POLS 207

Chapter 1

  • Public sector jobs do nothing for GDP

  • Government is #1 employer in the world

  • 17% rise in inflation in last 3 years

  • Question everything

  • Political culture of states controls policies

  • “Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it whether it exists or not, diagnosing it incorrectly, and applying the wrong remedy” -Ernest Benn

  • Government matters because you cannot escape it

  • Utilities like water and electricity is government




The Policy Making System

  • Policymaking system

    • How policy comes into being and evolves over time



  • Laws are only made by the legislature, policy can be made by others

  • Through the interpretation of the constitution other factors can make policies

  • Policy is how law is actually enforced

  • Not a nation of men but a nation of laws

  • Government does not solve problems, they help them.

  • People→ Linkage Institutions→ Policymaking Institutions→ Policies→ Policy implementation policy evaluation→ People

  • Linkage institutions

    • Media

    • Public opinion

    • Political parties

    • Interest groups

    • Elections



  • All media has bias

Day 2

  • Policymaking institutions

    • State Legislature

    • Executive and Bureaucracy

    • Judiciary

  • 33% of Americans can name all 3

  • Government is the institutions that make authoritatively binding decisions (Laws) for society

  • Government has authority to legally enforce their decisions

  • All laws are voluntary 

  • Laws are not restrictive, they give us freedom and present anarchy.

  • Thomas Hobbs- “Mankind in the state of nature is nasty and short; meaning without rules”

  • Majority of people obey the law

  • Policies

    • Fiscal: management of money through government

    • Education: Pre k through college

    • Social Services: SNAP

  • Education and SS about 80% of state spending

  • Lower 2

    • Transportation and criminal justice

  • Won't qualify for programs your paying for until 65 because make too much money

  • Government will push everything onto the consumer- basic capitalism

  • Policy Implementation

    • Feedback Loop

    • Peoples feedback is given through voting

  • Affordable health care (ObamaCare)- Health care can not be transferred across state lines

  • Politicians can't determine if policy is working only the people do

  • Constitution does not mention education, making it a state matter 

  • Political culture

    • Broadly shared values, beliefs, and attitudes about how government and society should function

  • Political culture in U.S. states, according to political scientist Daniel Elazar:

    • Moralistic- Government is a “good” thing and is there to help man search for the good society. Stresses that needs mass participation and should be open to everyone. Government should be very active in pushing for economic, social, and political equality

    • Individualistic- Government is a supply and demand commodity and should only apply itself when the people demand it. The people believe that the Gov should only help when the people can’t take a problem. Limited government

    • Traditionalistic- Starts in the southern states and is based on social networks. Politics is not for the masses, Government is for the elite not the masses,

  • Texas can’t legally secede from the nation or fly as high American

  • All states have to fly their flag below the American flag

  • Texas is a mix of individualistic and traditionalistic

    • Low tax, low service

    • Dominated by business and special interests

  • Texas has most uninsured people out of every state

  • Texas is middle of pack for education
    Day 3

  • SI group M-Th-7-8pm at white creek

  • Government- the institutions that make authoritatively binding decisions for society

  • Politics - the process through which these decisions are made

    • Harold Laswell - Who gets what, when, and how

  • All politics are identity politics because all politics are personal

  • Fiscal year = money year

  • Ignorance of the law is not a defense

  • Numerous ways to participate in politics

  • War is a form of political participation

  • The budget is the single biggest political fight on the National level

  • Redistricting at the state level is the biggest political fight

  • Comparative study of states and communities

    • Describes politics and public policy, and explains the differences from state to state and community to community

    • Analyzes socioeconomic and political environments to arrive at explanations

    • States and communities provide excellent “laboratories” for applying comparative analysis

  • Not as reliable as other sciences because people aren't as predictable

  • States have to be the tests for democracy in terms of policies.

  • States have to think differently in order to solve their problems because they don’t have resources like the federal government

  • Federal government can print and states cannot

  • All states have to have a balanced budget while the federal government doesn’t

  • Socioeconomic factors

    • Education

    • Income

    • Race and Ethnic Composition

  • Ideologies

    • Liberalism

    • Conservatism

  • The demographics of Texas favors democrats

  • Over 50% of Texas is different races

  • The turnover in congress is typically from retirement 

  • Structures of Texas tend to favor the republican party

  • Ideology 

    • Party affiliation and ideology are not the same

    • Liberal and democrat are not the same and conservative and republican is not the same

  • Liberalism: A states tendency to expand welfare benefits, regulate business, adopt progressive state income taxes, and generally use government to achieve social change

  • Conservatism: a states tendency to limit the welfare benefits, deregulate business, keep taxes low, and generally place less reliance on government and more reliance on individuals and the marketplace to achieve social goals

  • Liberalism typically = more government, conservatism typically= less government

  • Independent voters in the middle of the 2 are less likely to vote

  • Economic theory of democracy book by Downs

    • Uses Spacial analysis the show the reader his theory

    • Puts democrats on the left and republicans on the right to show how the parties move to the middle

  • Libertarians are socially independent and don’t fit on the spectrum

  • The spectrum is wrong it can not be defined in a single line

  • Political spectrum is less of a straight line and more of a pie chart



Constitutionalism in the states and the Texas Constitutions CH. 3

  • Constitution is the basic law of the land

  • Texas could be under as many as 3 constitutions

  • Constitutions do not govern people they govern governments

  • Constitution starts paraphrasing the first amendment

  • Federal constitutions set up negative rights

  • Doesn’t tell you what you can't do, but tells the government what they can’t do

  • Everything comes from the interpretation of the constitution, not what it actually says

  • All 50 states have a constitution. The state constitutions

    • Govern governments

    • Set government structure and organization

    • Distribute powers among branches of government

    • Prescribe the rules by which decisions are made

    • Limit the powers of government and protect the rights of citizens

  • Constitution applies to everyone in the country no matter what

  • Limited government

    • In our political heritage, the power of the government over the individual is clearly limited, with aspects of our life governments cannot regulate or interfere with

  • Legal status

    • State constitutions are the supreme law of the state and only subordinate to the U.S. Constitution, laws of congress, national treaties