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CHAPTER ONE: POLITICS AND GOVERNMENT

1.1 Politics as the activity by which groups reach binding collective decisions through attempting to reconcile differences among their members (pp. 3-4).

1.2 Governments as (a) institutions for making and enforcing collective decisions (‘the authoritative allocation of values’) (b) the top political tier within such institutions (pp. 4-6).

1.3 Hobbes’s case for government: it offers security against each other as well from external attack (p. 5).

1.4 Classifying governments as liberal democracies, illiberal democracies or authoritarian states (pp. 6-9).

1.5 Governance as the activity, process or quality of governing, a task in which government may not play a leading role, as with regulation of the internet. More broadly, we can speak of ‘international governance’ but not ‘international government’ (pp. 9-10).

1.6 Power as the capacity to produce intended effects. Power to: the capacity of a community to shape its own destiny. Power over: the ability of an individual or group to get its way against opposition. Power as a relationship (A affects B) and as a forceful means of realizing such influence (pp. 10-11).

1.7 Authority as the right to rule, existing when subordinates acknowledge the right of superiors to give orders. Exerted through tradition, charisma or a set of rules (pp. 11-13).

1.8 A legitimate system of government as one based on authority; those subject to the state recognize its right to make collective decisions. So legitimacy is authority applied to the system of government as a whole (pp. 11-13).

1.9 The state as a political community formed by a territorially-defined population which is subject to one government. The capacity of the state to regulate the legitimate use of force within its boundaries (pp. 13-17).

1.10 Sovereignty as the highest form of authority within the state. Combining internal sovereignty (law-making power) and external sovereignty (international recognition of the sovereign's jurisdiction) (pp. 13-17).

1.11 The nation as a people inhabiting a defined territory seeking political expression of its shared identity, usually through a claim to statehood. Nations as ancient, primordial entities vs. nations as modern, state-dependent loyalties (pp. 17-21).

• Nationalism as the doctrine that nations are entitled to self-determination (pp. 17-21).
• Nations and states can be linked in a nation-state (a state with its own nation), a multinational state (a state with more than one nation), a stateless nation (a nation without a state) and a diaspora (a nation dispersed beyond its home state) (pp. 17-21).