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Use these questions to test your detailed factual knowledge of each chapter. Make a note of your answers and then consult the answers page on this website. The answers section also gives you a cross-reference to the page of Hague and Harrop where the particular topic is discussed)

CHAPTER ONE POLITICS AND GOVERNMENT

1. Politics always involves

a) groups of people
b) economic conflicts
c) the use of force
d) relations between states

2. Government is

a) domestic politics
b) the same as politics
c) the entity formed by a nation and its territory
d) an institution for making and enforcing collective decisions

3. Who described states as 'bodies of armed men'?

a) Hague, Harrop and Breslin
b) Weber
c) Dahl
d) Lenin

4. Sovereignty refers to

a) the ultimate source of authority in society
b) ruling monarchs
c) ceremonial leaders
d) supreme courts

5. Power is the capacity to

a) exercise authority
b) produce intended effects
c) hold sovereignty
d) persuade

6. Authority is the right to

a) rule
b) delegate
c) nationhood
d) invoke tradition

7. Which of these is an example of authoritarian government?

a) rule by the military
b) the governments of new democracies
c) the governments of developing countries
d) the governments of postcommunist countries

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CHAPTER TWO DEMOCRACY

1. At least half the world's governments are

a) military-led
b) authoritarian
c) totalitarian
d) democractic

2. In a democracy

a) all positions of power are elected
b) elected rulers are not subject to any limits
c) elected rulers are subject to limits on their power
d) decisions are reached directly by vote of the people

3. Who said, 'the democratic method is that institutional arrangement for arriving at political decisions in which individuals acquire the power to decide by means of a competitive struggle for the people's vote'?

a) Lipset
b) Madison
c) Schumpeter
d) Hague, Harrop and Breslin

4. All semi-democracies combine

a) democratic and authoritarian elements
b) direct democracy with representative government
c) religious and secular rule
d) liberal and representative principles

5. Which of the following countries is an example of the first wave of democratization?

a) USA
b) Germany
c) Japan
d) South Africa

6. 'Asian democracy' is a term used by those who believe that

a) the army should serve as national guardian
b) Asian countries should follow Western traditions
c) democracy is possible within the family
d) there is a distinctly Asian approach to democracy

7. Which of the following is an example of a transition to democracy?

a) West Germany in the 1990s
b) South Africa in the 1990s
c) Germany in the 1930s
d) Spain in the 1930s

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CHAPTER THREE AUTHORITARIAN RULE

1. The main feature of ‘palace politics’ is

a) the absolute power of the monarch
b) that political power is inherited
c) the monarch is ruler of an empire
d) allegiance is owed to the ruler rather than to rules

2. Communist and fascist states were predominantly features of

a) the twentieth century
b) the nineteenth century
c) the eighteenth century
d) the seventeeth century

3. The first communist state was

a) Cuba
b) China
c) Russia
d) East Germany

4. Most military coups between 1950 and 2000 occurred in

a) Asia
b) Western Europe
c) Africa
d) Eastern Europe

5. Which of the following countries is an example of authoritarian rule?

a) India
b) Mexico
c) Poland
d) Saudi Arabia

6. Government by clerics (religious leaders) was initiated by a revolution in 1979 in

a) Iran
b) Iraq
c) France
d) China

7. Which of the following countries did not experience a period of military rule between 1945-2000?

a) Brazil
b) Mexico
c) Argentina
d) Chile

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CHAPTER FOUR THE STATE IN A GLOBAL CONTEXT

1. Which of the following is an intergovernmental organization?

a) The United Nations
b) Save the Children
c) Multinational corporations
d) The Catholic Church

2. An NGO is

a) A non-governmental organization
b) A neo-governmental office
c) A non-global organization
d) A non-governing oligopoly

3. Which national institution do Hague and Harrop describe as a 'big winner' from globalization?

a) The armed forces
b) The assembly
c) Central banks
d) The executive

4. The Charter of the United Nations asserts that the UN's purpose is to promote

a) international peace and security
b) domestic peace and security
c) world government
d) liberal democracy

5. Which of these countries has received 'humanitarian intervention' from the United Nations?

a) Cuba
b) Nigeria
c) Thailand
d) Somalia

6. Which of these regional organizations has the most developed institutions?

a) Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC)
b) The North Anerican Free Trade Organization (NAFTA)
c) The European Union (EU)
d) The Nordic Council

7. 'Conditionality' refers to

a) exclusion from the world economy
b) the mutual dependence of the developed and developing worlds
c) the practice of attaching conditions to aid
d) dependency theory

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CHAPTER FIVE THE COMPARATIVE APPROACH

1. Studying the relationship between the Presidency and Congress in the United States is an example of

a) state-centred analysis
b) institutional analysis
c) society-centred analysis
d) none of the above

2. A ‘case’ is

a) an instance of a more general category
b) any study of a specific country
c) any process which leads to a stable outcome
d) an example of a norm

3. A deviant case is

a) expected to become typical
b) an exception to the norm
c) tests a theory in the least favourable conditions
d) creates the category of which it is then treated as a case

4. Which of these designs for studying turnout 'selects on the dependent variable'

a) comparing voters and non-voters
b) studying the characteristics of non-voters
c) comparing turnout trends over time
d) comparing turnout across countries

5. Institutions in different countries are ‘functionally equivalent’ if

a) they learn from each other
b) they operate in entirely different systems of government
c) they fulfil a similar role within the political system
d) they are a device for replacing the government

6. Who said, 'simplification has been an integral part of every known scholarly work'?

a) Hague and Harrop
b) Marx, Lenin and Stalin
c) Locke, Hobbes and Hume
d) King, Keohane and Verba

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CHAPTER SIX POLITICAL CULTURE

1. According to Almond and Verba, the civic culture

a) inhibits the stability of democracies
b) is unconnected to the stability of democracies
c) contributes to the stability of democracies
d) is incompatible with the stability of democracies

2. In the United States and the United Kingdom, trust in government is

a) increasing rapidly
b) declining
c) static
d) increasing slowly

3. 'Social capital' is based on

a) Eastern Europe's 'third way'
b) widespread acceptance of the market economy
c) start-up funding for voluntary organizations
d) a culture of trust and cooperation

4. The primacy model of political socialization maintains that

a) television dominates plitical socialization
b) basic political loyalities are shaped by recent events
c) basic political loyalities are formed when young
d) political learning is greatest in late adulthood

5. Among which group would you expect postmaterialism to be most prevalent?

a) affluent and educated people with no experience of war
b) people who lived through war or depression
c) poor people in the least developed countries
d) members of conservative parties

6. 'Secularization' implies that the impact of religion is

a) increasing
b) static
c) declining
d) randomly variable

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CHAPTER SEVEN POLITICAL COMMUNICATION

1. According to the reinforcement theory of the media, the media

a) strengthen support for capitalist values
b) conserve but do not change the political attitudes and bebaviour of the electorate
c) reinforce the authority of the government
d) consolidate popular support for new democracies

2. When was mass literacy first achieved in most Western states?

a) Seventeenth century
b) Eighteenth century
c) Nineteenth century
d) Twentieth century

3. When did television become the most popular mass medium in most Western states?

a) 1930s-1940s
b) 1950s-1960s
c) 1970s-1980s
d) 1990s-2000s

4. Which of the following countries has the highest proportion of internet users amont its population?

a) Germany
b) Australia
c) United States
d) Norway

5. A pseudo-event is

a) an event which is only covered by television because it involves strong visual images
b) an event which would not take place except for the media covereage it is expected to generate
c) an event which is only covered by the media because it involves famous people
d) an event which is distorated by the media to enhance its newsworthiness

6. The agenda-setting theory of media maintans that the media exerts an influence on

a) what we think about
b) what we think
c) what we believe
d) what we imagine

7. An opinion poll is

a) a measure of what public opinion would be if everyone were fully informed about an issue
b) a moderated discussion about a particular topic among a small group
c) a lobbying campagin aimed at the general public
d) a series of questions asked in a standard way of a systematic sample of the population

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CHAPTER EIGHT POLITICAL PARTICIPATION

1. Which of the following is associated with increased representation for women in national legislatures?

a) low turnover among legislators
b) the party list system of prportional representation
c) the first past the post (plurality) system
d) federalism

2. Which of the these groups is most likely to experience 'political exclusion'?

a) postmaterialists
b) those who do not speak the native language
c) readers of Hague and Harrop
d) lawyers

3. 'Civil society' consists of

a) non-military institutions
b) groups 'above' the family but 'beneath' the state
c) amenity groups
d) administrative tribunals

4. 'Social movements' are

a) committed to terrorism
b) created by state legislation
c) separate from the state
d) allies of military rulers

5. Which of the following countries did not experience a revolution in the twentieth century?

a) China
b) Turkey
c) Mexico
d) United Kingdom

6. Which of the following countries did experience a revolution in the twentieth century?

a) China
b) United Kingdom
c) Canada
d) United States

7. Relative deprivation occurs when

a) people feel they get what they deserve
b) people feel entitled to more than they get
c) people feel they get more than they deserve
d) discontent is mobilized into political protest

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CHAPTER NINE ELECTIONS, VOTERS AND PUBLIC OPINION

1. 'Governments have ruled through elections more than they have been ruled by them' (Ginsberg). Is this a statement of

a) the view of elections as dealigning
b) the bottom-up view of elections
c) the top-down view of elections
d) the view of elections as realigning

2. Turnout at American elections is generally

a) below other democracies
b) about the same as other democracies
c) above other democracies
d) shows no clear trend compared to other democracies

3. Which of these electoral systems is most commonly used in elections to the assembly in Western European countries?

a) the alternative vote
b) plurality systems
c) majority system
d) proportional representation (PR)

4. Which of the following is generally true of proportional representation?

a) it is used mainly for presidential elections
b) it leads to single-party government
c) it is based on single-member constituencies
d) it leads to coalition government

5. Most presidents are chosen by

a) direct election
b) appointment
c) inheritance
d) the legislature

6. 'Partisan dealignment' refers to

a) weakening bonds betwen social groups, electors and parties
b) the declining space occupied by religion in political life
c) the collapse of communism
d) the emergence of a more active judiciary

7. A referendum is

a) another term for a no confidence vote
b) a vote of the assembly on a constitutional issue
c) a form of proportional representation
d) a vote of the electorate on an issue of public policy

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CHAPTER TEN INTEREST GROUPS

1. What do protective interest groups seek to protect?

a) the environment
b) the material interests of their members
c) consumers generally
d) the institutions of state

2. In most democracies, the most common channel through which interest groups seek to influence public policy is

a) the legislature
b) the courts
c) the bureaucracy
d) the military

3. In which of these countries are promotional groups most significant?

a) France
b) United States
c) Russia
d) Austria

4. 'Density of membership' refers to

a) membership as a proportion of national population
b) size of membership
c) membership as a proportion of eligible membership
d) the commitment of members to the group

5. 'Pluralism' emphasises

a) competition between interest groups
b) the significance of promotional groups
c) the decay of civil society
d) the importance of communal ties

6. 'Corporatism' emphasises

a) free choice in whether to join interest groups
b) the significance of private corporations
c) the significance of organised churches
d) state leadership of interest groups

7. According to Hague and Harrop, which country traditionally offered a good illustration of corporatism?

a) Austria
b) Australia
c) United States
d) China

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CHAPTER ELEVEN POLITICAL PARTIES

1. Which of the following is a function of political parties, according to Hague and Harrop?

a) aggregating (combining) interests
b) negotiating with foreign governments
c) administering elections
d) controlling the media

2. Elite parties originate in the

a) universities
b) workplace
c) assembly
d) media

3. The role of members in selecting party leaders

a) shows no clear trend
b) is staying the same
c) is decreasing
d) is increasing

4. The purpose of primary elections is to allow a party's supporters to

a) choose which candidate will represent their party in a general elction
b) choose the party leader
c) decide on party policy
d) ratify changes to the party's constitution

5. In 'An Economic Theory of Democracy', Anthony Downs assumes that parties

a) shape the policy preferences of their supporters
b) tend toward the ideological extremes
c) compete mainly over their competence at governing
d) seek to maximise their vote

7. Coalition governments are most likely in

a) an anti-party system
b) a two-party system
c) a multi-party system
d) a no-party system

8. Within parties in postcommunist countries, the leading force is most often

a) party members
b) party leaders
c) unreformed communists
d) the security services

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CHAPTER TWELVE CONSTITUTIONS AND THE LEGAL FRAMEWORK

1. A codified constitution is

a) set out in a single document or body of law
b) derived from the Roman law tradition
c) approved by the International Court of Justice (ICJ)
d) a constitution which has been amended by the courts

2. Judicial review is the power of

a) courts to give binding interpretations of the constitution
b) governments to override judicial decisions
c) courts to make emergency budgets
d) ombudsmen to review decisons made by civil servants

3. The European Court of Justice is a founding institution of what is now the

a) European Parliament (EP)
b) European Free Trade Association (EFTA)
c) European Union (EU)
d) North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO)

4. In most liberal democracies, judges

a) are secure in their tenure
b) can be dismissed by the government for poor decisions
c) are subject to re-election by the people
d) are accountable to select committees of the assembly

5. Administrative law regulates the relationship between

a) the executive and the judiciary
b) the executive and the assembly
c) the bureaucracy and citizens
d) the executive and the media

6. What was the attitude of the Nuremberg War Crimes Tribunal (1946) to the defence, 'I was just obeying state orders'.

a) that this defence is acceptable for conscripts only
b) that this defence is acceptable
c) that this defence is unacceptable
d) that the acceptability of this defence depends on circumstances

7. Which country has the highest level of judicial activism?

a) France
b) United Kingdom
c) Sweden
d) United States

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CHAPTER THIRTEEN FEDERAL, UNITARY AND LOCAL GOVERNMENT

1. In a federation

a) sovereignty is shared between central and state (provincial) governments
b) the central government must obtain the consent of all the states before acting
c) the central government could abolish the states if it wished
d) the central government shares sovereignty with the United Nations

2. Federalism is most common in

a) mid-sized states
b) large states
c) small states
d) no relationship between federalism and size of state

3. Which of the following is a federation?

a) Italy
b) Sweden
c) New Zealand
d) USA

4. In a unitary state, sovereignty rests with

a) the United Nations
b) local government
c) the central government
d) regional government

5. Which of the following is a unitary state?

a) Canada
b) France
c) India
d) Australia

6. Devolution means that

a) intergovernmental organizations take over some functions from national governments
b) central government sets up field offices in the provinces
c) regional governments take responsibility for all domestic policy
d) the central government grants decision-making powers to lower levels

7. General competence means that local governments

a) are subject to managerial scrutiny
b) cease to deliver services directly
c) can regulate any matter of concern to their area
d) are headed by mayors who also represent the central state

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CHAPTER FOURTEEN LEGISLATURES

1. What was the initial function of assemblies in medieval Europe?

a) representation
b) passing laws
c) scrutinizing the executive
d) selecting the government

2. Compared to the lower chamber, the upper chamber normally has

a) about the same number of members
b) more members
c) no general rule applies
d) fewer members

3. The members of lower chambers are most often chosen by

a) appointment by the government
b) direct election
c) indirect election through subnational governments
d) application to an official committee  

4. The microcosm view of representation is that the

a) the assembly should deliberate on national issues
b) the assembly should mirror society
c) members should vote with their party
d) members should act as trustees of their constituents

5. Who said, 'parliament is not a congress of ambassadors from different and hostile interests ... but Parliament is a deliberative assembly of one nation, that of the whole'

a) John Stuart Mill
b) John Locke
c) John Kennedy
d) Edmund Burke
 
6. The incumbency effect refers to

a) the electoral bonus accruing to members standing for reelection
b) the tendency for governments to win no-confidence votes
c) the growing prevalence of career politicians
d) the growing significance of parliamentray committees

7. Which of these functions of assemblies do Hague and Harrop claim is growing in importance?

a) holding emergency debates
b) initiating bills
c) shaping foreign policy
d) overseeing the executive
 
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CHAPTER FIFTEEN THE POLITICAL EXECUTIVE

1. In the presidential executive, presidents are elected by

a) the assembly
b) the electorate for an indefinite term
c) the electorate for a fixed term
d) the party which wins most seats in the assembly
 
2. In the parliamentary executive

a) the same person invariably serves as head of both government and state
b) the cabinet is directly elected by the voters
c) the government cannot be brought down by the assembly
d) governing parties emerge from the assembly
 
3. Which of these countries uses the parliamentary executive?

a) France
b) USA
c) Russia
d) United Kingdom
 
4. According to Hague and Harrop, which position is gaining more weight in the parliamentary executive?

a) the cabinet
b) the prime minister
c) head of state
d) ministers in charge of spending departments
 
5. 'Were it not for the monarchy as symbol of the cohesion of the Kingdom and therefore, the visible incarnation of federal loyalty, the x experiment would be doomed to failure’(Senelle) Of which country is Senelle writing?

a) Belgium
b) Denmark
c) Netherlands
d) Sweden
 
6. The dual(semi-presidential)executive employs both

a) a prime minister and a strong elected president
b) a prime minister and a ceremonial monarch
c) military and civilian heads of government
d) an elected president and a ceremonial monarch
 
7. Which of these countries employs the semi-presidential executive?

a) USA
b) Italy
c) France
d) Germany
 
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CHAPTER SIXTEEN THE BUREAUCRACY

1. According to Weber, the bureacuracy is

a) a disciplined hierarchy in which civil servants are subject to the authority of their superior
b) a loose network in which work is negotiated through business-style contracts
c) the personal office of the head of state
d) a device for distributing patronage and the spoils of office
 
2. Who introduced the concept of a representative bureaucracy?

a) Weber
b) Kingsley
c) Osborne and Gaebler
d) Guy Peters
 
3. Which group is over-represented in the bureaucratic elite?

a) women
b) graduates
c) ethnic minorities
d) people from a rural background

4. An ombudsman is a public official who

a) offers political advice to ministers
b) investigates allegations of maladministration
c) makes judgments on administrative law
d) supervises recruitment ot the bureaucracy
 
5. Which of the following is a component of new public management (NPM)?

a) clear targets are set and used to assess performance
b) recruitment is to the bureaucracy as a whole, not to specific jobs
c) more power is given to government departments
d) the bureaucracy is held responsible for economic development
 
6. What do Hague, Harrop and Breslin claim is the key political issue raised by the new public management?

a) accountability
b) efficiency
c) representation
d) recruitment

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