POLS 2305: Midterm study guide

Institutions

are the rules and procedures that provide incentives for political behavior.

Which of the following is the best definition of politics?

trying to influence conflicts over the leadership, structure, and policies of government

A system of rule that permits citizens to play a significant part in government is

a democracy

Which of the following is defined as a benefit that may be enjoyed by anyone and may not be denied to anyone once it has been provided?

public good

When a small group of elites determines most of the political decisions, we call that government

an oligarchy

Political scientist Harold Lasswell said politics is the struggle over

who gets what, when, and how

In an oligarchy

a small group of people controls most of the governing decisions.

One of the principles of politics described in the chapter says that

all politics is collective action

What is it called when people enjoy the benefits of some good while letting others bear the costs?

free riding

Political scientists would most accurately classify a governing system that recognizes no formal limits on its power and seeks to absorb or eliminate other social institutions that might challenge it as

totalitarian

A primary limitation of the national government under the Articles of Confederation was

that it could not prevent one state from discriminating against others in foreign commerce

n the debates between the Federalists and the Antifederalists

each side had a different view of the most likely source of tyranny

The power of judicial review

allows the courts to determine whether acts of Congress or the president are constitutional

The Connecticut Compromise is called the Great Compromise because it

solved the problem of representation by creating a bicameral legislature

What is the institutional principle that created three branches of government?

separation of powers

Why did the Antifederalists object to ratification of the Constitution?

They feared the Constitution would prove a threat to the states and to individual rights

Under the Three-Fifths Compromise

for the purposes of distributing seats in Congress only three-fifths of slaves would be counted

A bicameral legislature is

divided into two chambers

According to the necessary and proper clause of the Constitution

Congress is granted the authority to make all laws "necessary and proper" to carry out its charge

How has the Constitution has most often been amended?

by passage by two-thirds in the House and Senate and acceptance by three-fourths of state legislatures

Walmart is able to make high profits while keeping its prices low by

paying very low wages to its workers

Ford was different from Walmart in that he

paid his workers enough so that they could buy cars

Our book argues that economic inequalities also generate political inequalities. For evidence of this, we compared the campaign contributions of unions and corporations. Which contributes more?

Corporations and corporate lobby groups are responsible for an overwhelmingly large share of the country's political contributions

Following your textbook readings and the lecture for this week, which of the following perspectives or statements would be inconsistent with the "popular democratic" critique of America's political economy?

If you are wealthy in America, it must be because you worked hard for it, and you deserve it. The poor are poor only because they are lazy, or otherwise undeserving.

Popular democrats believe that in modern corporate capitalism

power is concentrated

The Senate was originally designed to maximize the input of citizens

False

The U.S. Congress is a bicameral legislature

True

Which of the following helps explain pork-barrel activities in Congress?

the collective action principle, because legislators must join with other legislators in exchanging support for each other's projects

When a network of small businesses across the country cooperated to oppose President Bill Clinton's health-care plan in 1993-94, it illustrated the power of which type of organization to influence congressional decision making?

interest groups

After the House has impeached the president, the president continues to serve unless the Senate votes to remove the president from office with a

two-thirds majority vote

In the House of Representatives, what is the term for elected individuals responsible for lining up party members on important votes and relaying voter information to the leaders?

whips

When members of the Senate prevent action on legislation they oppose by continuously holding the floor and speaking until the majority backs down, which tactic are they using?

filibuster

In recent years, how have congressional party leaders sought to augment their formal powers?

fundraising for members, including the use of leadership political action committees (PACs)

In 2003, the Texas legislature redrew the Texas congressional district boundaries in a way that favored Republicans. This exemplifies the practice known as

gerrymandering

According to Prof. Kiersey's Module 4 lecture on YouTube, the factor that was most important in shaping the work of Congress before the "Gingrich Revolution" of 1995 was _____

individual members and their districts

Which presidential powers are not expressed in the Constitution but stem from the "rights, duties, and obligations of the presidency," especially during wartime or national emergencies?

inherent powers

Which of the following is one of the president's expressed powers?

nominate federal judges

President George W. Bush argued that Congress could not block warrantless wiretapping because any such law required too much congressional involvement with executive agencies. This argument was based on what theory of presidential power?

theory of the unitary executive

The Constitution grants the power to declare war to

Congress

The New Deal shifted the national structure from a Congress-centered government to a president-centered government. This historical shift and the inability of any modern government to return to a Congress-centered government is an example of

path dependency

George W. Bush relied too heavily on his staff for information about weapons of mass destruction (WMDs) in Iraq, and he invaded Iraq to remove a nonexistent threat. This reliance exemplified the trade-off between

reliance on the in-house expertise of White House staff and the need to access independent outside opinion

Who is automatically in the president's Cabinet?

heads of all the major executive departments

President Franklin Roosevelt's speaking trips around the nation and radio broadcasts designed to promote his programs are an example of the presidential tactic often referred to as

going public

In our additional reading for Module 5, Greenstein seems to take the view that individual character matters a great deal in the presidency. This is kind of the classical view of the institution of the presidency, he says. By this he means that we see the o!ce as one relatively preserved from the in"uence of the forces around it. The president here is something of a heroic 'great #gure', whose name justifiably looms large in history. Greenstein develops a six-point framework to analyze the "______ presidency."

Personalized

In our Module 5 additional reading, Skowronek disagrees with Greenstein. Discussing the Obama presidency in particular, Skrowronek believes that the speci#c man (or woman) who occupies the position of president may be more shaped by the times they live in than they themselves can be considered a shaper of those times! Central to Skowronek's argument is the idea of political regimes. Now, the word 'regime' is one commonly used today in association with dictatorship. But in Political Science, the word is used somewhat more broadly. So, for the purposes of this class, lets define the concept of regime as something like a "political culture." This in mind, and based on your reading, what kind of president was Obama?

A president straddling the line between "reconstruction" and "preemption"