POG 240 Lecture Notes - Lecture 4: Politeia, Aristocracy, Montesquieu

• School: Ryerson University
• Department: Politics and Public Administration
• Course: POG 240
• Professor: Daniel Rubenson

Document Summary

State- some entity that has the monopoly of power, uses force, coercion and threats to rule some geographic territory. Government- people that operate the powers of the state. Regime- set of rules, norms, institutions that set up how government is constituted, all the rules, institutions and norms of how a particular country is organized, all countries are particular regimes although the country and their regimes differ. We might think a democracy has always been a good thing, but only recently has democracy been seen in a positive light. Democracy is very old and for most of its existence it has been viewed as negative. Democracy was seen as an obsolete, bad idea, dangerous and unstable. Idea that we can think about what is good and bad in terms of how we govern ourselves goes back to first political theorists. Demokratia- rule by the people, but we don"t think about who these people are.