accepted and followed
- “respect source of command” = commander has right + follower has obligation to obey
- Legitimacy — obey/oblige
- followership
- makes Authority possible
- “right to obey”, “duty”, “obligation”
- Authority-Legitimacy relationship — Max Weber:
- traditional authority = inherited position of authority
- legal authority = authority achieved through process and structures involving general rules agreed/consented/imposed upon all
- charismatic authority = “extraordinary personal qualities” generating authority beyond/above (sometimes without) traditional or legal
- Identity & Body:
- Power over subjectivity = our identity
- Biopolitics (Foucault & feminists): written in/on/of the body — war, sex, economy, psyche, etc.
- Governmentality (Foucault): self-governing, self-regulating (Panopticon)
- Language & Ideas
- “Common Sense” = naturalizing languages & ideas, and limiting scope for critical inquiry (Gramsci)
- Categories, words, knowledges, etc.
