Page 8-13,14-19,37-42,43-50,740-743, 70-78
1. What is the definition of government?
o The institutions that make authoritative decisions for any given society
2. What are the policymaking institutions in the US?
o The congress, the president, the courts, and federal administrative agencies (bureacracy)
3. What is politics?
o The process by which we select out governmental leaders and what policies they [ersure.
Politics produces suthoritative decisions about public issues
4. What is US vter turnout compared to other countries?
o America does quite poorly when judges by its voter turnout, with one of the lowest
rates in the world
5. Why does voter turn out matter?
o Voter turn out has an effect on who holds power. Because so many people don’t show
up, the results are a distorted sample of the whole.
6. What did the writes of the constitution think of democracy
o The writers of the US constitution had no fondness for democracy, as many of them
doubted the ability of the ordinary American to make informed judgements about what
government should do
7. What are the cornerstones of an ideal democracy
o Equality in voting, effective participation, englishtened understanding, citizen control fo
the agenda, inclusion
8. What does the pluralist throery of democracy say?
o A theory of government and politics emphaziging that politics is mainly a competition
among groups, each one pressing for its own preferred system. Compare the elite and
class theory, hyperpluralism, and traditional democracy theory
9. What are the key linkage instututions in the us
o
10. What is the basic idea of representation
o Relationship between the few leaders and the many followers
11. What is the most costly item on the federal budget
o Social welfare
12. What was the most of the DoI about
o A legitimate list of grievances against the English monarch
13. What were john locke’s key philosophical concepts?
o Man is free until he infringes on the rights of another man
o Rights should be recognized under natural law but there is an insecurity
o Property is number 1
o Social contract
o Life liberty and property
14. What did the delegates to the philidelphia convention consider the greatest threat
o democracy
15. What were the 3 disagreemetns in the convention
o equality
 Equality and representation of the states
 Slavery
 Political equality
o Economics
o Individual rights
16. What did the delegates include in the constitution about voting
o Nothing, they didn’t think the public was edu enough or well informed enough to
make a vote
17. What ere the 2 key elements of the madisonian model of government
o Separation of powers
o Checks and balances
18. What is meaning of the system of checks and balances
o One branch of government can’t get too much power and rule with a minority
19. What did james Madison say about the powers of the federal government
o
20. What are the key limitations of democracy
o Can’t make bad people good
o Should’nt violate rights
o Smart people
21. What are the essential elements fr a constitution to work effectively
o Majority rule
o Civic virtue to prevent the stomping of minorities
22. What is divided government
o
23. In what ways did the writers of the constitution limit democracy
o States pick US senators (changed)
o Electors pick US president
o Only whot male landowners can vote