This broad field of study is called political sociology, the study of political groups, leadership, and social power.
The first category, political participation, actions to support the government or politicians (HP), includes voting, wearing a badge to support a candidate, and being a member of a political party. If you have exercised your right to vote, you have engaged in political participation (C-19). Have you involved yourself in the Young Democrats, Young Republicans, or other campus political organizations? How has your socialization process contributed to your involvement or lack of involvement? If you engage in civic participation, individual and collective action to address issues of public concern, this is a more specific and targeted involvement that includes donating to a candidate, volunteering to collect signatures, and engaging in rallies and protests. Charles Koch and, before his death, his brother David have been actively engaged in civic participation. They have donated to candidates to address their personal concerns, which they believe are also important public concerns. A third category is political consumerism, choosing producers and products with the goal of changing ethical or objectionable institutional or market practices, which is when you boycott or “buycott” a product based on moral and ethical reasons.
Al Gore used the term global warming, the rise in surface temperature on the planet, and the term climate change, the weather impacts of the rising temperatures, have been used interchangeably.
- Hunting and Gathering: hunting, fishing, and gathering of plants (e.g., a small number of Aboriginal people in Australia primarily still hunt and gather).
- Horticultural and Pastoral: basic farming and domestication of animals (e.g., farming by hand and nomadic sheepherders).
- Agricultural: large-scale farming with animals and machinery (e.g., animals used to pull plows).
- Industrial: manufacturing of goods using advanced sources of power (e.g., factories during the Industrial Revolution in the late 18th century).
- Post Industrial or Information Age: production of information via computers and emphasis on services rather than manufacturing (e.g., computer, news, and social media companies such as Apple, Microsoft, Yahoo, and Facebook).
Capitalism, an economic and political system based on private control of the production and distribution of goods and services within a free market system (HP), is the economic system that developed due to the Industrial Revolution in Western Europe in the 1700s.
The industrialists who owned the factories rapidly grew wealthy as a result of the free enterprise system, which was labeled laissez-faire capitalism, a system of free enterprise without government intervention.
The politically well-connected robber barons influenced laws and regulations that eventually led to monopolies, possessing near or complete control of commodities or producing goods and services (C-19).
The second economic system is socialism, an economic and political system based on cooperative management or citizens’ production and distribution of goods and services normally within a democratic government (HP).
democracy, a system of government in which the power is vested in the people, and free elections are held, the rise of Putin’s political authoritarianism has been characterized as a “managed democracy” (Beer 2009). Other authoritarian governments include Iran, Venezuela, Azerbaijan, and Myanmar.
absolute monarchy, a system of government ruled by a monarch who has control of the government and state, in the 1800s, before being colonized by Britain
Most monarchies today are constitutional monarchies, a system of government in which a monarch is the Head of State and is governed by a parliament (C-19).
The second economic system is socialism, an economic and political system based on cooperative management or citizens’ production and distribution of goods and services normally within a democratic government (HP)
Socialism is often confused with a specific form of socialism — communism, an economic and political system based on the government’s ownership and regulation of all of the production and distribution of goods and services (HP).
totalitarian, a state-controlled government holding all authority over public and private lives (C-19)
There are three models of power, the ability to exert control over others and achieve goals with or without the support of society, that describe systems of economic and political power. The Marxist power model, ruling forces formulate public policies that are in the best interest of capitalism and the ruling class, is a classic conflict theory perspective.
The power elite model, power is concentrated among the elite and wealthy, particularly corporations, government, and the military, derives its name from sociologist C. Wright Mills’ book of the same title (Mills 1956).
In an extreme form, a dictatorship, a form of government in which a single person or political entity controls political authority, monopolizes the majority of power.
The pluralist power model, power is fragmented and dispersed among groups within a society, consists of groups such as social classes, special interest groups, political groups, and many others.
Lobbyists, individuals who persuade legislators to vote for a special interest of their group (HP), are federally regulated and are most often employed by PACs with offices in Washington, D.C. In 2021, there were 12,137 registered state and federal lobbyists (Duffin 2022).
Redistricting, changes in the boundaries of an electoral voting district, sometimes called gerrymandering, has been viewed as a social problem.
An alternative to the “winner-take-all” model is proportional representation, a system in which a political party’s representation in government is proportional to the number of votes they receive.
A state judge ruled that the restrictions placed on the students by the board of elections qualified as disenfranchisement, an effort to restrict or revoke the voting rights of an individual or group.
outsourcing, hiring a subcontractor or outside agency to complete the work formally done by employees within the company (HP).