POLSCI 111 Study Guide - Final Guide: Connecticut Compromise, Edmund Randolph, Bicameralism
12 Jun 2018
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Chapter 1 - Introduction To The American Political System:
I. Understanding American Politics
A. Politics: the process of making collective decisions to allocate public resources and to
create and enforce rules for the operation of society
B. Institutions: codified constraints on behavior. The term institution can refer to several
things, including organizations as large as a branch of the government and systems as
specific as rules for conducting debates in Congress
1. Rules or sets of rules or practices that determine how people make collective
decisions/
C. Political System: (American): complex, in part due to its federal nature and in part due
to the wide array of branches at each level of government and the many organizations,
businesses, and movements that seek to shape politics
II. Collective Dilemmas and the Need for Government:n
A. Collective dilemma: situation in which there is a conflict between group goals and self-
interest.
B. Thomas Hobbes argued that concentrating power in a sovereign with final authority
would prevent society from becoming a “war of all against all”
C. Governments exist to solve the fundamental problem that Hobbes articulated, as well as
other collective dilemmas that society faces
III. Types of Collective Dilemmas
A. Collective-action problem refers to a situation where people are individually better off
trying to free ride and benefit form a public good without contributing to it, but people as
a group would be better off if they all contributed
1. Public Good: a benefit provided to a group of people such that each member can
enjoy it without necessarily having to pay for it, and one person’s enjoyment of it
does not inhibit others from enjoying the benefit
2. Private Good: a product or benefit provided such that its enjoyment can be
limited to specific people, and one individual’s consumption of it precludes
others from consuming it
3. Free-riding: benefiting from a public good while avoiding the costs of
contributing to it
B. Prisoner’s dilemma: an interaction between two individuals in which neither actor has
an incentive to cooperate, even though both would be better off if they cooperated
1. Prisoner’s dilemma is a multi-person version of the prisoner’s dilemma
2. Transaction costs:
a) The challenges people face when they try to exchange information or use
other means to cooperate with each other
C. Coordination problem: is a situation in which two or more people must make a
collective choice, but there may be disagreement about which course of action is best
D. A problem of unstable coalitions is one in which three or more people must make a
collective choice, but any voting coalition for an alternative could divided by another
proposal. One solution to this problem is choosing an agenda setter who limits the
alternatives available to the group
1. Agenda setter: an authority that controls what options are decided on by a group
IV. Principal-Agent Problems:
A. a principal-agent problem is any situation in which one person (a principal) hires
another (an agent) to do a job on the principal’s behalf. The agent, however, may have
incentives to deceive the principal for personal gain
B. In government, the bureaucracy is often thought of as an agent that implements its
policy on behalf of Congress and the president, who are principals.
1. Bureaucracy: an agency or office devoted to carrying out tasks for the
government in a manner consistent with the law
2. Bureaucrat: any government employee who is not part of the ruling powers
V. Designing Institutions:
A. Governments address collective dilemmas and principal-agent problems by establishing
institutions
B. The programs and decisions created by government are called public policies
1. Programs and decisions that are enforced by the rule of law
C. How institutions are designed early on can shape the kinds of public policies that are
created later on. This process is called path dependence.
VI. Types of Governmental Institutions:
A. Types of political systems:
1. Authoritarianism: a political system in which there is no expectation that the
government represents the people, and the institutions of government do not give
the people a direct voice in who will lead
2. Dictatorship: authoritarian political system in which sovereign power is vested in
one individual
3. Monarchy: a political system in which a rule (usually a king or queen) is chosen
by virtue of being the heir of the previous ruler
4. Oligarchy: a political system in which power resides in a small segment of
society
5. One-Party State: a political system in which one party controls the government
and actively seeks to prevent other parties from contesting for power
6. Democracy: rule by the people; in practice today, this means popular election of
the government and basic protections of civil rights and liberties
7. Republic: a political system in which public officials are chosen to represent the
people in an assembly that makes important policy decisions
Chapter 2 - The United States Constitution:
I. What Do Constitutions Accomplish?
A. In societies governed by the rule of law, legal codes are applied to everyone in an
unbiased manner.
1. Definition: Rule of law: A system in which all people in a society, including
governing officials, are subject to legal codes that are applied without bias by the
independent courts.
B. Most societies governed by the rule of law base their government on a written
constitution, which establishes the basic institutions of government.
II. Origins of the American Political System:
A. During the American Revolution and immediately thereafter, the states faced a number of
collective-action problems that could not be solved by a national authority compelling
state action.
B. The first constitution of the United States was the Articles of Confederation, which
provided only limited power to the central government.
1. Definition - Articles of Confederation: The constitution adopted b y the Second
Continental Congress in 1777. It set up a weak central government consisting of
a congress with limited legislative power and virtually no authority over the
execution of its laws
C. At the Constitutional Convention in 1787, delegates adopted the Virginia Plan as a
working draft for a new constitution, which called for a bicameral legislature with
representation in each chamber, to be allocated based on state population.
1. Definition - Virginia Plan: A plan proposed at the Constitutional Convention by
Edmund Randolph of Virginia, which outlined a stronger national government,
with an independent executive and a bicameral legislature whose membership in
both houses would be apportioned according to state population.
2. Definition - Bicameral Legislature: a legislature consisting of two chambers or
houses
D. The New Jersey Plan was an alternative at the Constitutional Convention that focused
on amending, rather than replacing, the Articles of Confederation. It called for a
unicameral legislature with equal representation from each state.
1. Definition - New Jersey Plan - A plan proposed at the Constitutional Convention
by William Patterson of New Jersey to amend, rather than replace, the standing
Articles of Confederation. The plan called for a unicameral legislature with equal
representation among the states, along with a plural (multi-person) executive
appointed by the legislature.
E. The Connecticut Compromise between the New Jersey and Virginia Plans
1. Definition - Connecticut Compromise: An agreement reached at the
Constitutional Convention that there would be a bicameral legislature, with an
upper house (the Senate) composed of equal representation from each state and a
lower house (the House of Representatives) composed of representation from
each state in proportion to its population.
F. As a compromise between slave and free states, slaves were counted as three-fifths of a
person for purposes of representation and apportionment of direct taxes on the states.
III. Institutional Features of the Constitution
A. The U.S. Constitution allocates broad powers to the president to execute laws, protect the
country against military threats, negotiate with foreign countries, and appoint federal
officials. The president is elected through the Electoral College.
1. Definition: Electoral College - The electors appointed by each state to vote for
the president.
B. Congress is a bicameral legislature, in which both the House of Representatives and the
Senate must approve legislation before it can become law. The Constitution specifies
several enumerated powers for Congress, in addition to expressing an elastic clause that
offers Congress broader authority that is not enumerated.
