Political science Dharshanika prethimaniya preweshaya

Human beings are essentially political beings because they live in groups and their life is governed
by the State. In modern societies, their political life is defined by their being citizens, or members,
of a state. Citizens have a number of political functions such as:
• Engaging in political activities
• Voting (or not voting) at elections
• Participation, (or non-participation), in election campaigns
• Becoming (or not becoming) members of political parties
• Getting, (or not getting) interested in everyday politics.
All these reflect how citizens ‘behave’ as political beings. ‘Political behaviour’ is the concept used
in political science to describe it. Thus, political behaviour is citizens’ attitudes, preferences,
decisions, actions and even non-actions in politics.
• Political Ideologies:
A key factor which shapes political institutions and practices, citizen behavior, and governing
processes are political ideologies. Ideologies are sets of ideas that social groups believe as
frameworks that guide their thinking, actions, values, and commitments.
Political ideologies are sets of ideas that operate in the field of politics. They also help people to
construct public/individual consciousness which affect politics, political processes, political decisions
and political behavior.
In the contemporary world there are many political ideologies which shape political processes and
have an impact on public policy. Some of them are:
Socialism - Welfarism
Liberalism - Nationalism
Democracy - Feminism
All these political ideologies are sets of specific ideas about society and politics, and they provide
guidance and visions to political action, policies as well as shaping political institutions.
1.4 Approaches in Political Science:
Political science is an academic discipline with a fairly wide range of subject matter and a multiplicity
of approaches. . Its subject area and approaches have evolved over a period of many centuries.
The changes that took place during the 20th century are particularly important in this process of
evolution. It was during this period that political science emerged as a separate, scientific discipline.
These developments took place alongside the broad changes and developments which occurred
in the fields of social and human sciences in general.
Some of the important approaches in political science are:
• Philosophical - Normative Approach
• Comparative Approach
• Multi-disciplinary Approach
• Scientific (Behavioural) Approach
• Political Economy Approach
• Sociological Approach
• Feminist Approach
1.4.1. Philosophical/Normative Approach
This is one of the first and oldest approaches in political science. Plato and Aristotle, who were
Greek philosophers, were its pioneers.
Chief exponents of this in European political thought were Cicero, St. Augustine, Machiavelli,
Thomas Hobbes, John Locke, Emmanuel Kant, Hegel, and Karl Marx.
Among the political philosophers of 20th century are Mahatma Gandhi, Hanna Arendt, John Rawls,
Charles Taylor, and Jurgen Habermas.
Two common factors related to all these political philosophers are:
• All of them are not political scientists in the modern sense, but political thinkers. They
did not study politics scientifically as it is understood in the twentieth century.
• All of them looked at politics from a normative perspective.(We will soon get to
know the meaning of ‘normative’)
Now, let us try to understand first what the PHILOSOPHICAL approach is.
Three main features of philosophical approach are:
i) It asks, and tries to find answers to, fundamental questions about the world, such as:
• What is the world?
• How does the world exist?
• Can the world be understood or knowable?
• What is the meaning of human life?
• What is life?
Similarly, political philosophy asks, and proposes answers to, such fundamental questions
about the political world as:
• What is politics?
• What is the state and what are the reasons behind the existence of the state?
• Why should citizens obey the state?
• What is the relationship between the state and other human organizations?