Comparative Study Part 1

Pol Sc Help Exam Guide Comparative politics Semester 4 2021 Edition
EXAM GUIDE
New Syllabus COMPARATIVE POLITICS:

PROCESSES & INSTITUTIONS
BA Hons Semester 4
• Chapter wise Key points and

Model Answers to Past Year’s
Questions
• 3 sets of Sample Papers with

Hints for Semester Exam
• Tips for Writing Answers in

Open Book Exam
By the Author of
POL SC HELP
All rights reserved @polschelp.in 1 dupolschelp2018@gmail.com
PLEASE SPARE FEW MINUTES TO READ THIS
Dear students…WELCOME BACK!

This guide is intended to be like a cheat code ( oh no ! not cheating, like the cheat code of
winning the computer game) for your semester exams!
What it contains?
• Key points on each of topics/theme of the revised CBCS Syllabus.
• Theme/topic wise Answer templates to past year’s questions (taken from DU) and other
important questions.
• 3 sets of sample question papers with Answer Hints.
• Answer writing tips and tricks for OBE.
What is Answer Template?
• Answer written in a particular way (Intro, Body, Conclusion) as expected against essay
type questions in university exam.
• I have given you a template(format/structure). You may add or delete contents to make
the answer as your own.
How to use the Guide for the best results?
• For best results, this guide must be used with Pol Sc Help Videos on You Tube.
• First, watch the videos on the theme/topic from POL SC HELP- at least 4-5 times, first in
normal speed, later on with faster speed and selectively. Final watching shouldn’t take
more than 5 min.
• Second, read the key points on the theme/topic very carefully. In fact, even if you only
remember the key points you can write answers in the exam.
• Third, read the answers of past year questions, at least 5 times. Again, the final reading
may not take more than 5-10 minutes.
o I have chosen the questions to cover the entire syllabus.
o Note the key phrases repeated, made bold underlined, and in violet colour in the
answers. You should remember and reproduce them in your answers. Violet bold
are most important phrases. You should google them for further understanding.
o Also, note the standard (academic or legal) words I have used in the answer. Their
easier meaning/synonyms are given in bracket.
• Fourth, read carefully the sample question papers (3 sets). I have given hints to those
questions, too. Read them carefully.
• Finally, read the answer writing tips; use them in the exam
GOOD WISHES!
SECTION 1
Chapter Wise
Key Points
and
ANSWERS
Past Year’s &
Important
Questions
THEME 1: FORMS OF GOVERNMENT
1.A: CBCS SYLLABUS

• Unitary and Federal System
• Regime Types: Democratic, Authoritarian, Populism and Totalitarian
1. B: KEY POINTS:
Forms of Government: Unitary and Federal
• Federal form of Government:
• In federal form of Government, there are at least two layers of governments
(central/federal and provincial), both drawing power & autonomy from a written
constitution that is subject to specific amendment procedures and judicial review
by independent courts.
• Provincial or regional Governments are not subordinate to federal Government;
they are equal partner in governance.
• Sovereignty is divided between vertical layers of Governments (Central, provincial,
local)
• Example: USA, India, Canada, Australia, Germany, Switzerland
• Unitary form of Government
• All governing powers are concentrated in the central government. Administrative
divisions at regional and local levels exercise only those powers that the central
government has delegated to them.
• Example: UK, France, Poland, Peru, Sri-Lanka, Egypt, Israel, etc.
Regime Types: Democratic, Authoritarian, Populism and Totalitarian
• Regime:
• Political regime denotes principles, norms, rules, decision-making procedures,
institutional arrangements, etc. following which the governance of a country is
carried out.
• Regime, therefore, denotes how political relationships are structured, and organised
in a given society.

• As per Roy Macridis, famous comparative thinker, a political regime embodies the
set of rules, procedures, and understandings that formulate the relationship between
the governors(rulers) and the governed(ruled).
• Democratic Regime
• Rulers are chosen by the people through free fair, and periodic election
• legitimate Govt having people’s consent and mandate to rule
• Civil and Political Liberties: Rights & Freedom to Citizens protected by
constitution and courts, which limit the powers of the state
• Rule of Law: Constitutional Government
• Presence of strong & autonomous Civil Society (NGOs, interest groups, social
movements, opinion leaders)
• Free participation of citizens in political processes
• Strong, Independent, and Autonomous Institutional arrangement based on rule of
law.
• Populism: Populist Regimes
• Populism denotes democratic politics for protecting and furthering the interests of
‘the people’, ‘the real and pure people’, against the ‘corrupt elites’, and entitled
class.
• Populist leaders, party, and movements claim to represent ‘the real and pure
people’.
• In Populism, ‘the real people’ are generally the majority ethnic, racial, religious
community. In the populist ideology, they are the true and real people of that
nation.
• Populist ideology don’t believe in minority rights, pluralism, and multi-culturalism.
• Populism is anti-elitist, anti-establishment, anti-system, anti-institutionalist, and
illiberal. Populism denotes majoritarianism, as the ‘the people’ are always in
majority.
• It also denotes identity politics. Cultural Nationalism is the most common identity
used in Populism. ‘the people’ are considered as true and pure member of the nation
and political community as defined by the Populist leader/party.

• Authoritarian Regime:
• Authoritarianism denotes any political system that concentrates power in the hands
of a supreme leader or a small elite that are neither chosen by nor responsible to the
people.
• A form of government characterized by the rejection of political plurality ( diversity
of culture, political ideologies), the use of a strong centralised power to preserve
the political status quo, and dilution in the rule of law, separation of powers, and
democratic values.
• It denotes blind submission to a central authority, as opposed to individual freedom
of thought, belief, and action.
• Personalistic: Headed by supreme leader wielding great amount of individual
power- Hitler in Nazi Germany, Francisco Franco Spain, Saddam Hussein- Iraq,
Zia-ul-Haq- Pakistan, Mobutu in Zaire
• It also denotes arbitrary use of power by the ruler, who is not bound by rule of law
or constitution. People have no choice in replacing the ruler by voting.
• Individuals and groups have very few civil & political rights.
• Totalitarian Regime
• Oppressive Rule by single political party following distinct political ideology.
• Total control of State/Govt of almost all aspects of public and private life.
• State/Government interfere in both public and private domain to decide for
the people the right way of life- food, dress, entertainment, travel, moral
standards, education, etc
• For the ruling party the totalitarian regime is project for social
transformation- bringing in new civilisation.
• All these actions are guided by the state ideology. The party becomes the
vehicle to implement the ideology. Difference between the party and state
are diluted.
• Thus, it denotes subordination of all aspects of individual life to the
authority of the state.
• Denotes most extreme and complete form of authoritarianism.
• Benito Mussolini coined the term ‘totalitario’ in the early 1920s to characterize the
new fascist state of Italy, which he further described as “all within the state, none
outside the state, none against the state.” This became the defining feature of
totalitarian regime.

1.C ANSWER TEMPLATES OF PAST YEAR’S AND OTHER

IMPORTANT QUESTION
(Note: This is newly added theme, there are no past questions. However, important questions,
covering entire syllabus, have been framed and answer templates of them are provided below)
Q.1: Discuss the federal and unitary forms of Government, highlighting the
differences between them.
Answer Template:
Introduction:
On the basis of vertical division of powers between different layers of Governments, we
can classify forms of Government as federal or unitary. In federal form of Government,
there are at least two layers of government (central/federal and provincial), both drawing
power & autonomy from a written constitution that is subject to specific amendment
procedures and judicial review. Thus, in the federal form of Government, the provincial or
lower levels of Government are not subordinate to federal Government; they are equal
partner in governance.
On the contrary, in the Unitary form of Government all governing powers are concentrated
in the central government. Administrative divisions at regional and local levels exercise
only those powers that the central government has delegated to them.
In sum, in federal form of Government there are at least two independent and autonomous
Governments, whereas in Unitary form of Government there is only one independent and
autonomous Government- the central Government. All other Governments draw their
powers from the central Government, which is supreme.
Above definitions of federal and unitary form of Government are basic and simplistic.
There are different types of federal and unitary form of Governments. In recent times,
differences between these two forms of Government have blurred (become unclear). Many
federal Government acts like a unitary Government, whereas many unitary Government
look like federal Government. India and UK are examples of such federal and unitary
Government respectively.
Why a country adopts federal or unitary form of Government depends upon its historical,
geo-political, and socio-cultural contexts. Political culture also plays its role in it. How a
nation-state was formed or constituted also become important factor in choosing federal or
Unitary form of Government. Generally, geographically large and/or culturally diverse
nation-states have adopted federal form of Government.

Federal form of Government, in comparison of Unitary form of Government, is recent

phenomenon. First federal nation-state is USA, which adopted a federal constitution in
1789. Canada and Germany became the 2nd and 3rd federal nations in 1867 and 1871
respectively. Australia became a federal country in 1901. Many European communist
regimes, such as Russia/USSR, and Yugoslavia, adopted federal form of Government.
many of the Post-colonial States adopted federalism to accommodate ethnic, racial, and
linguistic diversities. Thus, Brazil, Argentina, Mexico, Venezuela, India, Pakistan,
Myanmar, Indonesia, Malaysia, Nigeria, Ethiopia, Congo, Cameroon, United Arab
Emirate, etc adopted federal form of Govt after becoming independent.
On the contrary, older and well-established nation-states remained unitary. UK is the best
example. Other prominent unitary nations are, France, Spain, the Netherlands, Japan,
Poland, Romania, Bulgaria, and the Scandinavian countries (Norway, Sweden, Finland).
After having outlined the meaning, basic differences, and historical evolution of federal and
unitary form of Governments in different parts of the world, in the next section of the answer, I
will try to list out the features of both forms of Government and also highlight the differences
between them.
Features of federal form of Government:

Great variation and types of federalism:
• On the basis of type of government system
• Parliamentary model- Canada, Australia, India
• Presidential model- USA, Switzerland, Brazil
• Hybrid Model-Spain, Germany, Belgium, Russia, Pakistan
• On the basis of Power division & relation between Federal and Regional govt
• Dual Federalism
• Central & regional Governments are independent of each other
• Cooperative Federalism
• Central & regional Governments join hands in governance
• Competitive Federalism
• Competition between Central & regional Governments
• On the basis of evolution/formation
• Coming-together federation:
• Regional or state Governments come together to form a federal nation-state
• Example: USA, Canada, Australia, Switzerland
• Holding-together federation:
• Central Government share power with provincial Government, which are
purposely created by the center.
• India, Belgium and Spain
• On the basis of Power divisions among constituent units
• Symmetric: same power to all constituent units/regional govt
• Asymmetric federalism: special powers to some constituent units/ regional govt
Other features:
• At least two layers of Government, Governance, legislature, election, etc.
• Citizens have political obligations to, or have their rights secured by, two govts.
• Clear Separation of powers:
• Powers and jurisdictions of central/federal and state/provincial Government are
clearly written in constitution
• Constitution is not easy to amend, especially the clauses related to federal structure.
• Supremacy of Constitution representing General Will and Popular Sovereignty- ‘Living
Constitutions’.
• Independent and strong Judiciary to interpret constitution, review constitutional
amendments, and adjudicate dispute between constituent units(states) and federal Govt
(centre)
• It is a kind of ‘self-rule plus shared rule’: Shared rule through a federal/central govt for
common purposes and self-rule for constituent units (Regional or State Govt.). (by Daniel
Elazar)
• Based on the presumed value and validity of combining unity in diversity, i.e.
accommodating, preserving, and promoting distinct local identities within a larger unified
political system.
• Federalism denotes divided sovereignty and divided territoriality in contrast to classical
Westphalian Nation-State having unified sovereignty and unified territoriality
• Amount of federalism vary across federations. Generally, more diverse the Society, more
‘federal’ the federation.
• Federalism is reflected in federal party system, federal political economy, and federal
social structure; all this make a federal society.

Features of Unitary form of Government:

• It is based on the principle of geographical centralisation of power. All the powers and
authority of the state is concentrated in a single governing entity- central Government.
• For administrative convenience country may be divided into several provinces but they do
not enjoy any independent power and autonomy. Powers to them are delegated by the
central Government, which can be taken away whenever desired by the centre.
• Horizontal separation of power, but no vertical division of power:
• Powers are clearly separated between legislature, executive, and judiciary.
• But there is no vertical separation of power between central and regional/local
Government.
• only the central entity (central Government) is legally independent and other authorities
are subordinate to the central government.
• Undivided sovereignty:
o Only one Government exercises the sovereign powers of the state.
• No rigid constitution:
o Constitution, in unitary states, may be written (France) or unwritten (UK). But such
constitutions are much less rigid. They can be more easily amended.
• Less power to Judiciary for Judicial Reviews:
o In unitary states, federal legislatures (parliament) are supreme. They represent the
popular sovereignty. Courts have limited power to struck down laws made by the
parliament.
Two models of Unitary form of Government:

As per Daniel Elazar, we may identify following two models of unitary Governments:
Hierarchic model:
• Administrative of governing powers arranged in top to bottom like pyramid. Central
Government is at top and regional and local Government below it.
• Lower levels of administrative units/Government get whatever power devolved or
delegated by the central Government.
• Example: France

Organic Model:
• There may be regional or sub-national constituting units having distinct culture,
language, identity, etc. But all of them act like integral part of an organic whole headed
by the central Government.
• UK is the best example of organic model. National Governments of Scotland, Wales,
and Northern Ireland are devolved many governing powers by the central Government.
But all of them are united as single nation-state and one supreme Government- the
central Government.
• This model resembles core-periphery model. Central Government acts like core, and
Sub-national/regional units are like periphery drawing powers from the central
Government.
Difference between federal and Unitary form of Government
Difference point Federal form of Government Unitary form of Government
Separation of Both horizontal (between 3 organs Only Both horizontal (between 3

power of state) and vertical (layers of organs of state); no vertical
Governments) separation of power.
Nature of Written, detailed, and rigid Less rigid constitution. Can be easily
constitution constitution. Not easy to amend. amended.
Constitution may be unwritten, as in
UK.
Nature and Powers Independent and strong Judiciary. Less powerful Judiciary.
of Judiciary Judiciary has the power to struck Parliament is supreme.
down laws passed by legislatures- Courts have much less power of
power of judicial review judicial review.
Judiciary is the custodian of federal
constitution
Highest Judiciary adjudicate
(settle) disputes between federal
and regional Governments

Nature of Divided territorially- both central Undivided sovereignty. Only one

sovereignty and provincial Government are sovereign entity- central govt
sovereign
Nature of the Generally large and culturally Generally compact and

country diverse and heterogenous society homogeneous society
Timeline of Recent political phenomenon; first As old as concept of state. Since

evolution evolved in USA in 1789 beginning, single central
Government ruled most the
state/empires.
Representative USA, Canada, Australia, Russia, UK, France, Spain, Netherlands,

countries Germany, Switzerland, India, China, Japan, Poland, Norway,
Brazil, Argentina, Nigeria Sweden, Finland
Conclusion:
Governments in all nation-states of the world are organised either in Federal or Unitary
form of Governments. Unitary form is older and default (given, natural) form of
Government. All the old and established nation-states follow unitary form of Government.
Federalism is a modern concept. USA became the first nation-state to adopt federal form
of Government. Since then, most of the large nations, except China, has adopted federal
form of Government.
There are great variabilities among different federal Governments. Some, like India, are
more unitary in nature, whereas some, like USA, are more federal in character. Of late,
during the age of globalisation, there has been a centralising tendency in federal countries.
Because of the need for faster economic development, large project implementations,
security concerns, and threat of terrorism and climate change, central Governments are
taking over more and more powers at the cost of the regional Governments. In many
countries, this has given rise to competition, conflict, and confrontation between the central
and regional Governments.
Unitary Government, on the reverse, are witnessing more and more devolution and
delegation of powers to regional and local Governments/administrative units. UK is the
best example, which devolved many powers to national Governments of Scotland, Wales,
and norther Ireland.
Because of the above two phenomena- centralisation in federalism and decentralisation in
unitary states- the division between federal and Unitary form of Governments has become
blurred in recent years. Despite the different Constitutional design, both federal and unitary
form of Governments seems to be following same governing style in practice. In most of

the nation-states, central Governments are very powerful, takes major decisions, and
manage the socio-economic progress in centralised manner. But there is good amount of
decentralisation to regional and local Government, whether it is mandated by a federal
Constitutional or delegated by the central Government.
Q.2: What do you understand by political regimes? Compare and contrast

Authoritarian and Totalitarian political regimes.
Answer Template:
Introduction:
Political regime denotes principles, norms, rules, decision-making procedures, institutional
arrangements, etc. following which the governance of a country is carried out. Regime,
therefore, denotes how political relationships are structured, and organised in a given
society. As per Roy Macridis, famous comparative thinker, a political regime embodies the
set of rules, procedures, and understandings that formulate the relationship between the
governors(rulers) and the governed(ruled).
In political discourse (academic discussion) regime is used in multiple contexts; it may
denote rule by a specific individual (e.g., Ṣaddām Ḥussein regime), rule by an
ideology (e.g., a fascist regime), nature of rule/ruler (e.g., a military regime, Authoritarian,
Totalitarian regimes). Most of such uses of regimes are carrying negative connotations
(meanings). In this sense, the concept of regime conveys a sense of ideological
or moral disapproval or political opposition. Regime change thus refers to the overthrow
of a government considered illegitimate and unpopular.
Each political regime is the outcome of specific historical, cultural, economic or social and
international contexts of a political community, which condition the political behaviour
and the attitude of those who govern and those who are governed.
In nutshell, regimes are ongoing rule by a particular individual, party, ideology, type, etc
in a particular country/region. For example, BJP regime in India, Trump regime in USA,
Communist regime in China, etc. In common language, government of the day is same as
regime.
Since beginning, political thinkers have been classifying and categorising different types
of regimes. Aristotle classified all existing Governments/regimes of his time into six types-
monarchy, tyranny, aristocracy, oligarchy, polity, and democracy. Since then, many other
types of regimes have been identified. Currently, most common regime types are:
Democracy, Authoritarian, Totalitarian, populist, and hybrid or mixed types.
Both Authoritarian and Totalitarian regimes can be said to be autocracy, that is, rule by a
single person, party, or entity. They are just opposite to Democracy, which is rule by the
people as a whole. Monarchy, tyranny, dynastic rule, dictatorship, military rule, etc. are

different types of Authoritarian regime. Single party communist rules in erstwhile USSR,
and communist bloc of nations, and fascist rule in Germany and Italy during inter-war
period are examples of Totalitarian regimes.
After having outlined the meaning, definitions, and essential features of political regimes and its
different categorisation, in the next section of the answer, I will try to explain in brief the
Authoritarian and Totalitarian regimes, their features, and differences between them.
Features of Authoritarian regimes:

• Authoritarianism denotes any political system that concentrates power in the hands of a
supreme leader or a small elite that are neither chosen by nor responsible to the people.
• A form of government characterized by the rejection of political plurality (diversity of
culture, political ideologies), the use of a strong centralised power to preserve the political
status quo, and dilution in the rule of law, separation of powers, and democratic values.
• It denotes blind submission to a central authority, as opposed to individual freedom of
thought, belief, and action.
• Personalistic: Headed by supreme leader wielding great amount of individual power-
Hitler in Nazi Germany, Francisco Franco Spain, Saddam Hussein- Iraq, Zia-ul-Haq-
Pakistan, Mobutu in Zaire
• It also denotes arbitrary use of power by the ruler, who is not bound by rule of law or
Constitution. People have no choice in replacing the ruler by voting.
• Individuals and groups have very few civil & political rights.
• State institutions and mass media are not independent. They follow the dictates of the ruler.
• Opposition political parties is either very few or non-existent in authoritarian regimes.
Opposition party leaders and whosoever opposes the ruling regime face surveillance,
threat, and violence.
• Since regime is maintained by force, military, police are highly significant and influential
in such states.
• Lack of state ideology:
o There is normally absence of any ideology to mobilise the masses. Therefore,
Authoritarian regime don’t try to transform or change the socio-cultural system. It
simply maintains the status quo.
• Widely spread, most numerous, and still rising trend:
o As per Human Rights Foundation’s research, the citizens of 94 countries, consisting
about 53 % of human population, are under Authoritarian regimes.

o As per the Economist Intelligence, top 21 Authoritarian regimes in world currently

include North Korea, Syria, Chad, Central African Republic, Congo, etc.
Types of Authoritarian regimes:

Tyrannies
• Also called dictatorship.
• Political power is acquired and used in absolute manner by a tyrant(dictator).
• Army, police become like personal force of the dictator. They are used arbitrarily to
threaten, repress and keep watch on the opposition leaders/group.
• Example: Batista in Cuba, Somoza in Nicaragua, “Papa Doc”, Duvalier in Haiti, Emperor
Bokassa in Central Africa, Idi Amin Dada in Uganda
Dynastic regimes:
• In dynastic regimes political power is shared by the ruling family, which rule by convention
without using much force.
• People consider such regime legitimate and offer political obligation to the regime.
• Majority of dynastic rules are benevolent, try to provide welfare service to people, and
undertake socio-economic development
• Power of the ruler is tempered (moderated) by social customs, conventions, mutual
obligations and religious sanctions.
• Lack of people’s participation in governance and representative institutions. Though some
dynastic rulers have given few powers to elected legislative assemblies.
• No distinction between the wealth of country and the personal wealth of the king/ruler.
• Example: Sultan of Brunei, Royal dynasty in Saudi Arabia, Morocco, Bhutan, Kingdom
of Nepal( before 2006), etc.
Military regimes:
• It is rule by military dictator, mostly after toppling a civilian Government through military
coup.
• Most common type of contemporary authoritarian form of Government
• Military rule can be either direct or indirect
• Indirect military rule: a pseudo-democratic regime in which despite the constitution,
regular elections, democratic power structures, and other democratic processes, the military
dictator controls and influences the decision-making process. Military has veto power on
major decisions.

• Direct Military regime: The military general act as de-facto president of the country.
Generally, such regime keep legislature, and judiciary intact, giving them some relative
autonomy.
• Military regime uses referendum and plebiscites to prove its legitimacy.
• Many military regimes handover the power to civilian Government peacefully. In Nigeria,
many ex. Military rulers participate in civilian Government.
• Example: Myanmar, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Ghana, Nigeria (multiple times in past), Brazil,
Sudan, Mali, etc.
Single-party regimes:
• Only one party is allowed or able, either by the constitution or by political practice, to rule.
• Even if opposition parties against the dominant ruling party are allowed, they have no real
chance of gaining power.
• Membership of the ruling single party are motivated primarily by personal attachment to
the leader or by tribal/ethnic loyalties, and party organization is not usually very strong.
• The police, army act as force of the ruling party, which becomes the support agencies to
the government.
• But because of weakness in party organization, the party plays the secondary role in
government.
• People get limited opportunity to participate in governance. They get some limited voting
rights.
• Since they lack any ideological force, or socio-religious sanctions, legitimacy of such
regimes are low.
• Example: Syria, Iraq (before the US military attack in 2003), Tunisia, Tanzania, Egypt,
Kenya and Mexico.
Totalitarian Regimes: Types and Features:

• Rule by single party following distinct political ideology.
• Total control of State/Government of almost all aspects of public and private life.
o State/Government interfere in both public and private domain to decide for the
people the right way of life- food, dress, entertainment, travel, moral standards,
education, etc
o All these are guided by the state ideology

o Thus, it denotes subordination all aspects of individual life to the authority of the
state.
o Denotes most extreme and complete form of authoritarianism.
• Benito Mussolini coined the term ‘totalitario’ in the early 1920s to characterize the new
fascist state of Italy, which he further described as “all within the state, none outside the
state, none against the state.” This became the defining feature of Totalitarian regime.
• Very few, almost negligible, civil and political freedom to citizens.
• Extreme repression to political opposition, a complete lack of democracy, extreme
personality cultism, absolute control over the economy, massive censorship, mass
surveillance, limited freedom of movement and widespread and arbitrary use of state
force/coercion.
• As a political ideology, Totalitarianism, traces its root from Plato’s conception of ideal
state, Hegel’s idea of organic state, Rousseau’s idea of general will and positive freedom,
and Marx’s idea of dictatorship of proletariat.
Types of Totalitarian regime:
• Communist totalitarian regimes
• State ideology: Marxism/Leninism/ communism
• Economic policy: Left Wing
• Single party Rule by the communist party.
• Example: Soviet Union under Stalin, China under Mao Zedong, and North Korea
under the Kim dynasty.
• Fascist regimes
• State Ideology: Fascism (extreme militant nationalism)
• Right wing in socio-cultural domain
• Single party rule: Fascist party in Italy, Nazi party in Germany
• Example: Nazi Germany under Hitler, Italy under Mussolini,
Difference Between Authoritarian and Totalitarian regimes
Difference point Authoritarian Regime Totalitarian regimes
State Ideology No state ideology A well-defined state ideology

Interference in public and It does not interfere or try to Total control of state/govt of
private domain of control people’s life almost all aspects of public and
citizen’s life private life,
Socio-cultural No attempt for social Attempts for total social

transformation transformation transformation- new socio-cultural
order
Maintain status quo
It brings new social institutions
Mass mobilization No mass mobilization, people mobilizes the whole population in

are aloof from the state. pursuit of its ideological goals.
People are attached to the state
ideology.
Popularity of the supreme Low popularity Very high popularity. Supreme

leader/ruler leader is considered as demi-God.
Legitimacy of the Low legitimacy High legitimacy

state/govt
Consent and Political Force and threat of Manufacture consent by

Obligation punishment are source of acceptance of state ideology.
consent and political
Attempts to develop a broad
obligation. consensus through positive
No attempt to build communication network and
consensus propaganda machinery
The emphasis is on obedience
Institutionalization and Low level of High degree of Institutionalization

modernization Institutionalization High level of modernization and
Poorly developed economy & economic & infrastructure
infrastructure- backwardness. development.
Nature of the regime Political Cultural and ideological
Conclusion:
In sum, both Authoritarian and Totalitarian regimes are non-Democratic autocratic rule. In
both rulers are neither chosen by people nor are they responsible or accountable to people.
In both regimes, the civil & political rights of individuals and groups are very limited,
almost negligible. Both regimes use state power and force in arbitrary manner. Opposition

to Government are suppressed with brute force. Both regimes control mass media and
communication network and restrict freedom of thought and expression.
But despite such similarities, as stated above, both the regimes differ on many counts. Main
difference is having a distinct political ideology in the Totalitarian regime. Due to this the
Totalitarian regime becomes a cultural project- to usher a new civilisation. Also,
Totalitarian regime attempt to control all aspects of life of its citizen. These two features
of Totalitarian regime separate it from the Authoritarian regime, which is merely a political
project to hold power maintain status quo. Hence, Authoritarian regime grant relative social
freedom. They don’t overturn the existing socio-cultural institutions. In nutshell, till they
are not opposed and allowed to rule, authoritarian regime don’t interfere in societal matters.
Finally, we should note that totalitarian regimes are decreasing in numbers after the
disintegration of USSR. But Authoritarianism is on rise. Currently more than 50 % of
world’s population is ruled by authoritarian regimes. Even many Democracies are
considered flawed having strong authoritarian tendencies. This should be the cause of
concern for the global political community.

Q.3: Discuss Populism and Populist regimes clearly bringing out its features
and highlighting its relationship to liberal Democracy.
Answer Template
Introduction:
Populism is a political ideology on which Populist regimes are based. As a political
ideology, populism denotes democratic politics for protecting and furthering the interests
of ‘the people’, ‘the real and pure people’, against the ‘corrupt elites’, and entitled class.
Populist leaders, party, and movements claim to represent ‘the real and pure people’. In
populism, ‘the real people’ are generally the majority ethnic, racial, religious community.
They are the true and real people of that nation. Populist ideology don’t believe in minority
rights, pluralism, and multi-culturalism. It is anti-elitist, anti-establishment, anti-
institutionalist, and illiberal. Populism denotes majoritarianism, as the ‘the people’ are
always in majority. It also denotes identity politics. Cultural nationalism is the most
common identity used in populism. ‘The people’ are considered as true and pure member
of the nation and political community as defined by the populist ideology.
Populism emerged in late 19th century, first in USA, as a reaction to liberal Democracy.
People’s Party formed in 1892 in USA was result of a Populist movement. Later on, in the
second half of the 20th century, populism spread in many Latin American countries, such
as Argentina, Brazil, and Venezuela under the Populist leaders Juan Perón, Getúlio Vargas,
and Hugo Chávez respectively. In the early 21st century, populist authoritarian regimes
arose in Turkey, Poland, and Hungary, and many other countries. In recent times, right
wing populism has sharply risen world over. Some of these prominent regimes are Trump
regime in USA( before January 2021), Marine Le Pen’s regime in France, and Bolsonaro’s
regime in Brazil.
Many political thinkers, such as Cas Mudde, a Dutch political scientist doing research on
Populism, consider rise of populism as failure and weaknesses of liberalism to take care of
aspirations of common people who were left out during the neo-liberal economic
liberalisation and globalisation. Most of these common people were majority population
living in small towns. The liberals, in the name of toleration, minority rights, and multi-
culturalism, undermined the aspirations of the majority, but poor and left out people.
Populist leader and party claim to represent these left out ‘common people’, who in their
view are the pure and true people of the land, and whose genuine rights were taken away
by immigrants, minorities, elites, and entitled class.
Populist leader/party get electoral support of the majority community- ‘the people’- and
therefore win the democratic elections. Thus, populism is very much part of the democratic
process. But it does not believe in liberal democracy, and related principles of pluralism (
co-existence of multiple interests, ideologies), minority rights, and multi-culturalism. Thus,

it is a kind of majoritarianism. Hence, populist regimes can lead to what the liberal political
thinker J.S. Mill described as the "tyranny of the majority”. In words of Cas Mudde,
Populism is illiberal democratic response to undemocratic liberalism. Thus, liberalism’s
failure in maintaining the true democratic spirit, its alignment with elites, entitled class, its
neglect of majority and left out communities, and its appeasement policies for electoral
gains have given rise to right wing populism in many Democracies.
After having outlined the meaning, essential nature, and evolution of populism and populist
regimes, in the next part of the answer, I will explain in brief the features of the Populist regimes.
I will also try to highlight the difference between populism and liberal democracy.
Features of Populism and Populist Regimes:
• Populism considers society to be separated into two uniform and mutually opposite groups.
First the ‘pure people’- the common people and second, the corrupt elites. Hence, it is anti-
elite, anti-insiders ( in politics), anti-system, and anti-establishment.
• It morally divides the society. ‘the people’ are pure and moral, whereas the elites are
corrupt and immoral.
• Populism is also anti-institutional, as it believes that political institutions protect interests
of elites. They are of little help to the common people.
• Populism believes that politics should be an expression of the general will of ‘the people’.
No institution can come in between the populist regime and ‘the people’.
• It is a form of nativism and is politics of exclusion. For Populist regime, real people are
‘son of the soil’ the ‘true people’ of the nation. Generally, majority race, religion, language
and ethnicity define the identity of ‘the people. It excludes the ‘others’, such as minorities
, immigrants, elites, etc. from the definition of ‘the people’.
• Hence, it is one form of majoritarianism, that is, principle that laws and public policies
should reflect majority view/opinion.
• Populism is illiberal democracy. It very much believes in electoral politics. Populist party
wins heavily in popular elections. But they dislike liberal democracy and associated
principles such as protection of minority rights.
• Populism believes in political efficacy (value, usefulness) of common people. For them,
‘the people’ are politically active and can decide their good, they don’t need guidance and
handholding of elites.
• Populist leaders are very good orator and attractive to the people and the media.
Mainstream media favours populist leaders/party for multiple reasons. One reason is that
populist politics create confrontation, conflict, and newsworthy items and hence they give
media eyeballs, and , therefore, more advertisements.

• Populism polarises the political debate. In Populism, opposition parties are not political
opponents but immoral and impure enemies. It creates conflictual and confrontationist
politics.
• Populist regimes generally witness weakening of liberal democratic institutions, including
courts and media. It may lead to Authoritarianism.
• Most of contemporary populist regimes follow right wing nationalism. Though populism
is neutral to political spectrum. It can be politically left or right.
• Populist leaders are generally having charismatic strongman image. They are generally
political insider-outsider, that is, they are very much part of ruling dispensation but outsider
to mainstream or central level politics.
Factors which gave rise to populism:
• Failure & weaknesses of liberal democracy, globalization and resultant loss of job,
economic hardship, identity politics, weak and fragmented coalition govt, cultural –
loss of cultural identity, and technology-ICT revolution, etc.
Effect of populism:
• Illiberal democracy, majoritarianism, widening of social cleavages, polarization,
weakening of liberal institutions, conflictual & confrontationist politics, weakening of
liberal democracy, may lead to authoritarianism.
Difference between Populism and liberal Democracy:
Difference point Populism and Populist Liberal Democracy

regimes
Ideology Populism, nationalism Liberalism- toleration, pluralism,

minority rights, multi-culturalism
Treatment of Elites Anti-elitist Elites are valuable leaders and

Consider elites as corrupt bulwark of liberal democracy
and immoral Source of knowledge, wisdom,
guidance
Treatment of ‘the common Consider majority Consider them as mass, to be guided,

man’ or majority community as ‘the and to whom elites have responsibility
community people’, real and pure of welfare and well-being.
people. Majority community should be ready
to sacrifice a bit for protecting the

rights of minority and marginalized

communities.
Liberal state institutions Believe they are elitist in Strong, independent, and autonomous
nature and created to institutes are pillars of democracy.
protect the interests of
elites.
Institutions cannot come
in between ‘the people’
and the populist regime.
Leadership Charismatic and Preference to institutional rules, norms

strongmen image of the than personalities.
populist leader.
Relation with democracy Very much democratic. Gave a specific kind of democracy –
Advocate direct representative liberal democracy
democracy, popular Does not support direct democracy.
Sovereignty, general Representatives should guide the
will. people and should take decisions on
Frequently uses their behalf.
referendum and
plebiscites
Nationalism Closely related to right Believes more on international

wing nationalist ideology institutionalism, inter-governmental
cooperation and interdependence.
Communitarianism Frequently raises More inclined towards individualism.

community feeling. Individual rights and pluralism(
General Will, societal contestation between multiple
common Good, etc. individual interests).
Conclusion
Populism as a political ideology emerged in late 19th century in USA in response to failure
and weaknesses of liberal democracy to take care of the aspirations of people of majority
community who felt left out by waves of immigration, appeasement of minorities, and loss
of cultural identity. Populism claims to represent the interest of ‘the people’, that is the
common people who are pure and moral, in exclusive manner. Populism dislike liberal

democracy, is anti-elitist, anti-establishment, anti- entitlements, and anti-institutionalism.

It believes that no one can come in between the populist regime and ‘the people’.
Globalisation, identity politics, loss of cultural identity, and ICT revolutions, etc. are
factors for rise of populism. Its effects have been polarisation, conflict, and confrontation
in politics, move towards illiberal democracy and authoritarian tendencies. Backlash
against minorities has been one major result of populism.
Populism is on rise in early 21st century but its popularity is perhaps overstated. Populism
has a long history in Europe and US but was largely marginal force. Only now in many
countries populist regimes have been established. Of late, many mainstream liberal
political parties are adopting populism for electoral gains. But they face dilemma as their
core ideology, which is essentially liberal, creates internal antagonism.
Finally, we should note that relationship of populism to democracy is complex. Populism
is essentially democratic ideology. In fact, it supports more direct form of democracy. But
it is against liberal democracy and associated principles of minority rights, pluralism, and
multi-culturalism. Populism can be both a corrective as well as a threat for liberal
democracy. Time will only tell in which direction populism takes democracy, especially
liberal representative democracy.
Q.4: Discuss the Democratic regime, highlighting difference between

presidential and prime ministerial form of Democratic Government. Also
discuss the limitations of liberal Democracy.
Answer Template:
Introduction:
Democracy, that is people ruling or governing themselves, has been the most preferred and
desired form of Government throughout the human civilisation. Democratic regimes
existed even during ancient times, such as in Greek city states and the Indian city of
Vaishali (Licchavis republic) . Concept of Gram Sabha in India is essentially a form of
direct Democracy. But after the ancient period, democracy was eclipsed by monarchy,
aristocracy, oligarchy, and other forms of Government. During the medieval period,
absolute monarchy was the most common form of Government.
Beginning 17th century, idea of democracy started to re-surface again. This time it was
mainly through the writings of liberal political thinkers, such as, Locke, Kant, and
Rousseau. These liberal thinkers presented their idea in form of a social contract theory,
which put individual at the centre of formation of state and Government. Social contract
theory also gave the principles of natural rights of life, liberty, and property to individuals.
These rights were considered sacrosanct and could not be taken away by the
state/Government, which were formed by the individuals through a social contract to
protect and better use their rights & liberties. Democracy in modern era was founded on
these liberal principles and was called liberal Democracy.
Liberal Democracy, in due course, included other liberal principles like toleration, minority
rights, pluralism, multi-culturalism, etc. Instead of direct form of democracy, liberal
democracy adopted representative democracy. As stated by liberal thinker J.S.Mill, it was
two step shifted democracy. First shift was that not the People but representative of the
people, elected by the people, ruled them. In reality, a small minority of the representative
are included in Government, remaining try to control them; this he called second shifting.
Many critics, including Gandhiji, derided (sharply criticized) liberal democracy as nominal
and false democracy. For them, it is rule of elites in the garb (dress) of democracy. Hence,
when we say democratic form of Government, actually we are talking about liberal
democracy.
Essential features of Democratic form of Government are 1. Rulers are chosen by the
people through free fair, and periodic election 2. legitimate Govt having people’s consent
and mandate to rule 3. Civil and political liberties: rights & freedom to citizens protected
by constitution and courts, which limit the powers of the state 4. Rule of Law 5. Presence
of strong & autonomous Civil Society ( NGOs, interest groups, social movements, opinion
leaders) 6.Free participation of citizens in political processes 7. Strong, Independent, and
Autonomous Institutional arrangement based on rule of Law.
Democratic form of Government can be subdivided into two types: Presidential and
Parliamentary. In the Presidential form of government, president is directly elected by the
people and acts as both head of the State and head of the Government. President is not
accountable to the legislature, which is also directly elected by the people. Thus, in
Presidential form of government there is clear separation of power between the executive
(president) and the legislature. In parliamentary form of government, executive comes out
the legislature(parliament). Leader of the majority party in parliament forms Government
and becomes Prime minister. PM heads the cabinet (council of minister), which is
responsible and accountable to parliament. In parliamentary form of government, president
is nominal head of the State. President has very little discretion to act of his own choice.
President is bound to act on the advice of cabinet headed by PM. Hence, parliamentary
form of government is also called cabinet form of Government.
There is also a mixed system, called semi-presidential system. In such form of Government
there is both a directly elected president, as head of state and with substantial executive
powers and a presidentially appointed prime minister, who heads the Government and his
cabinet, which is responsible to the legislature. France, Russia, Sri-Lanka, Congo, etc.
follow this hybrid form of Government.
After outlining the meaning, essential features and types of Democratic form of Government, in
the next section of the answer, I will try to highlight the difference between Presidential and
parliamentary forms of governments. I will also discuss, in brief, the limitations of liberal
Democracy as part of the Conclusion.
Difference between Presidential and parliamentary forms of government:
Difference point Presidential form of Parliamentary form of government

government
Head of the State President, who act as real Constitutional Monarch or President. Both
head of state acts as nominal head of state.
Head of President Prime Minister

Government
Role of Cabinet None, President has his Cabinet is supreme executive.

own office and staff to help Cabinet, headed by PM, actually govern the
him in governing. state.
How head of state is By direct voting by the Constitutional Monarch: hereditary

chosen people President: Indirectly elected by people’s
representatives
How head of President is head of PM is chosen by representatives of the

Government is Government; directly political party gaining majority of seats in
chosen elected. the popular or lower house of parliament
Relation between Clear separation between PM and his cabinet come out the
the executive and executive and legislature legislature.
legislature President is not responsible They are responsible and accountable to
or accountable to legislature
legislature. Popular house of parliament can remove
the Government/cabinet by passing no-
confidence motion.
Role & feature of Not very rigid party Rigid party discipline and loyalty to official
political parties discipline party line.
Legislatures may vote on Party can issue ‘Whip’ to vote on party line
principles on specific issues on specific issues.
cutting official party line. Legislatures are not free to vote on
principle/conscience.

Prominent USA, Brazil, Argentina, UK, India, Canada, Australia, and most of
Examples and many other American the European nation-states
nation-states
Conclusion:
We should note that when we talk about democratic form of government, we are actually
referring to liberal democratic form of government, which is a specific type of democratic
system. Liberal democracy developed, during 17th and 18th century Europe, by the
influential writings of liberal political thinkers such as Locke, Kant, and Rousseau. It was
developed as a package of socio-economic and political system. Free market economy,
capitalist social order, and liberal representative democracy were the economic, social, and
political components of the liberal ideology.
Essential features of Liberal Democracy is rule by people’s representative, rule of law,
constitutional government, separation of power, and constitutional guarantee of rights &
liberty to individuals. Liberal principles of toleration, pluralism, protection of minority
rights, and multiculturalism also became part of the liberal democracy.
Liberal democracy should be seen in the context of emergence of new capitalist social
order, rise of a new middle class - the professional class- and advent of modernity. But
liberal democracy was not same as the ancient and original Athenian direct democracy. As
J.S. Mill stated, it was two step shifted democracy; or as Gandhiji said it was nominal
democracy.
This brings forth the limitations of liberal democracy. Some of the limitations are: Its
overemphasis on individualism, protection of individual rights including minority rights,
its elitist nature -led by urban middle-class professionals of rising capitalist class- and its
neglect of community feeling, of the popular sentiments of majority community which felt
left out. Also, its emphasis on negative liberty and rights created sense of disillusionment
in the masses who felt that such rights and liberties could be enjoyed only by the entitled
elite class. Its emphasis on pluralism, multiculturalism and protection of minority rights
were considered as appeasement and vote bank politics by the majority community.
All these limitations of liberal democracy gave rise to populism and populist regimes which claim
to represent the interest of ‘the people’- the real and pure people- against the corrupt and immoral
elites. Interestingly, liberalism as political ideology defeated its competitor ideologies, such as
Fascism and Communism, but it is facing the strongest challenge from within democratic fold in
form of Populism. Populism is challenging liberal democracy on the same turf claiming to be
more democratic. Populism, in contrast to liberal democracy, advocates direct democracy. Perhaps
liberal democracy needs to introspect and take corrective measures to bring back democratic
essence in its theory and practice.

THEME 2: ELECTORAL SYSTEMS
2.A: CBCS SYLLABUS

• Definition and procedures of different types of
• Types of election system:
o First Past the Post
o Proportional Representation,
o Mixed Representation
2. B: KEY POINTS:
• Electoral System:
• Set of rules that structure how votes are cast at election and how these votes are
then converted into seats (Gallagher,2014)
• Institutional rules, norms, and structure by which representation are decided in
democratic political system
• Electoral System includes Electoral Rules (franchise rule, eligibility rule for
candidates, rules for party, election campaign rules, etc) , Electoral Formula( How
votes are converted into seats), District(Constituency) Magnitude( Numbers of
seats per constituency), and Ballot rules( Ballot box or EVM, how vote are casted,
etc)
• Factors affecting choice of Electoral System:
• Size & Socio-cultural diversity of the political system
• Literacy- Democratic and political
• Political Culture
• Nature of the party system
• Socio-economic context
• Power politics, consensus and compromise among ruling elites
• Historical experiences, traditions, practices, lesson learnt
• Effects of Electoral System on political system:
• Voter- representative link- clear in FPTP, not clear in PR

• Govt formation
• Multi-party coalition govt in PR system
• Strong single party govt in Majoritarian (FPTP) system
• Party System format
• Duverger’s Law: Majoritarian system- two party system and PR system:
multi-party system
• Ideological effects: FPTP: less polarization; PR: multi-polar party system
• More political and societal consensus in PR system
• Under representation of marginalized communities (minorities, women, indigenous
people) in majoritarian (FPTP) system
Main types of Electoral System:

Majoritarian system
• Also called Plurality System
• Winning formula: on getting more than 50% votes or more votes than any other
candidate
• District magnitude: generally single member constituency
• Variants of Majoritarian system
• Single member Simple Plurality system ( FPTP)
• Alternate Vote (AV)
• Supplementary Vote ( SV)
• 2nd Ballot system
Proportional Representation (PR) System
• Seats allotted to parties in proportion of votes obtained using complex mathematical
formula
• District magnitude: Multi-member districts/constituency
• Variants of PR system
• Party List PR:
• Voters chose party which nominate representative on seats won by it.
• Seats allotted to party in proportion to votes obtained by it.
• Single-Transferable-Vote( STV) system

• The winning candidate needs to obtain more than a fixed quota of votes
which is calculated through a mathematical formula.
• Voters give rank preferences to competing candidates.
• In the first round of voting only the first preference votes of each candidate
are counted and those candidates who obtain more than the fixed quota of
votes are declared winners.
• In case no candidate gets the required quota of votes then the bottom most
candidate is struck out and his/her second preference votes are allocated to
remaining candidate. This process is repeated until all the seats of the
constituencies are filled.
• Same rule is followed in AV system under majoritarian system but with 2
difference 1. Single member Constituency and 2. Requirement of more than
50% votes to win the seat in AV
Mixed Representation System
• Hybrid system mixing FPTP and PR
• Total seats divided in 2 parts
• One part elected as per FPTP another part through Party List PR system
• Voters cast 2 votes- one for candidate as per FPTP for their constituency and 2nd for
party as per party list PR
• District magnitude: Single member constituency (FPTP) and Multi-member
districts/constituency for Party List PR


IMPORTANT QUESTION
Q.1: What is an electoral system? Highlight the major features and merits & demerits of
FPTP (First Past the Post System).
Answer Template
Introduction:
Electoral system are institutional rules, norms, procedures and structures by which
representation are decided in democratic political system. Most important of those rules
are for conversion of votes into seats. As per Gallagher, Electoral System are set of rules
that structure how voters cast( express his choice) votes in election and how these votes
are then converted into seats. In a nutshell, rules of voting and conversion of votes into
seats won by political parties constitute electoral system.
Electoral rules may include rules about who are eligible to vote (franchise rule), voting
rules, who are eligible to run for election, party funding & spending rules, party registration
and symbol rules, election periodicity, campaign rules, etc.
One of the most important Electoral rules is Electoral Formula, that is, the rule about the
winning formula to convert votes into seats. On the basis of electoral formula or winning
rule, Electoral system can be categorized into Majoritarian (First Past the Post System),
proportional representation (PR), and Mixed representation.
Other rules as part of an Electoral systems are District (Constituency) Magnitude, that is,
numbers of seats per constituency. Two types are common- single member district (SMD)
or multiple member district (MMD). Rules related to Ballot Structure may be how voters
cast their votes? Whether it is secrete/open ballot. Rules regarding ballot boxes, and ways
of voting -tick marking, stamping, electronic voting machines (EVM), etc.
In many countries, the Constitution specifically define the electoral system and mention
the electoral rules. In many other countries, such as in India, electoral system and rules are
specified in separate law/act passed by Parliament. In India, Representation of the People
Act, 1951 specify the Electoral system.
As stated above, First Past the Post System (FPTP) is one of the winning formula or rules
for conversion of votes into seats. Generic category of Electoral system to which FPTP
belongs to is called Majoritarian system. In the Majoritarian system candidate winning
majority of the votes are declared winner. Majority vote may be more than 50% of total
votes casted (absolute majority rule) or maximum numbers of votes among all candidates.
In latter case, the winning candidate may not be required to get more than 50% of votes.
This variant of Majoritarian system is called First Past the Post System ( FPTP). As the
name suggest, the candidate who gets more votes than any other candidate reach to the
winning post first, and declared winner.
FPTP is one of the simplest Electoral system. Many countries having parliamentary form
of govt., including UK and India, follow this system. But as I shall explain later, the FPTP
has many demerits, most important being no direct co-relation between vote and seat
percentage. Thus, in FPTP, Seats won by parties are not in proportion of votes obtained by
them.
Features of FPTP:
• Single member constituency
o Generally, in FPTP, single member district (SMD) rule is followed.
o Hence, this system is also known as Single Member Simple Plurality system;
simple plurality denotes that winning candidate does not need absolute majority,
the candidate getting most votes among all candidate wins the seat.
• Simple, straight-forward, easy to understand
o Winning formula is most simple
o Unlike single transferrable voting (STV) or AV (Alternate Voting), FPTP is easy
to understand for both voters and candidates.
• Dis-proportionality
o No co-relation between vote and seat percentage
o For example, in 2014 general election, BJP got 282 seats (51% of seats) with 31%
of votes; In first general election Congress won 364 of the 489 seats (74%) with
45% of votes.
o A party may win more seats with fewer popular votes than its opponents, as
happened in 2018 MP assembly election, where BJP despite getting 41.02 % ( in
comparison to 40.89% by Congress), got lesser seats than those by Congress.
o This is due to ‘winner take it all’ feature of FPTP. Even by getting one vote more
than the 2nd candidate, the 1st candidate wins the whole constituency.
• Quick vote counts and result declaration
o Unlike STV or AV, there are no preference transfer in FPTP.
o Hence, vote counts and result declaration is quick
• Clear geographic link between voter and representatives
o only one candidate wins from the constituency

o Voting to candidate is direct, no party list or preferential voting

o Due to above two conditions, there is clear link between voter, representatives, and
constituency in FPTP ; geographic link between the representative and the
constituency and personal link between the voter and the representative.
• It gives way to ‘strategic voting’ phenomenon
o Voters may give their votes, against their first choice, to that candidate which has
chance of defeating the candidate the voters don’t want.
o This is because votes to losing candidates are wasted in FPTP.
• FPTP results into Two-party system
o called Duverger’s Law
o This is due to dis-proportionality in built into FPTP, which is unfavourable to 3rd
and other smaller parties.
o Also, due to strategic voting phenomenon in FPTP, 3rd party loses its due votes
• Generally, FPTP produces clear decisive mandate
o In FPTP, winning party wins big
o This is also because of ‘bandwagon ‘effect. Many undecided voters may vote for
candidates most likely to win. That is, they simply ride on the bandwagon.
• Encourages broad based centrist parties
o Since such party tries to accommodate interests of all segment of population, it
attracts votes from all segments/sections.
o On the contrary, extreme or single issue-based parties are unduly punished in FPTP.
• Since FPTP was the Electoral system adopted by UK, most of post-colonial states who
were part of the British colonial empire, adopted FPTP.
o Despite this, FPTP is not the most popular Electoral system. Majority of countries
have adopted proportional representation and its variants.
Merits & demerits of FPTP:
Merits of FPTP De-Merits of FPTP
Simple, straight-forward, easy to Unfairness: highly disproportionate: no

understand winning formula correlation between votes obtained and seats won

Quick vote counts and result declaration Punishes smaller issue-based parties
This limits the range of issues undertaken by
political parties.
Can be adopted in large and diverse country Favours large parties and strong regional parties
even with low levels of Literacy and Punishes small parties and ones with
geographically evenly distributed support (the
‘third-party effect’).
Suitable for newly independent post- Wastage of votes: votes of losing candidates are
colonial states due to its simplicity wasted unlike in STV or AV
Representatives are directly accountable to Encourage Strategic voting: as stated above,

the voters in the constituency, this is due to voters cast their votes strategically not to choose
clear link between voter and but only to defeat a certain candidate/party.
representatives.
Offers the electorate a clear choice of It offers only limited effective choice because of
candidate as well as of party its duopolistic (two-major-parties) tendencies.
Generally, FPTP provides strong stable It undermines the legitimacy of government

Govt having clear decisive mandate This is because the governments are formed
This is due to its features of its supporting despite getting less than 50% of votes.
two-party system and ‘winner takes it all’ Hence, technically, FPTP generally produces
feature unrepresentative, minority governments,
The elected Govt, which is formed It creates instability because a change in

generally by a single party, is directly government can lead to a radical shift of policies
accountable to the voters, unlike coalition and direction.
Govt. This is because of two-party system and partisan
politics, both of which is encouraged in FPTP.
Generally, FPTP also provide strong It discourages the selection of a socially broad
opposition. This is also due to its favouring spread of candidates in favour of those who are
two-party system. attractive to a large body of voters.
Reduces the range of political discourse and
political innovations.

keeps political extremism at bay by making Encourages Majoritarianism: Minorities may be

it more difficult for small radical parties to excluded through electoral process in FPTP
gain seats It may also promote populism, and polarization in
It Encourages broad based centrist parties- politics.
catch all parties.
Conclusion:
The sanctity of representative democracy depends on free and fair election. Therefore,
electoral system, which provides the rules, norms and procedures for voting and elections
of candidate is of utmost importance in representative Democracy. There are multiple kinds
of Electoral system having different rules for or voting, counting, and formula for
converting votes into seats. Why a particular electoral system is adopted by a country is
dependent on its specific historical and political context, especially its political culture and
historical political experience. For example, India adopted FPTP system because it had the
experience of this electoral system under the British colonial rule. Also, for a country as
large and diverse as India having very low level of literacy at the time of independence,
the simple and straight forward winning formula of FPTP was most suitable. On the
contrary the more mature democracies in Europe are now going for complex electrical
system such as AV and STV.
As explained above, the FPTP system has the simplest, straightforward, and easy to
understand rules for voting and formula for seat conversion. It generally provides strong
and stable single party government which is directly responsible to its voter. The system
establishes a clear link between the winning candidate and the voter. This system can easily
be adopted in large and diverse country having low level of literacy. FPTP discourages
extremism in politics. But FPTP has many demerits also. Most importantly its
disproportionality, which unduly punishes smaller issue-based party. It may exclude
minorities, woman, and other marginalised community through electoral process. It may
encourage majoritarianism, populism and polarization in politics. Because of its demerits,
of late, many countries are switching over to proportional representation ( PR). In
contemporary world FPTP has not remained the most preferred electoral system.

Q.2: Discuss the meaning, procedure, features, and merits & demerits of
proportional representation (PR) Electoral system.
Answer Template:
Introduction:
PR system is now increasingly being used in majority of the elections worldwide. The main
reason behind this is its proportionality, that is, the number of seats won by a party is more
or less proportional to the percentage of votes obtained by it. Thus, PR system removes
major weakness of the simple plurality system such as at FPTP. PR electoral system create
a representative legislative body that reflects the overall distribution of public support for
each political party. This system unlike FPTP does not penalise the smaller or single issue
based political parties. PR system also help minority communities to send their
representative, in proportion to their population, to Parliament.
But the PR system, generally, is more complex and votes to seats conversion is not so
straight forward as in FPTP. It uses complex mathematical and statistical formulas to
convert votes into seats and also to maintain proportionality. Another downside of PR is
that it produces fragmented the party system. It encourages large number of splinter parties,
which are able to send their representative in Parliament. This makes formation of stable
government challenging. PR system, generally, produces coalition Government. The
proportionality in PR system is not perfect; it depends on many factors such as seats in a
constituency (District magnitude), voting threshold, formula used for seat conversion,
variants of PR system, etc. This further adds up to its complexity.
Proportional representation was first used in the mid-19th century in Denmark by Carl
Andrae and in Britain by Thomas Hare and John Stuart Mill. Currently more than 90
countries use PR electoral system. Most of the European nations except UK, France,
Germany, Italy, Latin American nations: Argentina, Brazil, and others -South Africa, South
Korea, Sri Lanka, etc. are using the PR system. In India, STV PR system is used for election
of President, Vice President, and Rajya Sabha members.
There are multiple variants of the PR system. Methods currently in use include the single-
transferable-vote method (STV), the party-list system, and the additional-member system
or Mixed-member proportional representation (MMPR). MMPR is actually a mixed or
hybrid system. This include features of both single member plurality system (SMP) and
party list system of PR.
Features of Proportional representation (PR) system

Proportionality:
• First and the foremost feature of the PR system. Proportionality is the USP( unique selling
proposition) of PR system.

• Proportionality means that numbers of the seats won by a party is proportional to the votes
obtained by it.
• Thus, there is direct relationship between the seats won by a party and the votes obtained
by it.
• However, Proportionality is never perfect. It depends upon many factors; these are:
o District Magnitude (numbers of seats in a constituency) : more the numbers of seats
in a constituency the more is proportionality.
▪ Therefore, in many countries entire nation is one constituency.
o Voting threshold: Parties have to win a minimum percentage of votes to get any
seat. For example, suppose the vote threshold is 5 %. It means any party must get
at least 5 % of total votes to be eligible to be allotted seats in proportion to votes
obtained.
▪ Thus, more the vote threshold the less is proportionality
o Formula used for seat conversion
▪ the two main formula are the largest-remainder rule and the highest-average
rule.
o variants of PR system
▪ Proportionality varies in STV, Party list, MMPR, etc.
Multimember Constituencies:
• Proportional representation systems use multimember constituencies, that is, more than one
candidate is elected from a single constituency
• In some cases, like in Germany, entire nation is a single constituency.
PR system generally produces coalition Government
• Smaller parties also get seats proportion to their vote’s percentage. Hence, large numbers
of parties are represented in parliament. Hence, difficult for a single party to get majority
of seats. Therefore, coalition Government is the feature of PR system
Complex and time consuming
• PR uses complex statistical methods to convert votes into seats and maintain
proportionality.
• This makes PR system complex and declaration of election results time consuming.

Geographic link between the representatives and constituency is broken.

• Especially in the closed party list PR system, the voters simply choses the party; they don’t
have any connection to the candidates. Thus, link of representative to constituency and
voters is not as clear as in FPTP.
PR system have multiple variants (variations)
• STV and party List are its two main types:
• Party List PR:
• Voters vote for party which declares list of party candidates who would be allotted
seats won by the party
• Generally entire nation is one constituency
• Open party list vs Closed Party list:
• Closed party list: Party declares list of candidates in order of preference;
voters are allowed only to choose party.
• For example, a party wins 10 seats on the basis of total vote’s
percentage. Then, first 10 names from top in the party list will be
nominated against these seats.
• Open party list: Parties declares their list of candidates without any
preference order. voters choose party and then give their choice of
candidate.
• Ex: Israel, most of European nations
• Single-Transferable-Vote ( STV) system
• Multi member constituency; 3-8 seats;
• fixed quota of votes, calculated by different formulas, required to be obtained by
the winning candidates
• Voters cast single vote with preference, that is, give rank 1,2,3,4…to each
candidate;
• 1st preference ( 1st rank) votes of all candidate counted; candidates getting more
votes than the quota are declared winner.
• If no candidate gets the required quota, preferences of bottom most candidates
transferred to other candidates till required numbers of winning candidates are
found.
• EX: Republic of Ireland and Malta

Merits & demerits of PR system
Merits of PR system De-Merits of PR system
Fairness: Seats are proportional to votes Complex winning formula, tough for masses
obtained to understand, time consuming counting
More diverse representation- mirroring society Strong and stable single-party government is
unlikely
Coalition Government is most likely
Minorities and other marginalized Splinter and small parties may crop up.
communities also get representation
Smaller parties and parties having widely Encourages extremism- smaller, single issue-
spread votes are not penalized based party may dictate
Votes are not wasted Proportionality depends on other factors (DM,

Votes of losing as well winning candidates are mixed, voting threshold, etc)
re-allotted to other remaining candidates This makes it even more complex
No tactical or strategic voting or manipulation No geographic and personal link between

of constituency boundaries(gerrymandering) representative, constituency, and voter
More inter-party co-ordination and co- More polarized party system

operation- less confrontationist politics Multi-party system
Parties spread across entire political
ideologies.
Offer more choices to voters- cutting across In multi member Districts and open party list
party line system, intra-party competition- less unified
and disciplined party structure
Balance of inter and intra-party competition Fragmentation of Party system
Currently, most popular electoral system Unsuitable for large but poor countries having
low levels of literacy and political awareness.

Conclusion:
PR system reflect more faithfully the people’s support to different political parties across
the political spectrum in a country. This is because of its feature of proportionality. In this
system the number of seats won by a party more or less is proportional to the percentage
of votes obtained by it. Because of this proportionality feature, PR system protect interests
of minority and other marginalised and divergent communities better in comparison to
simple plurality system such as FPTP. Because of these inherent strengths of the PR system
more and more mature democracies across the world are adopting this system.
But on the flip side, the PR system is not simple, it uses very complex statistical formula
for conversion of seats from votes and to maintain proportionality. In PR system, it takes
more time to declare the result and form the Government. It is also criticized for creating
fragmentation in the party system. This is because of the presence of many small splinter
and single-issue parties. This makes strong single party government almost impossible in
PR system. Generally, it produces a coalition government. This is also considered its
weakness. But it helps consensus building across the political spectrum which makes the
political culture more tolerant and consensus oriented.
We have seen in the above discussion that there are two main variation of the PR system.
First is Single Transferable Vote (STV) system in which the winning candidates are
required to obtain a fixed quota of votes. The constituencies are generally multi member.
In the 2nd variation, which is called party list system, each political party issues its list of
candidates, and voters are selecting the party in close party list system and both candidate
and party in the open party list system.
In a nutshell, we can say that proportional representation is more democratic in the sense
that it allows representation to all segments of population despite their political divergence
from the mainstream. It checks majoritarian and populist tendencies in democracy. It
makes political culture more tolerant and consensual. Hence, despite its complexity, PR
system is increasingly adopted in more and more mature democracies across the globe.

Q.3: Define electoral System. Distinguish between the ‘First Past the Post (FPTP) system and
Proportional Representation ( PR) system with suitable examples.
(Answer hint: For the first part of the question, refer to answer to Q.1 at page 31, here only the
second part of the question is answered)
Introduction:
First Past the Post (FPTP) and Proportional Representation (PR) are two of the most
prominent electoral system followed in democracies world over. FPTP is the simplest
variant (variation) of majoritarian electoral system whereas the PR is the generic name of
an electoral system with many variants in which proportionality between votes and seats
are maintained.
Before further discussion we should note that both these electoral systems are essentially
the rule for converting votes into seats won in an election; in other words, both of them are
formula for winning a seat. In the majoritarian system the winning candidate is either needs
to obtain an absolute majority of votes polled (more than 50%) or more votes than any
other candidate. The latter is the simplest variant of majoritarian system in which there is
single winner from a constituency and the winner only need to get most votes among all
competing candidates. This system is called single member simple plurality system, which
in common language is called first past the post (FPTP) system to indicate the nature of the
winning formula where the winning candidate simply need to be first among all candidates.
Thus, in FPTP, winner need not get majority of votes. For example, a candidate may win
in FPTP with only 25 % of votes, if each other candidate got even less votes than this.
In the PR system the number of seats won by a political party is more or less proportional
to the percentage of votes obtained by it. Two of the most common variant of PR system
is Single Transferable Vote ( STV) and party list system. In the party list system, each
political party declares list of its candidate for the multi member constituency. The voter
simply needs to choose a party. After the counting of votes the parties are allocated seats
in proportion to the votes obtained. In PR, each constituency has many representatives; in
some cases, such as in the Netherlands, the entire country is one constituency.
In the STV, in a multi member constituencies, the winning candidate needs to obtain more
than a fixed quota of votes which is calculated through a mathematical formula. Voters
give rank preferences to competing candidates. In the first round of voting only the first
preference votes of each candidate are counted and those candidates who obtain more than
the fixed quota of votes are declared winners. In case no candidate gets the required quota
of votes then the bottom most candidate is struck out and his/her second preference votes
are allocated to remaining candidate. This process is repeated until all the seats of the
constituencies are filled.

From the above discussion it is clear that FPTP and PR system are essentially based on
very different principle. In the FPTP the essence is its simplicity and straight forward rule
for winning a seat, whereas the essence of PR is its proportionality. But PR becomes
complicated as it uses complex mathematical formula and statistical methods for
conversion of votes into seats. Also, in FPTP there is a clear geographic and personal link
between the representative, the constituency, and the voter. Such clear link is lacking in the
PR system, especially in the party list system, in which the voters are not knowing for
which candidate are they voting. Many such differences can be found between FPTP and
PR electoral system.
In the following table the most important differences between the FPTP and PR systems are
enlisted with some examples:
Difference between the FPTP and PR electoral system:
Difference Point FPTP PR
Simplicity Very simple and straight forward rule Complex winning formula and
for winning a seat/election. time-consuming counting
Simple for voter to understand Uses Complex mathematical
Easy and less time-consuming vote formula and statistical tools for
conversion of votes into seats.
counting
For example, largest remainder is
Quicker result declaration
one such rule in which the total
number of votes obtained by a party
is divided by the number of seats,
or some similar formula.
Also, uses complex methods to
maintain proportionality.
Tough for voters to understand,
time consuming counting and result
declaration.
Proportionality No co-relation between vote and seat • Numbers of the seats won
percentage by a party is proportional to the
o for example, in 2014 general votes obtained by it.
election, BJP got 282 seats (51% of • However, Proportionality is
seats) with 31% of votes; In first never perfect. It depends upon

general election Congress won 364 of many factors, such as, numbers of
the 489 seats (74%) with 45% of seats in a constituency, vote
votes. threshold, Formula used for seat
o A party may win more seats conversion, special methods to
with fewer popular votes than its maintain proportionality, etc.
opponents, as occurred in 2018 MP For example, take vote threshold.
assembly election, where the BJP, suppose the vote threshold is 5 %.
despite getting 41.02 % ( in It means any party must get at least
comparison to 40.89% by Congress), 5 % of votes to be eligible to be
got lesser seats than those by the allotted seats in proportion to votes
Congress. obtained.
Thus, more the vote threshold the
less is proportionality
Ease in Govt Generally, easier and quick Govt Not so quick and easy way to form
formation formation. Government. This is mainly due to
no single party getting majority of
seats and presence of large
numbers of parties having few
seats.
Nature of Govt Generally, FPTP produces single Generally, PR system produces

produced by the party majority Govt, which is strong coalition Govt, which is not so
electoral system and stable. strong and stable.
Wastage of votes votes obtained by losing candidate votes obtained by losing candidate
obtained by losing are wasted. are not wasted.
candidate Thus, effectively the voters voting for They are re-allocated to remaining
losing candidate lose their candidates in STV.
representation. In party list system, all votes are
counted for seat conversion.
Nature of party As per Duverger’s Law, FPTP results PR, generally, results into multi-
system into Two-party system party system
o This is due to dis- Fragmented party system (many
proportionality in built into FPTP, splinter and smaller parties) is
which is unfavourable to 3rd and common feature of PR system
other smaller parties

Effect on political More partisan and conflictual More consensual political culture,
culture political culture as for coalition formation support
of all parties are required.
Link between Clear geographic link between the No clear geographic and personal
voter and Constituency and its representative link between the Constituency,
representative voters, and representatives.
Also, clear link between voters and
their representative. For example, in close party list
system, the voter simply chooses a
party, without knowing for which
candidate he/she is voting.
Representation to Minorities may lose representation in Minorities get better representation

minorities FPTP. in PR.
If votes of majority community are
polarized, the winning candidate may
not need minority votes.
Strategic or Because of the wastage of vote No need for nay strategic voting, as
tactical voting feature in FPTP, voters may vote not all votes are counted for seat
to get their preferred candidate conversion.
elected but to defeat the candidate
they don’t like.
Minorities and other excluded
categories of voters may vote in such
strategic manner.
Suitable for which Suitable for 1. Newly independent Suitable for country having great
type of country? country with low level of literacy and social diversity and heterogeneity.
political awareness. Party list system is suitable newly
2. Matured democracy which may independent country with low level
handle polarised and conflictual of literacy.
politics and total change of regimes
from one party to other.
Countries About 47 countries- USA, UK, More than 90 countries- Most of

following these Canada, India, Pakistan and other the European nations except UK,
systems Commonwealth nations France, Germany, Italy, Latin
American nations: Argentina,

Brazil, and others -South Africa,

South Korea, Sri Lanka
Conclusion:
In sum, FPTP and PR are two mainstream electoral rules for converting votes into seats.
Both are based on very different principle, have different features, and outcomes. In fact,
both seems to be pole apart.
Essence of FPTP is its simple and straightforward winning formula. Proportionality is the
essence of PR system. PR is better able to reflect the popular support to different political
parties across the political spectrum. Minorities and other diverse social groups get better
representation in PR. PR also does not suffer from manipulative techniques, such as,
tactical voting, Gerrymandering (manipulation of constituency borders), etc. found in
FPTP.
Because of these merits, despite its complexity, PR is being adopted by more and more
countries. Currently, PR is the most popular electoral system. It is followed in twice
numbers of countries following FPTP. In many countries following FPTP, campaigns are
on to shift to PR. Even in UK, the originator of FPTP, shifting to PR has become an
important political debate.
Q.4: Write a short note on Mixed representation system.

Answer Template:
As the name suggest, Mixed representation is a hybrid electoral system. In this system
features of both simple plurality system such as FPTP and proportional representation
system are combined. Objective to mix two different electrical system is to balance the dis-
proportionality of the majoritarian (simple plurality system) system by the PR system and
also to take advantage of the clear linkage between the representative and the voters of the
majoritarian system. Thus, the mixed representation system is trying not only to take
advantage of FPTP and PR system but also trying to minimize their dis-advantages. But
this also makes the mixed representation system more complex and result declaration more
time consuming. The system also has to use complex methods using statistical formula to
distribute seats and maintain proportionality. This further adds up to its complexity.
Mixed representation is called mixed member proportional representation (MMPR) or
Additional Members system. It is considered as a variant of proportional representation (
PR) system in which some seats are elected through constituency wise voting using FPTP.

In the mixed representation system, the total seats in the legislative body are divided into
two parts. For one part of the seats, the voters elect representative from their constituency
through majoritarian or simple plurality system such as FPTP. While for the remainder of
the seats, voter cast their vote through the party list system of proportional representation.
Thus, in this hybrid system, voter cast two votes- one for candidate representing their
constituency and second vote for the political party as per the party list. It should be noted
that the total seat distribution in the legislative body is, however, decided only on the basis
of the votes received in the party list PR system. For the constituency wise simple plurality
voting generally single member are represented from each constituency; whereas for the
party list the multi member constituencies are the norm.
Best example of mixed representation system is election for the German parliament
Bundestag. Half of the total seats in the Bundestag is elected by proportional representation
and remaining half by simple plurality voting in single-member constituencies. Each voter
casts two ballots/votes. The first vote is cast for an individual to represent a constituency.
The candidate receiving the most votes wins the election. The second vote is cast for a
regional party list. The results of the second vote determine the overall seat sharing between
parties in the Bundestag. All parties that receive at least 5 percent of the national vote or
win at least three constituencies are allocated seats on the basis of the percentage of votes
that they receive through the party list PR voting. The votes of parties not receiving
representation are re-allocated to the larger parties on the basis of their share of the votes
in the party list voting.
Other countries which have followed the German system include Italy, Japan, New
Zealand, and several eastern European countries, such as, Hungary, Russia, and Ukraine.
Altogether about nine countries follow the mixed representation system.
Features of the mixed representation system are:
• Two- vote system:
o voters cast first vote for the candidate representing his or her constituency and
second vote for non-constituency representatives through party list PR system.
• Division of numbers of seats between constituency and non-constituency seats varies from
country to country. For example, in Italy and Japan, respectively, roughly three-fourths and
three-fifths of all seats are constituency seats. Whereas in Germany 50 % of total seats are
constituency seats.
• The seat sharing formula in the legislative body is decided only on the basis of votes
received through the second vote, that is, the party list PR system.
• The system combines the benefit of clear geographic and personal linkage of representative
with the constituency and voters as well as the proportionality of the PR system.
• The system uses all the votes cast to the parties and no vote is wasted. For this, different
formulas are used.
• To maintain proportionality multiple methods are used. Two most common formula or
methods for this are the largest remainder method and the highest average method.
o Parties winning more seats than the proportion of votes, their seats are adjusted
using overhang seat formula. On the contrary, some parties receive extra seats
called ‘balance seats’ to maintain proportionality. In some cases, the size of the
legislative body is increased to maintain the proportionality.
• Vote Threshold:
o in many countries vote threshold is also applied in this system, that is, a party must
get at least a certain percentage of total votes or some minimum numbers of
constituency seats to get seats in proportion to the votes obtained through PR
system.
o For example, in Germany, a party should get 5% of the total votes in the party list
or it should win at least 3 constituency seats. In New Zealand, a party must win at
least one constituency seat to be eligible to get seats in the proportion to votes
obtained through the party list PR system.
In sum, mixed representation system combines the simple plurality system like FPTP with
party list PR system. This allows the system to take advantage of merits of both the systems
while minimizing their de-merits. But this makes the system more complex. Division of
seats between constituency and non- constituency seats, statistical formula to allocate seats
in proportion to votes in the PR system, methods to maintain proportionality, and ways to
manage the ‘over-hang votes’, etc. makes the system very complex. This may be the reason
that only few countries in the world are using this system despite its being most balanced
system.

THEME 3: PARTIES AND PARTY SYSTEMS
3.A: CBCS SYLLABUS
• Historical contexts of the emergence of the party system

• Types of parties and party system
3.B: KEY POINTS
Political party:
• Political Party is an organized group, often with common ideologies, political aims and
opinions, which aims to acquire and exercise political power to influence public policy.
• As per Leon D. Epstein, Political Party is a group that “seeks to elect governmental
officeholders under a given label”.
• As per Maurice Duverger, Political Party is a class, a doctrine (set of ideologies).
Role & functions of Political parties:
• Political Parties aggregate and articulate societal interests, public opinion, and policy
demands.
• They offer choice to people in choosing political ideologies, policy options, and governing
vision.
• They form Government and help implement policies for socio-economic development.
• Political Parties recruit, train, and nominate political leaders as representatives of people.
• Political Parties are essential channel for representation in democratic politics.
• Governments in modern era, democratic, authoritarian, or totalitarian, cannot be imagined
without political parties.
Types of Parties:
• On the basis of ideology or position on ideological spectrum
• Left parties
• Communist, Socialist, Social Democrats (center-left), Green, Liberals
(center-left on Social issues)

• Right Parties
• Conservatives, Liberals(economy),Fascist, Christian Democrats (centre-
Right), Nationalist
• On the basis of organization and target voters
• Cadre, Mass, Catch-all, Party
• Cadre party: elite parties in the beginning of democracy in UK and USA.
Small size of membership limited to few, those having property, social
status, personality, etc.. For example, the Whigs and the Tories in UK and
the Federalists and the anti-federalists in USA.
• Mass party: Parties offering membership to masses, raises national issues,
and have wide electoral base; for example, Socialist Parties in 20th century
Europe; German Social Democratic Party (SPD) and the UK Labour Party
• Catch-all party: Parties which aim to get votes from all class/sections/
interests; for example, the Congress and the BJP in India
• Ideological attachment ( by Hitchner & Levine)
• Pragmatic parties, Doctrinal parties and Interest parties.
• Pragmatic parties: don’t have any fixed ideology; quite flexible in making
alliances to gain power. For example, SP, BSP, & RJD in India
• Doctrinal parties: Have fixed party ideology; for example, CPI in India
• Interest parties: Representing specific interests of a section/segment of
population; for example, Farmers' League in Sweden;
• Constitutional vs. Revolutionary parties
• Constitutional parties: who believe in constitution and work within its framework:
Congress, BJP, and all mainstream parties in the world
• Revolutionary party: Hindustan Socialist Republican Army by C.S.Azad;
Revolutionary Socialist Party ; currently many political parties uses the tag
‘revolutionary’, world over, but they don’t reject the constitution completely.
• Representative and Integrative parties (by Sigmund Neumann (1956))
• Representative: reflect, represent, and channelize public opinion- Catch all parties
• Integrative: shape public opinion by political mobilization- Socialist Parties
• Party of Government vs Party of Opposition
• Liberals, Conservatives, Christian Democrats and Social Democrats- habitually
governing parties

• Communist, Regionalists, Environmentalists and Nationalists - habitually opposing

parties
Party System:
• Party System denotes number, nature, ideological make up, interactions, and inter-
relationships among political parties in a political system at a given time.
• As per Heywood, party system is a relatively stable network of relationships between
parties that is structured by their number, size and ideological orientation.
• As per Duverger, Party systems are described by the number of parties within a political
system during a given time, along with their internal structures, their ideologies, their
respective sizes, alliances, and types of opposition, competitions, etc.
• As per Sartori , party system is a system of interaction between political parties in a
political system.
Factors determining types of Party System:

• Electoral Rule
• Duverger’s Law: FPTP- two party system
• Proportional Representation - multi-party system
• Social Cleavages (Societal fault lines) by Rokkan & Lipset
• European Societies: Rural/urban; center/periphery; worker/owner; church/state
• Asian & African post-colonial States: Caste, ethnicity, language, Religion
• Institutional structure or design of the State/Government
• Federal or Unitary;
• Presidential or Parliamentary
• Time: Maturity of political system
• Larger Socio-political context; political culture; major political events- partition,
Constitutional changes, etc.
Types of party system:

• Single party system
• Pseudo(false) party system- as at least two parties required to form a party system.
• Hegemonic- hegemony of single party

• Single party dominance

• Two Party system
• Distinct vs Indistinct Bi-partisan system
• Two plus half party ( 3rd party) system
• prolonged Dominance of one party
• Multi- party system
• Moderate Pluralism
• Polarized Pluralism
• Fragmented party system
• Two broad coalition System

3. C: ANSWER TEMPLATES TO PAST YEAR’S AND OTHER

IMPORTANT QUESTIONS
Q.1: What do you mean by political party and party system? Differentiate
party from party system in comparative politics.
Answer Template
Introduction:
In representative democracy Political Party plays essential role of helping people choose
their representatives in organized and meaningful way. Political parties organize and
articulate public opinion, policy demands, and larger societal interests. They offer choice
to people in choosing political ideologies, policy options, and governing vision. They form
Government and help implement policies for socio-economic development. Political
parties recruit, train, and nominate political leaders as representatives of people. Thus,
Political Parties are essential channel for representation in democratic politics.
Political Parties are defined in many ways. Simplest definition is that Political Party is a
group of persons organized to acquire and exercise political power. As per Leon D. Epstein,
Political Party is a group that “seeks to elect governmental officeholders under a given
label”. As per Maurice Duverger, Political Party is a class, a doctrine (set of ideologies).
In a nutshell, we may define Political Party as an organized group, often with common
ideologies, political aims and opinions, which aims to acquire and exercise political power
to influence public policy.
Political Parties can be categorized in many ways. On the basis of ideological leaning, they
may be called right, left, or centrist party. Traditionally Communist, Socialist, Social
Green, etc. are considered left parties. Whereas Conservatives, Fascist, Nationalist are
labeled as right parties. Liberals, Social Democrats, Christian Democrats are categorized
as centrist parties. On the basis of organization and target voters, parties may be Cadre
party, Mass party, and Catch-all party. For example, in India, the Congress in its early years
after formation, the CPI, and the BJP can be called cadre, mass, and catch-all party
respectively.
Party System, on the other hand, denotes interaction and inter-relationship- cooperation,
competition- between Political Parties of a political system. As per Heywood, Party System
is a relatively stable network of relationships between parties that is structured by their
number, size and ideological orientation. For Duverger, Party systems are described by the
number of parties within a political system during a given time, along with their internal
structures, their ideologies, their respective sizes, alliances, and types of opposition. As per
Giovanni Sartori, Party System is a system of interaction between political parties in a
political system. Thus, in sum, interactions and inter-relationship among Political Parties
in a political system give rise to Party System. Over a time, like any other system, the Party
System also becomes a self-sustaining and autonomous.
Party system are generally categorized based on numbers of Political Parties in a political
system. Thus, it can be single, two-, or multi-party system. This is how Duverger classified
Party System. Within this broad classification, Sartori further categorized Political Parties
on many criteria. For example, single party system may be further divided into Hegemonic
and Single party dominance system. Multi-party system, as per Sartori, can be categorized
as Moderately polarized, polarized Pluralism, and Fragmented or atomized party system.
Having outlined the meaning, definition, and broad types of Political Parties and Party System, in
the next section of the answer I will try to list out the differences between them.
Difference between Political Party and Party System

Political Party and Party System are different in meaning, definition, and functions. Party
System is made up of Political Parties. They are the building blocks of the Party System.
But both have different functions in representative democracy. They are not one and same.
Following table list out the differences between them:
Basis of Political Party Party System

comparison
Meaning An organized group, often with common Number, nature of their structure
ideologies, political aims and opinions, and ideological make up, and
which aims to acquire and exercise interactions among political
political power to influence public parties in a political system at a
policy given time.
Relationship Parties are the building block of party Political parties are the main
among them system components of the Party System.
Number, nature, and interactions of In turn, nature of Party System
parties determine party system also affects nature and types of
For example, party system is categorized political parties.
on the basis of number of Political Party System is dependent
Parties- two-party system, multi-party variable; they cannot exist without
system, etc Political Party.

Political parties are independent

variable; they can exist even without
existence of Party System; for example,
single party regimes.
Relation to Party form Govt, they oppose Govt Party system affect Govt
Govt formation; for example, coalition
Government in multi-party system
Relation to In single party totalitarian rule, the party Institution of the State, reflecting
State represent the state, virtually become one. the larger political culture and
In other regimes also, the ruling party political system of the state.
represent and exercise the state power
Influence on Directly affect the policy formulation No direct influence on public

public policy policies.
Part of the larger political system.
Political Political Party represent a particular Party System represent a spectrum

ideology political ideology of political ideologies in a political
system.
Endurance Party come and go, merge with others, Party system remains for ever-
grow & shrink permanent feature
Individual Individuals may affect party- Denote Institution, structure of

agency vs charismatic leader, Leader party, etc political system
structure
Time to evolve Parties may emerge quickly, almost in a It takes considerable amount of
moment; similarly, they also may vanish time to evolve a party system.
quickly. Once evolved, it is quite enduring(
long lasting).
Examples BJP, Congress, Democrats, Republican, Single party, two party, multi-party
Conservatives, Liberals system

Discussion and Conclusion:

Political Party is organized group of people, like a class, who are sufficiently like-minded,
share common ideologies, and work together to acquire political power (form Government)
to further policies which promote their interests as well as ensure, in their view, good life
for the community. In simple words, political party is a group of persons organized to
acquire and exercise political power.
Party System emerges from the inter-relationships and interactions of political parties in a
political system. In long run, it becomes a self-sustaining system having distinct features
reflecting the political culture of the larger political system.
From the definition itself it is clear that both Political Party and Party System have different
meaning, roles, and functions. Party System is made up of political parties. Without
political party, there is no Party System. However, reverse is not true. political party may
exist without any observable Party System. For example, the single party regime. As the
parties start interacting and develop a certain kind of relationships among them, party
system emerges. With time they acquire certain features unique to that political system. In
a sense, political party is independent variable whereas Party System is dependent variable
contingent( dependent) on political parties.
Both the Political Party and Party System reflect the larger socio- cultural context, political
history, lessons learned, and political culture of the country. In turn, both of them affect
the political culture and the political system in which they play out their activities. For
example, electoral rule may determine the type of Party System- FPTP resulting into 2-
party system- but Party System also start influencing the electoral system and larger
political culture. For example, two- party system may result into sharply polarized partisan
politics but ideologically both the parties may come closer to the center, minimizing the
ideological difference. Multi-party system, on the other hand, may give way to
ideologically more diverse but more consensual political culture.
In sum, political parties are indispensable for politics in Modern era. It doesn't matter
whether a political system is democratic, authoritarian or totalitarian, political parties are
required in all forms of governments. They are one which mobilizes people, articulate
interests, and influence public policies for socio-economic development. Party System, on
the other hand, represent the numbers, types, interactions, and inter-relationships among
political parties in a political system. Party System is one of most important features of any
political system. It reflects as well as influences the overall political culture of the nation.

Q.2: What are the major party systems? Discuss the merits and demerits of a
two-party system compared to a multi-party system.
Answer Template
Introduction:
Number, nature of their structure and ideological make up, interactions, and inter-
relationships among political parties in a political system at a given time gives rise to Party
System. Like any system, the Party System, given sufficient time, also becomes self-
sustaining and autonomous. Party System is one the most important features of political
system of any country. It reflects the overall socio-political context and political culture of
the nation.
Party System can be categorized on many criteria, each producing different types of Party
System. Most simple criteria, used by Duverger, is number of Political Parties in a Party
System. On this criteria, Party System may be classified as single party, two-party, and
multi-party. Giovanni Sartori, Italian political scientist specialized in studies of party
system, however took the criteria of ideological separation among the parties in a political
system. On this basis he categorized Party System as Moderate Pluralism, polarized
Pluralism, and Fragmented or atomized party system.
As the names suggest, Moderate Pluralism denotes presence of many parties among whom
ideological differences are not much. On the contrary, in the polarized Pluralism, parties
are found across entire ideological spectrum- from far left to far right. Finally, Fragmented
Party System, each party has different ideology, making them behave as autonomous atom,
hence another name of atomized pluralism.
However, for this answer, I am taking the Duverger’s classification, in which the major
Party System are two party and multi-party system. Single party system is also considered
a separate type, but strictly speaking, one party cannot make a system, for which at least
two parties are required.
In the next section of the answer, I am discussing the nature, features, merits and demerits of both
the major party systems- two party and multi-party system.
Two party System
If in a political system, there exist only two party or two dominant parties having any real chance
of forming Government, this gives rise to two party system.
• Distinguishing features:
• Not more than 2 parties at any given time have a genuine chance of gaining power
• One of these is able to form Govt of its own without help of 3rd party, other provide
strong opposition, that function as party in waiting and form shadow cabinet.
• Over a period of time power alternate between two parties

• Such a system is often referred to as majority parliamentarianism

• Sub-Types: (given by James Jupp)
• Indistinct (not very clear) bi-partisan (two party) system;
• Not much ideological separation between two parties
• Not very strict intra-party discipline.
• Ex: USA- democrats and republican parties come together on many
ideological issues
• Distinct bi-partisan system;
• Good amount of ideological separation between two major parties
• Very tight intra-party discipline
• Ex: UK- Labour and Conservative parties
• Variations:
• 3rd party may grow and challenge two party- 3 party system ( Ex: Liberals in UK
1918-31)
• One party may rule for several years ( National Party in New Zeeland 1975-1999)-
Looks more like a dominant party system
• Reflect maturity of democratic political system;
• UK (Conservative vs Labour), USA (Democrats vs Republican) being the best
examples.
• In matured democracies in Western Europe: Socialist vs non-socialist parties.
• Examples: UK, USA, Canada (Liberal vs Conservative) , Australia( Liberal vs Labour),
and New Zealand( before 1993)(National vs Labour), Germany (Christian Democratic
Union vs Social Democratic Party)
Multi-party system:
Consistent and electorally significant presence of more than 3 parties may be termed as multi-party
system
Features:
• Coalition Govt are defining features of Multi-party system; Because of large numbers of
electorally significant parties, it is difficult for any one party to obtain majority of seats in
parliament and form a majority Government.
• Hence, such systems are also called non-majority parliamentarianism. This is because no
single party usually get majority of seats in parliament.
• Types (depending upon ideological separation, nature of interaction)- (given by Sartori)

• Moderate Pluralism
• Ideological differences between major parties are not much
• There is a general inclination to form coalitions and move towards the
center of the ideological spectrum.
• Example: Belgium, Sweden, the Netherlands and Norway
• Polarized Pluralism
• more marked ideological differences between major parties, some of which
may adopt an anti-system stance
• Example: France, Italy and Spain until the 1990s
• Fragmented or atomized party system
• Each party has different ideology, making them behave as autonomous
atom, hence another name of atomized pluralism
• Existence of Deep social cleavages, and many parties to represent these
cleavages.
• Example: Italy, Netherland, Thailand, Austria, and many erstwhile eastern
bloc nations.
• Other variations/types
• Two and half party system: Example: Germany two large- CDU and SDP and 3rd
competing party- Free Democrat Party
• Predominant party system: One large party and many smaller parties, some of
them represented in Govt. Example: Japan in the postwar era
Merits and demerits of a two-party system compared to a multi-party system.

Let us first discuss the Merits and demerits of a two-party system; the following table list
out them.
Merits of two-party system De-merits of two-party system
Strong, stable, accountable, and effective Limited choice: people can choose only between
government two parties. Also, ideologically both parties come
Generally able to produce stable and strong towards center of ideological spectrum, further
limiting the effective choice.
single party majority Government.

Predictability- people know very well both Complete change in policy direction with change
the parties which forms Government in Government. This is because of single party
alternatively majority rule.
Clear accountability: Government is clearly Highly polarized partisan politics. Entire nation,
responsible to the voters, as it is a single politically, divides into two parts.
party majority Government.
Faster Govt. formation Majoritarianism and populism: either of both the

Unlike multi-party system, Government parties may adopt populist methods, undermining
rights to minorities, marginalized and other
formation is much faster.
excluded communities
Denote political maturity- a mature political Irresponsible party government- impossible

culture promises in election manifesto
This may lead to popular dis-affection from party
politics; people losing faith in Political Parties.
People have a clear choice between two Status Quo: no much change is expected.
well-known parties. This is also due to ideological convergence of
both the parties.
Strong opposition: this keeps the High entry barriers for small, single issue parties.
Government in check and make to more Makes politics more centrist, predictable,
sensitive to people’s demands. uniform, and unexciting.
Now let us see the Merits and demerits of a multi-party system.
Merits of multi-party system De-merits of multi-party system
Internal checks and balances within government Difficulty in Govt formation

This is because of the coalition Government, which is This is its biggest demerit
most likely in multi-party system This is because no single party is likely
to get majority of seats.

More consensual political system/culture: Favours post-election negotiations and horse-

debate, conciliation and compromise among different trading
political ideologies/view-points. Time consuming Government
formation.
Avoid pitfalls of majoritarianism and populism; less pitfalls and difficulties of running
chance of any party adopting populist measures. coalition Government
Splinter and smaller parties may raise
unreasonable demands.
More effective choice to people: choices available Party fragmentation

across the entire political spectrum- from extreme left May lead to atomized or fragmented
to extreme right. party system.
Broad responsiveness on part of Govt which take Weak and unstable coalition
account of competing views and contending interests. Government.
Again, this is due to compulsion of coalition
Government.
Citizens are more politically aware and active In moderate pluralism, all parties
moving to ideological center, offering
little effective choice
Allows small parties, single issue movements to raise Pragmatism preferred over ideology
their voice through party system. This makes and principles
democracy more substantive. This is due to compulsion of forming a
coalition Government.
Conclusion:
On the basis of number of Political Parties in a political system, two major types of Party
System are – two party and multi-party systems. Both have distinct nature, feature, merits
and demerits. Many factors determine why a political system develops two party or multi-
party system. But electoral rule plays the most important role. As per the Duverger law,
single member district simple plurality system, commonly known as FPTP system give rise
to two party system. Whereas, the proportional representation (PR) system leads to multi-
party system.
Generally, two party produces single party majority Government which are strong, stable,
and decisive Government. On the contrary, multi-party system generally produces coalition

Government, whose formation is difficult, complex, and time consuming. They are also
considered weak, unstable, and not very decisive Governments. But on the other hand,
multi-party system give way to more consensual and tolerant political culture which may
lack in two party system.
Thus, both these major Party Systems have their merits & de-merits. No one is better or
worse than other. Depending upon the larger socio-cultural contexts, political culture,
historical experiences, etc. either of them may be more suited to a particular country.
Q.3: Differentiate party from party system. Explain the evolution & growth of
party system in the modern world.
(Answer hint: For the first part of the question, refer to answer to Q.1 at page 52, here only the
second part of the question is answered)
Introduction:
Evolution of party system is political phenomenon of modern era. During the ancient and
medieval periods, most of world’s regions were ruled by big empires and monarchs. Under
these monarchical regimes, there was no concept of political party.
But with rise of new capitalist social order, the absolute monarchical rule was challenged,
first in England, and then in other European countries such as France. People, especially
the new rising professional or capitalist class demanded political power. This gave rise to
parliament in England after the glorious revolution in 1688. With this, political factions or
cliques (groups) started to emerge on political scenes. These factions or cliques were group
of people having similar ideologies and political interests. They represented interests of
different sections of the society as per the social cleavages (social fault lines) existing in
the society. With time, these factions developed into Political Parties. With passage of
times, the interactions and inter-relationships among these parties produced Party System.
Before further discussing the evolution of Party System in different parts of the world, let
us see the factors which determine the nature and type of Party System in a political system.
Factors determining the evolution of Party System:
• Electoral Rule
• Duverger’s Law: majority system with single-member districts ( FPTP) produces
two party system
• Proportional Representation (PR) system results into multi-party system

• Social Cleavages
• Given by Rokkan & Lipset ;
• Social cleavages are fault lines in societal make up around which Party System
evolve:
• Social cleavages in European society: Rural vs urban; center vs periphery; workers
vs owner; church vs state
• Social cleavages in Asian & African post-colonial States: Caste, ethnicity,
language, Religion.
• Institutional structure or design of the State/Government

• Federal or unitary;
• Federal system results into many regional or state parties.
• Presidential or Parliamentary
• Presidential system: non-distinct bi-partisan system
• Parliamentary system: distinct bi-partisan system
• Time: Maturity of political system
• More time, more stable Party System.
• Larger Socio-political context; political culture; major events, such as wars, partition,
constitutional changes, etc.
Evolution of political parties and party system

• Started in 17th – 18th Century England: the Tories & the Whigs were formed from
factions/cliques around feudal lords and wealthy merchants/Bankers ; later on, Tories
became the Conservative party and Whigs became the Liberal party
• 18-19th Century mainland Europe: Liberal (Bourgeois Elites) vs Conservatives (Landed
aristocrats) parties; they were elite or cadre parties.
• Early 20th Century: Socialist party emerged as mass party to articulate workers/loburers
interests. Agrarian parties emerged in Nordic Countries during this time.
• Post 1917 Bolsheviks revolution- Communist party came out of Socialist parties as cadre
based ideological party
• Inter war period: 1918-39: Fascist Parties (based on fascism) emerged in Italy, Germany,
France, Spain and many other European nations

• Post WWII: Christian democratic parties, Catholic in inspiration, denoting combinations

of social conservatism and economic liberalism, emerged in mainland Europe.
• During 1960s, Regional, or sub-state nationalist parties, representing distinct territorial or
cultural entities, appeared in Europe; For Example: Scottish national party, Basque party
• During 1970s: Environmental/Green parties emerged with support drawn from young,
educated, middle-class voters anxious over ecological degradation, gender discrimination,
human rights, nuclear power, and animal rights
• Greens were labeled as ‘New Left’; in reaction to them emerged ‘New Right’- law and
order, patriotism, and personal morality issues.
• Last decades of 20th Century: Nationalist Parties- national pride, cultural continuity, social
conservativism, Statism, free market economy- emerged in Europe in reaction to Elitism,
Entitlements, and cosmopolitanism
• Thus, except in UK, Europe has matured multi-party system dominated by Christin
Democrat (center-right, conservative), and social democrat (center-left, liberal).
Evolution of political parties and party system- USA:

• 1790s -1820: 1ST Party System: Federalist Vs. anti- Federalist (Democratic-
Republican) party
• Federalist wanted strong central Government, closer relation with England.
• Anti-federalist: more powers to states, less close to UK than France.
• 1830s-1860- 2nd Party System: Whigs (break up faction of Democratic-
Republican, some federalists, and other groups) vs Democratic-Republican party
• 1860s-1890s: 3rd party system: Republican (Whigs) vs Democrats (Democratic-
Republican)
• Republican, led by Abraham Lincoln, won civil war, unified USA,
abolished Slavery in southern states, and protected minority rights
• Interest and voter re-alignment happened during 4th (progressive era) and 5th (New
deal party system)
• Currently (6th party system): matured two-party system
• Republican have support in south, rural and sub-urban areas, among white
lower-middle class, and wealthy businessmen;
• Democrats gets support from African-Americans, Latinos, other
immigrants and white urban progressives- urban liberal middle class

Evolution of party and party system in Post-colonial States:

• During de-colonisation (1946-65) political parties emerged in post-colonial
nations. Most of them were parties which led national independence movements.
Later on, other parties emerged to represent social cleavages, different political
ideologies and socio-political contexts.
• The first Government was formed by the national movement party, which gave rise
to single party dominant party system.
• Social Mechanisms and cleavages which created political parties and party systems
were different in post-colonial states than those in developed/matured democracies.
Caste ( India), Language, Ethnicity( Africa), etc were other Cleavages around with
party politics grew.
• However, in late 1950s and 60s, in many post-colonial African and Asian nations,
single party dictatorship started. Most of these parties were the party of national
independent movement. They were led by very popular charismatic leaders.
• In some countries, such as Japan, India, Malaysia, South Africa, single party
dominated despite open electoral competition.
• In 3rd wave of democracy starting 1980s, and especially in post-cold war era, many
of these countries, such as Ghana, Malaysia, Mexico, Pakistan etc returned to multi-
party democratic system.
• Most of the Post-colonial States have fragmented party system.
• Party system is still evolving in these Post-colonial States.
Party system in erstwhile communist bloc states of eastern Europe

• Similarly, in the erstwhile communist bloc states of eastern Europe, party system
is in flux;
• After adoption of democratic form of Government, political parties are emerging
and vanishing in short time. Hence, party system has not settled in these nations.
• In many of these nations, the communist party, which ruled the totalitarian regimes,
are banned, except in Russia.
Conclusion:
Evolution of Party System is a modern era political phenomenon. Political Parties and Party
System started to emerge in 17th century England with the rise of capitalist social order.
The new powerful capitalist class, along with feudal lords, got political power in form of
parliament against the absolute monarchs. This resulted into factions or cliques around

which Political Parties developed. Most of these parties were cadre party, membership to
which was limited to elite and entitled class. It was a close class just like the capitalist class.
Franchisee was limited only to propertied and landed class.
All this changed with rise of socialism in early 20th century. Socialist/communist parties
were mass parties. They opened their membership to labour, worker, peasants, and other
common or mass people. This also resulted into more franchise rights to poor and
uneducated people. Post Bolshevik revolution, communist parties emerged from the
socialist parties. With this Party System also changed. Rise of fascist parties during inter-
war period gave a different dimension to Party System in Europe. But soon, with the end
of WWII, Fascist parties were eliminated from the political scene. In mainland Europe, the
social cleavage of religion vs state played out in form of rise of conservative Christian
democrat parties. On the other ideological spectrum were liberal democratic parties, which
followed classical liberalism. All this gave rise to a very distinct party system in Europe.
As explained above, party system in USA started as an extension to those in the Europe,
but with time, and also due to distinct political culture and socio-cultural context, USA
developed a very different two-party system.
Post-colonial states saw Political Parties coming out of national independent movements.
The party which led the national movement formed the first Government after
independence. They became the dominant party. The party system showed features of
single party dominance, as in first 25 years after independence in India. Slowly with time,
other political parties emerged on political scene based on the existing social cleavages and
prevalent political ideologies. Many of these post-colonial state saw fragmented party
system as well as single party authoritarian rule.
In sum, Party System evolve over time in a country, reflecting the larger socio-political
context and political culture. In turn, Party System start influencing the political system
and larger political culture. Evolution of party system is still ongoing in many parts of the
world, especially erstwhile communist bloc of nations and many post-colonial states.
Q.4: Discuss party system in contemporary times in the context of developing

countries.
Answer Template:
Introduction:
Political Party is an organized group, often with common ideologies, political aims and
opinions, which aims to acquire and exercise political power to influence public policy.
Number, nature of their structure and ideological make up, interactions, and inter-

relationships among political parties in a political system at a given time give rise to Party
System.
Most of the developing nations are post-colonial States which became independent after
the second world war. Most of these developing nations adopted democratic form of
government on the pattern of their colonial masters. The political party of the National
Movement which led the nation to independence became the dominant party and formed
Government after the independence. These national movement parties were led by
charismatic leaders having mass popularity. They were also the tallest leaders of national
movement for independence; for example, Jawaharlal Nehru of Indian National Congress
in India, Kwame Nkrumah of Convention People's Party in Ghana, Robert Mugabe of
Zimbabwe African National Union (ZANU) in Zimbabwe, etc. Many other parties,
subsequently, emerged in these countries. They were based on the social cleavages of those
societies. But none of them could challenge the dominant party of national movement. The
Party System in these developing countries in few decades after their independence was
single party dominant system. In the categorical framework of Sartori, some of those single
party systems was hegemonic, that is, the dominant party had hegemony on Government
and state institutions.
But by 1960s, because of many factors, but especially the problem of simultaneous State-
Building and nation-building and keeping pace with economic development, most of these
fledgling (inexperienced, new) democracies became single party authoritarian regime.
Ironically, the party and the leader who led the country to Independence also led the
authoritarian regimes. for example, Kwame Nkrumah and his Convention People's Party
in Ghana, and Robert Mugabe and his ZANU in Zimbabwe. Similar pattern developed in
Indian subcontinent (Pakistan and Bangladesh) where military authoritarian rule replaced
fledgling democratic regimes.
But by 1980s, especially after fall of USSR, under the third wave of democratization, most
of these developing nations returned back to democratic form of government. Thereafter,
under the democratic regimes, party system started to take shape. But the party system of
these developing nations is not stable, mature, and institutionalized. It shows institutional
weaknesses of the political system in developing nations.
Majority of the Political Parties in these post-colonial states are personalistic (revolve
around a strong leader), non-transparent and lack ideological coherence, and people’s trust.
In many surveys in developing nations, political parties, as an institution in democracy,
find themselves ranked in the bottom.
In the next section of the answer, I will try explain in brief the evolution of Party System in
developing nations, their features, and current status.

Evolution of party and party system in developing nations (Post-colonial States)

• During de-colonization (1946-65), after end of second world war, political parties emerged
in post-colonial nations. Most of them were parties which led national independence
movements. Later on, other parties emerged to represent social cleavages and socio-
political contexts in these nations.
• Social Mechanisms and cleavages which created political parties and party systems were
different in post-colonial nations than those in developed/matured democracies. Caste
(India), Language, Ethnicity (Africa), etc were other social cleavages around with party
politics grew.
• In most of these post-colonial States, the party of national movement became the dominant
party and formed Governments. Other parties, though in large numbers, could not
challenge the hegemony of the dominant party of national movement.
• However, in late 1950s and 60s, in many post-colonial African and Asian nations, single
party dictatorship started. Ironically, the most popular leader of national movement became
the authoritarian ruler with the help of the dominant party.
• For Example: Convention People's Party of Kwame Nkrumah in Ghana, National
Liberation Front in Liberia, CCM of Julius Nyerere in Tanzania, ZANU-PF of
Robert Mugabe in Zimbabwe, General Ershad’s People’s Party in Bangladesh,
President Mobutu’s Popular Movement of the Revolution in Zaire, Institutional
Revolutionary Party in Mexico, etc
• In some countries, such as Japan, India, Malaysia, South Africa, single party dominated
despite open electoral competition.
• In some countries, like Mexico, single party dominance was by exploiting loopholes in
rules and by manipulations.
• In the 3rd wave of democracy (coined by Huntington), in the post-cold war era, many of
these countries, such as Ghana, Malaysia, Mexico, Pakistan etc returned to multi-party
democratic system.
• But in most of these countries political party and party system shows signs of institutional
weaknesses. Centralized decision making, the lack of well-institutionalized rules and
procedures, and the decline of ideology or unifying principles are the features of most of
the parties in these developing nations. This has eroded legitimacy and trust of political
parties in the eyes of common people.
Features of Party System in developing nations

• Party system is still emerging – new parties are formed and vanishes frequently.

• Merger and extinction of parties from election to election. This makes the Party System
unstable.
• Most of the ruling parties emerged from national movements. Only now they are facing
serious challenges from the parties which emerged after the independence. For example,
in India, the BJP, which was formed in 1980, is the dominant party now. But in many other
developing countries, such as in south Africa, the national movement party is still the
dominant party.
• Thus, party system in most of these post-colonial states, till 3rd wave of democratization,
can be categorized as Dominant party system.
• In many of these countries, such as in Ghana, Zimbabwe, Tanzania, etc., national
movement party of popular charismatic leader became the medium for authoritarian
regimes.
• Socialism was declared ideology of majority of these parties, which ruled the authoritarian
regimes, but actually they are pragmatic in practice. They have little ideological coherence.
• Of late, starting 21st century, Populism is on rise in many of the developing countries. For
example, Chavez regime in Venezuela and Fujimori regime in Peru.
• Party system in Post-colonial developing countries is still evolving. They require time for
maturation, as in UK and USA. Currently, they show signs of institutional weakness and
reflect the general weaknesses of democratic institutions in these developing nations.
Features of party system in the developing post-communist countries:

• Erstwhile Eastern bloc communist nations of Europe may also be bracketed under
developing countries.
• The party system in these post-communist developing Nations is still evolving. In almost
all these countries the Communist Party, which ruled a single party totalitarian regime,
were banned, except Russia.
• Soon after democratization in these countries many new parties emerged. The party system
soon become fragmented or atomized. The strong leaders such as, Putin in Russia, are not
having a strong party affiliation.
• Party systems in these countries remain weak and in transition. Every now and then new
party emerges and vanishes.

Developing nations, especially the post-colonial states, shows institutional weaknesses in
the party system. Like many other state institutions, political party and party system were

also borrowed from western democracy, particularly from country of their colonial ruler.
Because of different socio- cultural contexts, political culture, and historical experiences,
the development of political party and party system in these developing nations took very
different path than those in the western European nations.
In most of these developing countries the party of the national movement which led the
country to independence from colonial rule became the dominant party and ruled for
decades after the independence. This gave rise to single party system in many of these
countries. In some country, features of hegemonic single party system were visible.
Subsequently, many other parties cropped up in these developing nations. These new
parties represented the social cleavages, diverse social interests, and existing ideological
choices. But party system in these developing nations is still in flux; it has not matured and
has not taken a clear shape as in in the UK or USA. This is natural also because maturation
of party system takes centuries together.
Another feature of the political party and party system in developing nations is rise of
populist parties and majoritarianism in recent years. In many countries, the right-wing
nationalist parties are acquiring the features of populist parties. They claim to represent
‘the people’- the real and pure people- against the corrupt elites and entitled class. For
example, United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV) led by Chavez in Venezuela and
People's New Party led by Fujimori in Peru. Rise of populism is changing the nature of
party system in many of the developing nations.
In conclusion, we can say that party system in developing nations depicts (shows)
institutional weaknesses and instability. They cannot be classified into any of one of major
categories of party system as given by Duverger. Party systems are still evolving and it
will take considerable time before they become stable with clear cut features as in the UK
and USA. Development and maturation of party system goes hand in hand with deepening
of democracy and democratic institutions in these developing nations.

THEME 4: NATION-STATE
4.A: CBCS Syllabus

• What is nation–state?
• Historical evolution in Western Europe and postcolonial contexts
• ‘Nation’ vs ‘State’: Debates
4.B: KEY POINTS:
• Nation:
• Large groups of people claiming common bonds like Descent (ethnicity). language,
religion, culture and historical identity.
• A kind of ‘imagined community’ members of which rise above their group
identities, such as religion, ethnicity, language, etc to develop a super identity- the
national identity.
• People who feel sharing common culture, way of life, worldview, historical past
and future aspirations.
• State:
• State is defined as highest political institution having sovereignty over a fixed
territory.
• In all matters concerning that territory and people living within the territory, state
has full control and final say.
• State has legitimate monopoly of use of force and violence in its territory.
• Population residing within that territory offer political obligation to the state.
• State has government and other institutions, such as Army, Court, Legislature, to
maintain peace & order.
• States are recognized by other states as sovereign and equal, and it forms
international state system together with other states.

• Nation-state:
• When a nation has its own state, it is called Nation-State.
• In another word, a state which is composed of people belonging to one nation.
• A situation in which territories of nation and state coincide, that is, become one and
the same.
• Default political institution governing territorial divisions of earth.
• Features of nation-state:
• Nation is the ‘soft’ and State is the ‘hard’ part of nation-state.
• Nation-State is political concept of modern times having its origin in western
Europe.
• Nation-States emerged first in 19th & 20th Century western Europe, when
linguistic and ethnic nations got their own state.
• De-colonized states of Latin-America, Asia, and Africa were also called nation-
states
• All modern states which are members of UN are considered as Nation-state
• European template of nation-state was globalised through the process of
colonisation and de-colonisation.
• In true sense, very few countries can be defined as Nation-State. Most of them are
multi-national.
• Nation-building:
• Consciously building a common sense of nationhood, sense of belongingness to a
larger community - imagined community- the ‘we’ feeling, the feeling of other as
‘us’, having shared interest, shared identity.
• Essentially a cultural process.
• State-building:
• building Institutions, systems and state capacity to enable state maintain order,
provide security, dispense justice, and provide basic welfare needs to people within
its territory and behave responsibly as member of international community.
• Essentially a political, technocratic, and bureaucratic process.
• Globalisation and nation-state:
• Nation-state is itself a globalised phenomenon. European template of nation-state
was globalised through the process of colonisation and de-colonisation.

• Globalisation has impacted nature, role, and capacity of nation-states and how
citizen relates to the state/Govt.
• Globalisation has somewhat broken the territorialization of Earth in boarders of
nation-states.
• Globalisation has changed the concept of Sovereignty of nation-states. Instead of
territorial Sovereignty, nation-state invested in pooled Sovereignty.
• Globalization has affected sovereignty in multiple ways- making boarders
permeable, disruptive technologies, rise of non-state actors, International
organizations, de-centered and networked regulation, complex interdependence,
and collective action dilemmas.
• However, many feels that despite globalisation, nation-state remains most
dominant actor both internally and externally. In many ways globalisation and
associated technological revolution has strengthened the state capacity to control
its territory and population.
• Nationalism and Nation-state remains most potent political ideologies. Rise of
nationalist and right-wing political parties world over is proof of this.


IMPORTANT QUESTION
Q.1: What do you understand by Nation-state? Highlight the difference

between Nation and State.
Similar questions:
Q. What is distinction between state and nation? Discuss with a reference to western Europe.
Answer Template:
Introduction:
Nation-State has been one of the most important political concepts in modern era. Today
almost the entire globe is territorially divided into Nation-State, which are sovereign over
those territories. Nation-State is made up of two words- nation and state- both very different
political concept, having different meanings and historical contexts. Hence, to understand
the meaning of Nation-State, first let us discuss the meaning of nation and state separately.
State is defined as highest political institution having sovereignty over a fixed territory.
Population residing within that territory offer political obligation to the state. State has
government and other institutions, such as Army, Court, Legislature, to maintain peace &
order. States are recognized by other states as Sovereign and equal, and it forms
international state system together with other states. In all matters concerning that territory
and people living within the territory, state has full control and final say. As per Weber,
State represents the political community having the monopoly of the legitimate use of force
& violence within a given territory.
Thus, state, in a nutshell, is the sovereign and highest political institution commanding a
fixed territory within which it has got the legitimate right to use force to maintain order
and manage both internal & external affairs.
From the above discussion it is also clear that essential components of State are a fixed
territory having clearly defined border, a permanent population, sovereignty, government,
legitimacy and monopoly to use force, recognition as equal by other states.
On the other hand, Nation is defined as an imagined community, that is, group of people
who feel as if they are part of same community. Glue which binds the people as one
community may be common descent, ethnicity, race, language, religion, culture, historical

identity, etc. Community feeling as part of same nation is, in most cases, notional
(imaginary) not real. People feel being part of same nation. Hence, Benedict Anderson
defined nation as imagined community. Instead of being real, it is perception of being part
of same community based on some common binding factor.
Nations may or may not be tied to a fixed territory. People of same nation main live in
many different territories spread across the globe. For example, the Jews people before
formation of Israel. What is important is that there should be a psychological bond that
bind people together, which create the consciousness among people of being part of a
particular nation.
Having discussed briefly the meaning of nation and state separately, we can now discuss
the concept of Nation-State. It is the political entity which is formed when the territory of
State and Nation become one and same. In other words, when a nation gets its own state
then Nation-State is formed. In the Nation-State, the political community, which form state,
become a nation. Thus, political and national community becomes one in a Nation-State.
We should note that as per this definition there should be only one nation in a state.
However, most of the Nation-State have more than one nation within its territory. Hence,
in a strict sense there may be only few countries which can be defined as Nation-State.
Nation-building is the process wherein diverse communities within the territory of a state
are homogenized (made similar) into one nation.
In the next section of the answer, I will try to further elaborate upon the meaning and features of
both Nation and State separately. I will also try to highlight the differences between them with
some examples.
State: Meaning & Definitions

• Highest political institution having sovereignty over a fixed territory, obtaining political
obligation from population residing within that territory, having an effective government
and other institutions, and capacity to enter into relations with other states as sovereign and
equal.
• State represents a political community. State has the monopoly of the legitimate use of
physical force (violence or coercion) within a given territory.
• State can be understood as territorial political division of globe.
• State represents political independence & autonomy of people, as part of a political
community, residing in a fixed territory.
• State denotes the ‘body politic’, politics, or ‘the political’- politics is what pertains to State.
• Thus, State is defined as having:
• a defined territory and border

• a permanent population
• sovereignty: both internal & external
• an effective government
• the capacity to enter into relations with other states as Sovereign and equal.
Features of state:
• Sovereignty: It exercises absolute and unrestricted power; in that it stands above all other
associations and groups in society
• Publicness: All activities of State and its institutions are considered falling in Public
domain
• In contrast, civil society, market, and family are considered private domain.
• The state is an exercise in legitimation: represent General Will of people, Societal
Common Good. Hence, state solicit political obligation from people living in its territory.
• State represents the highest political institution of a political community.
• It also represents the popular Sovereignty
• Monopoly over legitimate use of force.
• Only the state has the right to use force & violence in legitimate way to maintain
peace & order with its territory; no other entity has such right.
• The state is a territorial political association
• Territory is integral to concept of state, without which there cannot be any state.
• State denotes territorial division of globe.
• Diplomatic recognition:
• States are recognized as equal & sovereign by other states in the International state
system
• Other states are not supposed to interfere in internal/domestic affairs of any state.
• Each state honour the territorial integrity of other states.
Nation: Meaning & Features

• Large groups of people having feeling of community due to perceived common bonds of
descent(ethnicity). language, religion, culture and historical identity.
• "Psychological bond that ‘define’ a people and differentiate them from others-
subconscious conviction of belonging to one community.
• Thus, nations are like imagined communities. (Benedict Anderson).

• Features:
• Nation is not same as race or ethnicity; nation is abstract and imagined community,
not real;
• Nation may be multi-ethnic, multi-racial, and multi-cultural.
• Nation is not a territorial concept. People of one nation may live in different
territories.
• For example: Jew’s nation- Jews lived in all parts of the world.
• Nations may not have their own state:
• For example: East Timorese, Kurds, Tibetans, Chechens and Palestinians,
etc. are nations without state.
• Nations may be spread into more than one state:
• For example: the "Arab nation" is spread in more than a dozen states, while
the nation of the Kurds takes in large chunks of four states- Turkey, Iraq,
Syria, Iran
• Many nations may exist in one State
• USSR, Yugoslavia, Czechoslovakia, etc were examples of Multi-national
states. Currently, most of so called nation-state are multi-national, as per
definition of nation.
• Nationalism is identification with one's own nation (national consciousness) and
placing primary emphasis on promotion of its culture and interests as opposed to
those of other nations
• Nationalism has been the most forceful ideology in modern times for human
societies, sometimes even more than religion, cosmopolitanism, race, caste, class
and ethnicity.
Nation-State: Meaning & Features

• When a nation has its own state, it is called Nation-State.
• Nation-state implies that population of a state constitutes a nation, united by a
common descent, a common language and many forms of shared culture.
o Nation-state denotes ideal of "one nation, one state".
• In this case, territorial boundaries of a nation are same as that of the state
• Since nation is a cultural concept whereas state is a political concept, nation-state
denotes cultural boundaries match up with political boundaries.

• A State whose population considers themselves as a nation may also be called as

Nation-State
o For example: most of the post-colonial states, in which people of different
race, ethnicity, language, and religion developed national consciousness.
o Being the colonies of a foreign nation and therefore desire to be free became
the binding factor of such nations.
• Despite different in meaning and concept, Nation-State and States are considered
one and same in common parlance (in day-to-day language).
o Nation-states are called nations
o UN, which is organizations of States is called United ‘Nation’.
• Nation-State is political concept of modern times.
o Nation-States emerged first in 19th & 20th Century Europe, when
Linguistic and Ethnic nations got their own state
o De-colonized states of Latin-America, Asia, and Africa were also called
nation-states
o All modern states which are members of UN are considered as Nation-state
• In true sense, very few countries can be defined as Nation-State. Most of them are
multi-national.
• Nation-states use the state as an instrument of national unity, in economic, social
and cultural life.
o State, by its policies, attempts to create national market ( one nation-one
market), national transportation( Indian rail, Air India), national language,
national bank, etc
o State promote nationalism in making a diverse group of people feel like one
big community. It creates an imaginary super unity and oneness on top of
diversity and heterogeneity.
o Thus, nation-state may also be understood as exercise to culturally
homogenize the diverse and heterogenous population. State plays important
role in forming uniform national culture.
• Other characteristics of nation-state are more centralized and uniform public
administration, direct rule of state on citizen( no layered authority), more techno-
cratic and efficient state administration, etc.

Difference between Nation and State:

From the above discussion it is clear that nation and state are very different political concept. We
can identify many differences between them. Following table list out some of key differences:
Difference point Nation State
Type of concept Primarily a cultural concept A Political concept
Meaning • Group of people claiming • Sovereign political

common Descent, language, institution representing
religion, culture (dress, food, people residing in a
worldview, way of life) and territory
history.
• Highest political
• A imagined community. institution of a political
community
Tangibility(visibility) Intangible concept- imagined

or More tangible concept-
abstract community territory, population, govt,
More psychological and emotional army, institutions
feeling than real thing. One can see the state’s actions
Relation between Nation may have its own state- Many nations may exist in one
them Nation-State state- multi-national state
Nation may have multiple states Ex: USSR
Ex: Kurd nation, Arab nation
Relation with Nation- ‘Soft’- psychological and emotional- ‘hard’- Govt, army, court- part
State part of Nation-state of Nation-State
Chronology( in time) Newer concept, emerged in modern Older concept, existed since
times- after 18th century ancient Greek times.
Ex: Greek city states, States
emerging in ancient India-
Magadh state

Associated ‘ism’ Statism: Doctrine that state Nationalism: Ideology of

intervention is the most appropriate affection and support to one’s
means of resolving political problems, nation as opposed to those of
or bringing about economic and social other nations
development.
Conclusion:
State as a political concept is as old as human civilization. People required a political
organization which can maintain peace and order, manage the disputes, decide upon
distribution of resources, etc. Therefore, we find mention of state in ancient Greek, Indian,
Mesopotamian, Chinese, and in many other ancient civilizations.
On the contrary, the concept of nation, that is, a group of people having the feeling of
psychological and emotional bond of being part of an imagined community, is a modern
phenomenon. The concept of nation emerged in Europe with the advent of capitalism in
18th century. It also coincided with enlightenment movement, scientific and industrial
revolution, and coming of the modern age.
In the form of Nation-State, these two diverse political concepts got merged into one.
Nation-State denotes nations having their own state. In this situation the territory of nation
and state coincide, that is, becomes one. The phenomenon of nation-state is also essentially
European in its origin. Beginning modern era ( 18th-19th century) , in place of multi-ethnic,
multi-racial empires such as Hapsburg and Ottoman, emerged nation-states. Each nation
got its own state.
In Europe, the common binding factor for nation building was mostly language, and in
some cases race and ethnicity. But when the same template of nation and nation-state was
adopted by the post-colonial States after their Independence, it created many problems.
Biggest problem was of nation building. In Europe, the nations evolved through a long and
violent process of few centuries. Europe fought two great wars in name of nationalism. The
process of emergence of new nations continued as late as 1990s when fifteen new nations
emerged from the dis-integration of USSR. Further Yugoslavia disintegrated in the name
of nationalism into 5 nation-states. Czech and Slovak nations came out from
Czechoslovakia. In contrast, the postcolonial states are still struggling to build a nation out
of multi-racial, multi-lingual, and multi-cultural people comprising of such States.
In sum, differences between nation and state are very obvious. They have very different
meaning, nature, and features. State has been the primary and premier political organization
from ancient times. State is considered necessary for orderly and peaceful human life. It is
a very tangible or visible entity. One can feel state’s presence and its activities through the
presence and actions of government, courts, armies.

Wherein nation is very recent phenomenon emerging in modern Europe with advent of
Enlightenment and modernity. Nation is more imaginary than real in nature. People feel or
perceive that they are part of same nation. It is like imagined community. State is
essentially a political concept whereas nation is a cultural concept. Despite such contrasting
nature & features, both came together to form one of the most forceful and important
political concepts in modern times, that is, the nation-state.
Q.2: What is a nation? Discuss the evolution of nationalism in post-colonial

states.
(Answer hint: for the first part of the question refer to the answer to Q.1 on page73. Here
only the second part of the question is discussed.)
Introduction:
Post-colonial States are those nation-states which emerged after gaining independence
from their colonial rulers. During 19th and 20th century majority the third world, that is,
Asia and Africa where under the colonial rule by European powers. Most of these States
gained independence in a very short duration of about 25 years after the end of Second
World War. Due to this sudden de-colonisation large number of new Nation-States came
into existence in Asia and Africa. All these States were accepted as equal member of the
international state system. They also became members of the United Nations.
However, the process of Post-colonial States becoming nation-states has been filled with
lots of difficulties, challenges, and roadblocks. The process of nation building in these
Post-colonial States is still on.
Main issue in nationalism and nation building in post post-colonial states was copy and
paste of European template of nationalism and nation-state into the heterogenous and
diverse societies of post-colonial states. Most of these colonial states where multi-ethnic,
multi-religious, multi-lingual, multi-racial and multi-cultural. The European powers
divided the colonial territory among themselves in arbitrary manner disregarding the spatial
(territorial) distribution of ethnic or cultural communities. This resulted into many ethnic
communities spread into multiple colonial states. Post-colonial States had a very diverse
and heterogenous social makeup. For example, the Indian state which gained independence
in 1947 had large Muslim population spread all across the state. In addition, it had multiple
religious, cultural, ethnic, and linguistic communities.
Post-colonial states tried to evoke nationalism and build nation on the pattern of European
nationalism on top of its diverse and heterogeneous society. For this, the nationalist leaders,
mostly from the elite class, invoked historical nation, ancient civilization ancient, cultural
unity, and anti-colonial sentiments. But raising national consciousness on the top of a
highly heterogeneous and diverse society became difficult after gaining independence as

the common bond of anti-colonialism had vanished. Also, as the post-colonial states started
working, political processes and practices, especially party politics, widened the social
cleavages of religion, class, caste, ethnicity, and language. This posed challenges in nation
building. Many post-colonial states faced long civil wars and movement for national self-
determination. For example, Sri-Lanka faced 26 years of civil war on ethnic division. India
had to be trifurcated into three nation-states on religious and linguistic grounds. many
African post-colonial states saw prolonged ethnic war and genocide.
In a nutshell, nationalism and nation building in post-colonial states have been a very
challenging and difficult process. It was mainly because of the very heterogeneous and
diverse nature of societies and incompatibility ( not being fit for) of European template of
nationalism and Nation state for the post-colonial states. Political processes and
actions/activities of Post-colonial States also added into the challenges of nation building.
In the next section of the answer, I will try to further explain in brief the process of nationalism
and nation building in the post-colonial states.
Evolution of nationalism and nation-state in post-colonial states:

As stated above large numbers of new nation states emerged in the 3rd world as result of sudden
de-colonization after the 2nd world war. Brief account of the emergence of new nation-states
are as below:
• Philippines became first nation-state in Asia by becoming independent from the USA
in 1946. Next, India and Pakistan became Independent nation-states in 1947.
• This led to accelerated de-colonization process first in Asia, then west Africa, and East
Africa
• Between 1945 and 1960, about three dozen new nation-states emerged in Asia and
Africa after getting independence from their European colonial rulers.
• New Nation-states in Africa:
• British Colonies: Egypt, Sudan, Kenya, Uganda, South Africa, Gambia, Sierra
Leone, Somalia, Zimbabwe, Zambia, Botswana, Nigeria, Ghana, and Malawi
• French Colonies: Benin, Burkina Faso, Guinea-Bissau, Ivory Coast, Mali,
Niger, Senegal, Togo, Cameroon, Central African Republic, Chad, Congo-
Brazzaville, Equatorial Guinea and Gabon, Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia
• Belgian Colonies: Congo, Rwanda; Portuguese colonies: Angola and
Mozambique

• New Nation-states in Asia:

• China became nation-state in 1949 after the Communist Revolution.
• Two Koreas, north and south, became nation-state in 1945 after getting
independence from Japan
• Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia became nation-state after decolonisation of
French Indo China.
• Indonesia became nation-state in 1945 after end of Dutch rule and then Japanese
occupation during 2nd world war.
• Malaysia became independent nation-state from Britain in 1963.
Processes and methods of nationalism and nation-building in post-colonial states:
• National consciousness grew by mass education, mass media, and most importantly
through anti-colonial struggle- national movements for independence.
• National freedom movements were led by western educated urban Elites. Most of these
leaders were deeply influenced by western liberal ideology. They wanted to copy the
European nationalism into their newly independent state.
• Those great leaders were successful in mass mobilization, unified resistance for
political and cultural sovereignty, nation building, political process and institution
building on the pattern of European nation-states.
• Newly independent nations undertook twin challenges- state building and nation-
building.
• Most of them first became state and then by nation-building process, tried to become
nation-state. But most of them are actually ‘state- nation’, that is, they are state still in
process of becoming nation like European nation.
• Nationalist Elites invoked historical cultural nationalism, ancient civilization,
emancipatory vision, anti-colonial sentiments, etc. to make a homogenous nation
overlaid on highly heterogenous (multi-lingual and multi-ethnic) society.
• Inclusion of these new states into UN and acceptance as part of Westphalian state
system helped them gain legitimacy and build nation.
• However, European Template of nationalism and nation-state is not easily replicable
in post-colonial states.
• Process of raising national consciousness and nation-building became challenging due
to political process and practices of post-colonial states. Social cleavages ( gaps) of
religion, ethnicity, language, etc became wider due to party politics and sometimes
partisan decisions by the post-colonial states.

• Only few could become strong unified nation-state; most of them are struggling and
many, such as, Somalia, Sudan, Syria- became failed state. Many post-colonial states,
such as Sri-Lanka, Myanmar, Nigeria, Angola, Sudan, Liberia, Rwanda, Sierra Leone,
etc. had prolonged civil wars, which further eroded nationalism and posed threat to
national integration.
Conclusion:
In sum, common binding factor for nationalism in Europe was common language,
and in some cases race and ethnicity. But when the same template of nationalism
was adopted by the post-colonial states after their independence, it created many
problems. Biggest problem was of nation building which demanded homogeneity
on top of very diverse and heterogenous society. Another problem was political
processes and state practices which widened the social cleavages of religion,
ethnicity, and language.
In Europe, the nations evolved through a long and violent process of few centuries.
Europe fought two great wars in name of nationalism. The process of emergence of
new nations continued as late as 1st decade of 21st century. Fifteen new nations
emerged from the dis-integration of USSR. Further Yugoslavia disintegrated in the
name of nationalism into 5 nation-states. Czech and Slovak nations came out from
Czechoslovakia. In contrast, the postcolonial states are still struggling to build a
nation out of multi-racial, multi-lingual, and multi-cultural people comprising of
such States. They still have to go a long way before claiming to have become
nation-states.
Q.3 How is nation different from state? Illustrate major phases of

evolution of nation-states in western Europe.
(Answer hint: for the first part of the question refer to the answer to Q.1 on page 73. Here
only the second part of the question is discussed.)
Introduction:
Western Europe has a long history of evolution of nation-state spanning for few
centuries. But the modern form of nation-states emerged in western Europe mainly
during 19th century. Most prominent examples of evolution of nation-states in
Europe is emergence of unified Italian and German nation-states in 1861 and 1871
respectively. Before that the nation-state of England/UK, France, Spain,
Netherland, etc. emerged.

Before the emergence of nation-states in western Europe there existed large multi-
national empires such as Habsburg empire, Kingdom of France, the Russian
Empire, the Portuguese Empire, the Spanish Empire, the Ottoman Empire, the
British Empire, etc. These empires were different from modern nation-states. They
ruled a feudal society and were having a layered and divided authority, that is,
hierarchy of authorities- Emperor- kings- lords/baron-Nights- who ruled the people.
There were many Papal or church states, ruled by churches.
Formation of nation-states from big multi-national empires started with the re-
formation movement (protestant movement) in 16th century. Reformation
movement gave the king to choose own religion for his state. It also brought
separation of church from state. Treaty of Westphalia, in 1648, was a big leap
forward in emergence of nation-state. It granted direct rule by kings to a population
having its own religion, culture, and language. This was the start of nation-state and
disintegration of multinational Empires. The concept started to take shape that the
state should have one nation, one religion, one language, one culture.
This process was further accelerated by political ideology of liberalism, which
entrusted upon the state the responsibility of guaranteeing natural rights to its
citizen. The capitalism, which was an economic extension of liberal ideology,
produced new professional capitalist class. The capitalist class supported formation
of nation-state for creation of a uniform national market, national transportation,
and national economic policies. Enlightenment movement, scientific, and industrial
revolution all helped in making nation-state as the prime political institution
governing a particular territory in western Europe.
Multiple processes can be identified in emergence of nation state in western Europe.
Transformation, that is, gradual transformation of existing independent political
unit was the process adopted in formation of British and French nation-states.
Unification of independent but dispersed political units saw the emergence of
German and Italian nation-state. Later on, USSR and Yugoslavia also emerged as
nation-states following the process of unification. On the contrary, many nation-
states came up through a process of disintegration or break up. Large multinational
empires broke into multiple nation-states. For example, Hapsburg Empire broke
into Austria, Hungary, Serbia, Bohemia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Croatia, and Romania
nation-states. USSR dis-integrated to give 15 new nation-states. Yugoslavia
produced 5 nation-states.
We can identify few catalysts which accelerated the formation of nation-states in
western Europe. Prime catalysts were warfare and capitalism. The reformation
movement, enlightenment movement, scientific and industrial revolution, etc. also
acted as catalysts. Competition for overseas colonies in 19th century also fueled the
feeling of nationalism in western Europe and helped formation of nation-state.

Imperial aspirations of German and Italian nations helped in unification of

Germany and Italy resulting into unified German and Italian nation-states.
Finally, we should acknowledge that the evolution of nation-states in western
Europe is filled with conflicts, war, violence, and loss of life. Western Europe
fought two world wars largely on the issue of nationalism and nation-states.
Conflict and violence in formation of nation-state continued till recently.
Disintegration of Yugoslavia into 5 nation-states was only after a prolonged ethnic
clash and civil war in Balkan region.
After having outlined the evolution of nation-states in western Europe, in the next section
of the answer, I will try to delineate different phases of the evolution of nation-state in
western Europe. As part of the Conclusion, I will also discuss the issue of transporting
western European template of nation-state in post-colonial states.
Phases of evolution of nation-states in Western Europe:

• Ancient and Medieval periods:
• The Greek city-state system, the Roman Empire, and the Empires in Middle Ages
are key developments prior to the evolution of Nation-state in 18-19th Century
• In the ancient world there existed small city states in Greece and Italy.
• Thereafter, very large dynastic empires- Roman Empire; Roman res
publica, or commonwealth emerged. They were similar to the modern concept of
the state. The ‘Roman res publica’ was a legal system whose jurisdiction extended
to all Roman citizens, securing their rights and determining their responsibilities.
• Medieval period saw feudal system in Europe, and Multi-national empires - Holy
Roman Empire and later on Habsburg (Austro-Hungarian Empire), Kingdom of
France, the Russian Empire, the Portuguese Empire, the Spanish Empire, the
Ottoman Empire, the British Empire, etc emerged in Europe.
• Empires had layered and divided authority
• Emperor did not rule directly its subject.
• Ruling hierarchy of Emperor- kings- lords/baron-Nights.
• church vs state: Large territories were ruled by churches under the papal
authority.
• In those times there were no concept of sovereign states, territorial integrity,
national self-determination, and secular state.
• State territories were always changing. Even marriages in royal family
would result into change in state territories.

• However, they had diplomatic relationship, trade & economic interactions,

and some sort of balance of Power.
• Modern period:
• First phase: 16-18 Century: Evolution of British and French nation-states
• Processes: Transformation of existing states
• Capitalism, Reformation movement, Enlightenment movement, scientific &
industrial revolutions, French Revolution, etc. helped evolution of nation-states.
• Westphalian treaty 1648: Beginning of International state system
• Concept of sovereignty, territorial integrity, non-interference in
national/domestic affairs, etc. were accepted.
• It separated church from state.
• It removed layered and divided authority. King started directly ruling its
subject.
• Each state was free to choose its own religion and moral standard.
• Second phase: 19th Century:
• Emergence of German and Italian nation-state by process of Unification; Serbia,
and Greece emerged from Ottoman Empire.
• Processes: Unification, Cessation/dis-integration of Empires.
• Third phase: Post World war I
• Disintegration of Habsburg and Ottoman Empire and coming up of Austria,
Hungary, Romania, Yugoslavia, Czechoslovakia, Bulgaria, and Turkey nation-
states.
• Process: Disintegration of multi-national Empire by defeat in wars
• Fourth phase- post cold war:
• Disintegration of USSR, Yugoslavia, Czechoslovakia: New nation-states of
Ukraine, Lithuania, Latvia, Moldova, Estonia, Croatia, Bosnia-Herzegovina,
Montenegro, Czech and Slovak Republics etc
• Process: Disintegration of multi-national state or federation.

As explained above evolution of nation-states in western Europe has a long and
violent history. Process of formation of nation States started with the reformation
movement in 16th Century. It got a big push through the treaty of Westphalia in

1648. But the momentum of nation state formation gathered pace in 19th century
with the emergence of unified German and Italian nation-state. Before that,
England, France, Spain, Portugal, Netherland, etc. transformed the pre-existing
States into nation-states.
The process of formation of nation state in Europe continued as late as till first
decade of 21st century in which the new nation-states of Kosovo emerged from the
disintegrated Yugoslavia and Serbia. Before that, during the last decade of 20th
century, 15 new nation-states came out from dis-integration of USSR.
We should once again acknowledge that nationalism and nation-state is essentially
Western European concept. Evolution of nation-states in western Europe is closely
linked to rise of capitalism and liberal political ideologies. Evolution of nationalism
and nation-states in western Europe cannot be separated from the religious reform
movements, enlightenment movement, and scientific and industrial revolution in
western Europe between 16th and 19th century. It is also linked to aspiration of
European nations of having overseas colonies in the third world. In a nutshell,
nationalism and nation-states in Europe should be seen a specific socio-cultural
context of western Europe during 16th and 19th century.
Another important fact we should acknowledge is that when the same template of
European nationalism and nation-state is transported in multi-ethnic, multi-
religious, multilingual, and multicultural post-colonial States, it faced many
problems and roadblocks. It is because nation-state demands uniformity,
homogenization, superimposition of one mainstream culture, language over the
diverse minor or small cultures and languages. Such homogenization is quite
challenging in diverse and heterogenous societies in post-colonial states.
Finally, we should also acknowledge the fact that the process of evolution of nation-
states in western Europe is filled with huge amount of violence and loss of life.
Therefore, other parts of the world especially, the third world, should device its
own way a of political institutions best suited to its socio-cultural context then
simply transporting the Western European template of nationalism and nation-state.

Q.4: What is the idea of nation-state? Discuss the debate between nation-
building and state-building.
(Answer hint: for the first part of the question refer to the answer to Q.1 on page 73. Here only
the second part of the question is discussed.)
Introduction:
Nation-state is a political concept of Western European origin. Between 16th and
19th century, in western Europe, political territorial divisions happened in form of
emergence of nation-states in which each state had one nation - people having
common culture, religion, language, etc. This gave rise to the phenomena of nation-
state, which became the default political institution governing territorially divided
world. Globalization of ‘nation-state’ as political phenomena happened due to
colonization of 3rd world by European nation-states.
When the third world countries gained Independence from their colonial rulers,
they became independent states. For such post-colonial states the problem was that
they were expected to be like European nation-state without having either a strong
and capable state or having one-state one-nation condition. Most of these post-
colonial states lacked robust state institutions, capacity and investment for able to
carry out the task of providing security, justice, and welfare services to people.
Hence, state-building was required. They also lacked cultural, religious, ethnic, and
linguistic uniformity as of the European nation-states. Most of the post-colonial
states have very diverse and heterogenous societies. Feeling of nationhood,
belongingness, and loyalty to a super national identity was lacking. Hence, they
also required nation-building.
Thus, the newly independent post-colonial states had to undertake two
simultaneous projects- state building and nation building. This gave rise to the
debate between nation-building and state-building.
Before discussing the debate between these two political processes, let us
understand another context of this debate. This is related to recent attempts of the
international community led by USA to state-building in failed and fragile States
such as Afghanistan, Iraq, Somalia, Congo, Central African of Central African
Republic, etc. This was linked to International terrorism wherein it was felt that
failed and fragile states are becoming safe heavens for terrorists. Also, International
state system required responsible behaviour from each member state. With these
intentions the international community started building state institutions, capacity
and capabilities of these States. This was called state-building.

Having outlined the backgrounds of emergence of these two terms- state-building

and nation-building- I will try to explain in brief the debates related to them. But
before that first let us see the definitions of these two terms.
OECD, 2008, defined nation-building as “actions undertaken, usually by national
actors, to force a sense of common nation-hood usually in order to overcome ethnic,
sectarian or communal differences; usually to counter alternative sources of identity
and loyalty; and usually to mobilize a population behind a parallel State building
project. “
We should note how OECD linked nation-building to state-building. This definition
started the debate whether nation-building is merely a component of state-building?
Is nation-building merely a means to achieve the end/goal of state-building?
As per World Bank state-building is defined as “the centrality of efforts to build
state capacity and accountability including a strong attention to most basic State
administrative and delivery mechanism complimenting capacity investment with
robust effort to improve accountability and balancing state capacity building efforts
with support for civil society and private sector.”
Many things about state-building comes out from the above definition. state-
building essentially involve building robust state institutions, strengthening state
capacity to be able to perform its sovereign duties- both in domestic and
international domains.
Difference between state-building and nation-building:
Before further discussing the debates between nation-building and state-building, let us see
the main differences between them.
Difference point Nation-building State-building
Meaning building a common sense of building Institutions, systems and

nationhood, sense of belongingness state capacity to enable state
to a larger community - imagined maintain order, dispense justice,
community- the ‘we’ feeling, the provide basic needs to people
feeling of other as ‘us’, having within its territory and behave
shared interest, shared identity, responsibly as equal member of
shared values, shared history, and international state system.
shared culture.
Leading actors National, community, and group Political leadership, the elected
leaders. Mass media and opinion political executives.
leaders.

Process Raising national consciousness Setting rules, regulations, and

building trust, commitment, and policies.
mutual understanding. Building robust and independent
institutional mechanisms.
Instrument/methods Stories, myths, cultural and historical Codification, constitution

symbols, heroes, and cultural making, institutional design, etc.
traditions.
Results Feeling of common nationhood, Well organized independent state

sense of belongingness to an institutions that deliver without
imagined national community, the discrimination security, justice,
‘we’ feeling, people shifting loyalties and social services.
from their group identity to national
identity.
Time frame Open ended, ongoing, continuously Results expected within a fixed
evolving- no fixed time frame; short time frame.
usually a very long-term process.
Referencing Self-referencing- only the people In reference to international state

involved in the process can decide system, international laws,
what is the meaning of nationhood, treaties, covenants, etc.
sense of belonging, and having
shared identity.
Debate between nation-building and state-building:

Following are the major debates related to nation-building and state-building:
• Can nations be built by design or by external support or it is self-generating
or spontaneous?
o The OECD definition, stated above, convey that nation-building can be
carried out, of course by national actors, as a conscious well-planned
project.
o But many may disagree. For them, nation-building is continuously ongoing
process with is largely self-generated. The process, however, may be
supported by nationalist leadership and state policies, such as mass
education, mass media, cultural fests, promoting historical and cultural
icons, places, etc.

• Is nation building same as state-building?

o As explained above, both terms differ from each other on many counts.
They are not one and same.
o But the current ongoing effort of international communities in state-
building in fragile states such as Afghanistan convey the sense that state-
building include nation-building as a mere component.
o Also, in common political discourse, both terms are used interchangeably.
• Whether nation building and State Building are interlinked same way as
nation and state?
o Both nation-building and state-building are important component of making
a nation-state.
o Nation is a cultural concept. Nation-building, is therefore, a cultural
process. State, on the other hand, is a political concept, and therefore, state-
building is essentially a political process.
o But in nation-state both these process merge.
• How both phenomena are related? is there a hierarchical relation between
nation building and state building? Is one more important than other?
o Many feel that nation-building is the primary process. State-building is
merely a part of this process.
o A strong nation will form a political community which will have its own
state. On the contrary, a state without feeling of nationhood will lack
legitimacy and will not be able to use its full capacity and authority.
o But many thinkers feel the opposite. For them, state-building is the main
goal. Nation-building is merely a means to achieve the end/goal of state-
building. The OECD definition given above has the same view.
o However, there are third view also which believes that both nation-building
and state-building are interlinked, none is above or below to other, both are
equally important component of nation-state.
o In this view, state without nation is meaningless as it loses legitimacy.
People don’t have loyalty to the state. Nation without state is also
meaningless, as the keeping an imagined national community together
without state apparatus is very difficult.
o State is a very important factor in nation building; it makes the trust real and
tangible by underpinning (supporting) it with policies and laws that
convince each group that it is part of the broader national community. It
generates feeling of ‘us’, ‘we’ feeling in the nation state.

• Is European template of nation-state required to be transported to all parts of

world? Should the same process of nation-building and state-building, as
happened in western Europe, need to be repeated in 3rd world?
o Process of evolution of nation-states in western Europe was a long-drawn
process spanning few centuries. It was is filled with huge amount of
violence and loss of life.
o 3rd world post-colonial states were expected to build nation-state following
European template within few decades!
o Historical and cultural contexts in 3rd world is very different from Europe.
o Therefore, the post-colonial states need to find fundamentally new concept
and approach to nation building that is less time consuming, that does not
seek refuge in violence and war, that accommodates diversity, and does not
force homogeneity over its diverse and heterogenous society.
Conclusion:
In sum, just like nation and state, nation-building and state-building have different
meaning, nature, processes, and features. However, both are intimately linked to
each other in the common project of nation-state. The way European template of
modern nation-state was globalized, especially in the post-colonial state in 3rd
world, gave rise to several debate points related to nation-building and state-
building. Current attempts of international communities, led by global hegemon
USA, to state-building in failed and fragile states, such as Iraq, Somalia, and
Afghanistan, etc. raises many questions on the nature of nation-building and state-
building, their inter-relationship, and role of external support in nation building.
Many critics feel that current attempts of the developed world to impose the western
European template of nation-state on 3rd world is another way of neo-colonialism.
It is same type of attempt as undertaken by the European colonial powers in name
of ‘civilization mission’ and ‘white men’s burden’.
European nation-state has a specific historical and cultural context. Simply copying
and pasting the European processes of nation-building and state-building in 3rd
world countries may not yield desired outcome. Hence, other parts of the world
especially, the third world, should device its own way nation-building and state-
building best suited to its socio-cultural context. They should also avoid the war,
violence, and homogenizations (making society uniform, diluting diversity)
associated with nation-building in western Europe.

THEME 5: GENDERING COMPARATIVE POLITICS:

INSTITUTIONS AND PROCESSES
5. A: CBCS SYLLABUS:
• Political Representation (its gender dimension)

• Women in Conflict and Peace
5. B: KEY POINTS:
• Gender:
• Gender is a social construct. It is the social organization of sexual differentiation,
that is, ideas of being male/female; masculinity/femininity, social manners
expected from different sexes, division of labour between sexes, etc.
• Gendering the sexes: attaching femininity (feminine attributes, female manners) to
females and masculinity (masculine attributes, manly nature/behaviour) to males.
• Gender denotes hierarchical power relationship between male and female; males
are kept above female.
• In sum, sex is biological but gender is a social phenomenon. It denotes how society
assign attributes (features, properties), roles, functions, and powers to different
sexes.
• Patriarchy: The social norm putting men over women. Only men inherit properties, they
are the master, family head & owner of the females of the family.
• Gendering Comparative Politics:
• It is defined as comparative politics research in which gender is either a dependent
or independent variable. In other words, when political issues and phenomena under
study through Comparative method, uses gender as analytical tool as well as impact
of the issue/ phenomena on gender norms.
• For example, in comparative study on Democratisation, including voting rights to
women as defining criteria of Democracy. Similarly, analysing gendered
dimensions of modern nation-states and its institutions. Another example is
gendered nature of political participation and representation.

• Gender Mainstreaming
• Gender mainstreaming is the process of assessing the implications for women and
men of any planned action, including legislation/law, policies or programs, in all
areas and at all levels.
• Thus, it denotes analysing and dissecting plan, program, laws, policies, etc. from
gender perspective.
• It also denotes gender sensitiveness in Government’s plan, program, laws, policies,
etc.
• Gender dimension of women in conflict & peace:

• Women’s role and experiences in conflict or war zones are dependent on gender
norms. For example, masculinity is to protect the dignity and purity of
family’s/community’s women. For oppressor or attackers, violating bodies of
women of enemy’s community is a war tactic to humiliate and subjugate them.
Thus, women’s body becomes the arena(site) of violent struggle.
• Women also face honour killing and domestic violence in conflict zones. They are
killed by the men to prevent them falling into enemy’s hands.
• Gender also plays out its role in women’s role in peace negotiations, peacebuilding,
and their roles & experiences when peace returns.
• Despite having most relevant and unique experiences of the conflict and bringing
different skill sets, women are mostly excluded from peace negotiations. They get
little representation in the newly built political institutions. Their rights are
continued to be violated both in private and public domain.
• Thus, women are worst sufferer in both conflict and peace. Social norms of gender
and patriarchy play a great role in such miserable condition of women conflict and
peace.
• UN Security Council Resolution 1325
• This resolution is a landmark event in UN’s effort to mainstreaming gender in UN’s
policies and actions on conflict & peace. It takes a holistic view of women, peace,
and security.
• The UN Security Council adopted resolution 1325 on women, peace and security
on 31 October 2000.
• The resolution reaffirms the important role of women in the prevention and
resolution of conflicts, peace negotiations, peace-building, peacekeeping,
humanitarian response and in post-conflict reconstruction.

• The resolution stresses the importance of their equal participation and full
involvement in all efforts for the maintenance and promotion of peace and security.
• Resolution 1325 incorporate gender perspectives in all United Nations peace and
security efforts.
• It also calls on all parties in conflicts to take special measures to protect women and
girls from gender-based violence, particularly rape and other forms of sexual abuse,
in situations of armed conflict.
• UNSC Resolution 1325 is a binding international law on each member nation-state.
• However, the challenge presented by the widespread use of ‘rape as a tactic of war’
was so pervasive (widespread) that the UN Security Council was compelled to pass
four more Resolutions—1820, 1888, 1889, and 1960 (during the period 2008 –
2010)— to more focused attention on the issue of women’s bodies becoming site
of violent struggles in the conflict zones.
• Gendered dimension of women’s Political Representation:

• Gender is in root of politics, nation-state and its institutions. All these have definite
masculine overtones.
• Politics defined as game of power, and power defined as domination, subjugation,
has definite masculine overtones.
• Modern nation-states are violent and militarized political institutions having
monopoly of violence. Thus, nation-state is defined as having masculine attributes.
• Politics was put in public domain, which was out of bound of women from ancient
times. This was as per the dichotomy of private vs public. Women were supposed
to be confined into private domain- family and civil society- leaving public domain
for men.
• All this resulted into exclusion of women from politics and political representation
since beginning.
• In modern era, under the liberal ideology, women were allowed entry into politics,
were given equal voting rights, of course after a long struggle and protests, were
also given entries into legislatures, government, judiciary, armies, militaries and
other state institutions.
• For this, many countries brought the affirmative action policies, such as, reserved
seats or quota.
• Because of all these efforts, today women have equal voting rights in almost all
countries. Many countries have women as head of state/Government. Many
countries have equal numbers of women in cabinet. Women’s representation in

legislative assemblies are steadily increasing, many countries have about 50 % of

women representatives.
• But despite all this, effective participation of women in politics and state institutions
are still marginal. They find difficult to excel in these political institutions as they
are highly gendered. Most of them are defined in such a way that they attain
muscular attributes and overtones. Social norms of gender have denied the
masculine attributes to women. This makes them at odd with these state institutions.
• Hence, unless the social norms of gender and patriarchy are overturned to usher
new gender-neutral social order, women’s political representation would continue
to be nominal and ineffective.

5. C: ANSWER TEMPLATES TO PAST YEAR’S AND OTHER

IMPORTANT QUESTIONS%
(Note: This is newly added theme, there are no past questions. However, important questions,
covering entire syllabus, have been framed and answer templates of them are provided below)
Q.1: Critically examine the issues of women in conflict and peace from gender
perspective.
Similar question:
Q. How roles and experiences of men and women are different in conflict and peace? How
gender plays its role in this?
Answer Template:
Introduction:
Great war might not have happened after second World War but war and violence
continued in form of innumerable conflict zones in different parts of world. Most of these
conflict zones fall in third world countries. They are sites of ethnic civil wars or struggle
for national self-determination or protests against the militarized or authoritarian states.
Some of these conflicts sites in present time are Central America like Nicaragua, Middle
East like Syria, Iraq, Yemen, South Sudan, Congo, Libya Somalia in Africa, Afghanistan,
Kashmir, Myanmar, etc.
Comparative studies of these conflict zones, particularly the issues of women, from gender
lens reveal many aspects of the conflict which are not visible otherwise. The conflicts itself
denote the masculine and violent nature of modern Nation state and militarized militant
nationalism. It also reflects the militarization culture and normalization of violence.
Women and men act and experience differently in the zone of conflict; these are determined
by their gender roles and identities assigned to them. In the conflict zone, war is played out
on woman's body which represent the honour, dignity and self-esteem of the
communities/nation to which they belong. Violating the women's body in form of rape and
sexual violence is used as ‘tactics of war’ to humiliate and subjugate the opponents. Thus,
women's bodies become arena of violent struggle in these conflict zones.
Another issue is structural nature of violence represented by these conflict zones. Many of
these structural factors have gender dimensions. The structural factors of the political

economy of war and arms trade, the culture of militarization, violent nature of nation and
state building, etc. are played out within the idea of masculinity and patriarchy.
Nations are given feminine identity, like mother. Masculinity is to protect the honour &
dignity and even die for the ‘mother’ nation. Under the patriarchy, women are treated as
bearers of culture and family/community’s honour. Masculinity is to protect and die for the
chastity and purity of the women. Thus, gendered social structure and power relations are
at the root of many phenomenon, especially issue of women in conflict & peace.
As stated, above notion of patriarchy and masculinity shape the fate of women in these
conflict zones. Actions and experiences of women in both peace and conflicts are
determined mainly by their gender roles and identity. Of course, other identities, such as,
ethnicity, race, nationality, etc. intersect with gender identity to determine role and
experiences of women in peace & conflict. In the conflict zone woman face brutality-
sexual violence, rape, displacement, kidnapping, etc. from the opposing forces; as stated
above these acts of brutalities are linked to the gendered idea of masculinity, femininity,
and patriarchy.
Similarly, peace making and peacebuilding in these conflict zone also has gender
dimensions. Women, despite being the worst sufferer and having the most relevant
experiences, are excluded from the peace negotiations. Their voices do not matter in the
peace agreements and structures & Institutions rebuilding after the peace is returned to the
conflict zones. Women don not find roles as peace negotiators, signatories of peace
agreement and policy maker as peacekeeper and peace-builder. After the peace return,
inequal gendered power relation, lack of rights in private and public domain continues.
Nothing changes for the women, who fought side by side to their male counterpart,
sacrificing their self for social good.
Thus, we can see that many issues, related to women in conflict & peace, come to the fore
when the conflict and peace are analyzed and dissected through the gender lens. Gender
lies at the root of the very idea of conflict & peace, which denote the masculine and violent
nature of modern nation-state, nation and state building. Women’s role and experiences,
both in conflict and peace, are linked to gender roles & identity, and related notions of
masculinity, femininity, and patriarchy.
In the next part of the answer, I will try to list out and explain in brief some of the most important
issues related to women in conflict and peace from the gender perspective.
Gendered dimensions of conflict:

• Meaning of Gender:
o Gender is a social construct. It is the social organization of sexual differentiation,
that is, ideas of being male/female; masculinity/femininity, social manners
expected from different sexes, division of labour between sexes, etc.

o Gendering the sexes: attaching femininity (feminine attributes, female manners) to

females and masculinity (masculine attributes, manly nature/behaviour) to males.
o Gender denotes hierarchical power relationship between male and female; males
are kept above females.
• Patriarchy: The social norm putting men over women. Only men inherit properties, they
are the master, family head & owner of the females of the family.
Gendered dimension of conflict, war, and violence:
• Most of these conflicts denote masculine and violent nature of modern nation-state, nation
and state building.
• Majority of these conflict zones are part of the incomplete project of nation-building. For
example, Kashmir valley, FATA and parts of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa on Pakistan-
Afghanistan border, Israel- Philistine border, etc.
• Conception of masculinity defined as ownership of Zan (women) and Zamin (land),
protecting and even dying for them.
• Women are considered family’s/community’s asset, bearers of culture and
family/community’s honour. Obsession of societies with chastity and purity of their
women also plays its part.
• Nation as female: notion of the nation being essentially feminine in construction. A
connection is made between the homeland and mother; for example, ‘Bharat Mata’.
• Masculinity is protecting national territories as mother’s body.
• A logical result of this construction is that women’s bodies are treated as territories to be
conquered, claimed or marked by the attacker.
• Thus, when the feminine self comes to signify the nation, communal, ethnic, national and
international conflicts are then played out on women’s bodies, which become arenas ( sites)
of violent struggle.
• Women are humiliated, tortured, raped and murdered as part of the process by which the
dignity and self-esteem of opposition are crushed and project of nation-building are carried
out.
• The nation/state may also take control of Women’s reproductive power to prevent the
production of undesirable and unwanted children for the naion.

Role & experiences of women in conflict:

• As stated above, their bodies become site of violent struggle. They face sexual violence,
rape, kidnapping, and displacements.
• As many of the women lose their males in the war, they become the bread earner for the
family. They have to move outside in field, offices, markets, further increasing their
vulnerabilities.
• But sometime, this may give women sense of empowerment. They get economic
independence and gender equality.
• Women help their men fight the war. They take care of logistics, care for wounded, nursing,
information carrier, etc.
• In many cases, women themselves takes arms and become directly involved in the war. For
example, Tamil women in Sri-Lankan civil war. In this role they may become the
oppressor, and perpetrator (offender) of war crimes.
• Women as fighters in war may use their bodies as weapons against the opposition. For
example, women suicide bombers.
Role & Experience of Women in Peace

• Generally, women are excluded from the peace negotiations, peace keeping, and peace-
building projects.
• This is despite women bringing unique experience and skill sets on the peace negotiations.
Peace studies have indicated that chances of peace lasting for more time increases when
women are the peace negotiators.
• There is lack of political will and resources to support gender sensitive peace-building in
the conflict zones.
• As per UN women, in the 31 peace negotiations between 1992 and 2013, only in 4 %
women were signatories, in only 2.4% cases they were chief-mediators, and only in 9 %
negotiators!
• Women are under-represented in army, police, security forces, peace keeping forces. They
constitute only 8% in police, and 2% in military peacekeeping; first time, only in 2014,
women became head of UN peacekeeping force in Cyprus.
• In the new institutional structure, after the peace returns, women are marginalized. The
plan, policies, schemes, and projects for rebuilding don’t take gender issues into account.
• Because of this, inequality in gendered power relationships and violations of women’s
right- both in private and public domain- continues.

• In many cases, peace lowers women’s freedom, equality, and empowerment. They face
oppression and domestic violence when men return after the peace returns. The lose their
freedom gained when they became the bread winner for the family.
Conclusion:
Analyzing and dissecting the conflict and peace from gender perspective reveals many
issues related to women’s roles & experiences in conflict & peace, which otherwise are not
observable. The rising numbers of conflict zones all around the World after Second World
War itself has its roots in gendered notion of masculinity and militarized nationalism.
culture of militarization, masculine and violent nature of modern Nation state and violent
and militarized processes of nation and State Building are some the factors for rising
conflicts world over.
Nations are given feminine identity, treated as mother, whose territories are like mother's
body. Masculinity is to protect the mother nation and even die for protecting its body, that
is, the national territories. All this play out in the notion of patriarchy which consider
women as asset and bearer of culture and dignity of the community/nation. This results into
women's body becoming site of violence in the conflict zone. The oppressors believe that
by violating the woman's body they will humiliate and subjugate the opposition
community/people/nation. Such thoughts are manifested in war crimes of sexual violence,
rape, kidnapping, and displacement of women in conflict zones.
Women’s experiences in conflicts are varied; it is not one sided. They are not only the
victims and oppressed but also, sometimes, take arms and use their body to defeat the
opposition. Another gender dimension in conflict is opportunity it gives woman to become
the breadwinner for the family, to take up man’s role, feel empowered, and attain gender
equality. But this is short lived as men, after the peace is brokered, come back to family
and take away the short-lived independence of women. With this their gender inequality
and violation of their rights -both in private and public domain- continuous. In fact, women
face increasing domestic violence after the men return back to family.
Thus, we can see that role and experiences of women in conflict are varied and mostly have
gender dimension.
Similarly, in peace also gender plays a big role in issues related to women. Despite women
having unique experiences during conflict, they are excluded from the peace negotiations
and institutions and structures building after the peace returns. Their voices are not getting
adequate representation in the newly built institutional mechanism. There is no gender
mainstreaming in the plan, policies, schemes, and projects after the peace as part of peace
building exercises. This is unfortunate and need to be corrected. But this is not easy as it
requires fundamental changes in social construction of gender, idea of masculinity, culture
of militarization, and institution of patriarchy, etc.. Concept of nation-state also need to be
changed.

Thus, in sum, we can say that women are sufferers both in conflict and peace. Their bodies
become the site of the violence, they face the burnt of opposition’s might and masculinity
during conflict. But when peace returns their short-lived independence also vanishes and
they continue to face inequal gender power relations and violation of their rights both in
private and public domain.
Q.2: Examine political representation of women from gender perspective.
Answer Template:
Introduction:
Since beginning politics was put in public domain which was not allowed for women. For
example, the Athenian democracy did not allow citizenship and voting rights to women.
Under the accepted dichotomy of private vs public, women were supposed to be confined
to private domain, that is, family and civil society. The public domain was kept out of
bound for them.
All this changed in Modern era when liberal democracy started to emerge, first in Europe,
and then elsewhere. The feminist raised the slogan of personal is political to break the glass
partition between the private and the public. Slowly but surely, women got political rights
of representation, especially the voting rights and right to be represented in legislative
assemblies, governments, judiciary and other state institutions. Currently almost all
countries have granted equal voting rights to women. Many countries are having women
as head of the state/ government. More than one dozen nations, especially the Scandinavian
nations, have almost equal number of women in cabinet as men. Women are allowed
representation even in police and army.
But despite all this, there are many issues with the political representation of women. Most
of these issues are due to gendered nature of the modern nation-state and its institutions.
Politics itself defined in a gendered way. Politics as a game of power which is defined in
terms of domination, force, and subjugation has definite masculine overtones. The modern
nation-states are violent and militarized political institutions. War, violence and force have
been the preferred processes through which nation and State building have been carried
out. Most of the state institutions, such as, the government, the Judiciary, the army, the
military, the courts, the legislative assemblies, etc. are highly gendered in nature. They all
work in the overarching patriarchal norms of the society. Because of such gendered nature
of nation-state and its institutions, women find difficult to participate and excel in these
institutions even if they get entries into them.

Hence, to actually have women's effective political representation a fundamental change

in the very definition of politics, nation-state, and nature of state institutions are required
to be brought about. But this is easier said than done. It requires overhauling (substantial
changes) in the social construct of gender and patriarchy. This in turn require new social
norms, new civilization which is gender neutral.
In the next part of the answer, I will explain in brief the comparative evolution of political
representation, especially voting rights, to women, methods adopted by different nations to
increase women’s political representation, and finally, issues related to political representation of
women.
Voting rights to women: a comparative and chronological ( in time) account

Ancient period:
• In Athenian democracy, Women were excluded from participating as they were not
counted as citizen. Later in Republican Rome, too, women were not allowed to participate
in politics and therefore didn’t have voting rights.
Medieval period had hardly any democratic regime. Hence, there was no question of voting rights
to either men or women.
Modern period:
• Democracy started to appear in Europe during 18th century, first in England, and then
France and other mainland European nations. But women were denied political
representation and voting rights.
• Under the deep rooted social norm of private vs public, it was believed that women should
be confined to private domain- family and civil society.
• The dichotomy of private vs public was broken by the feminist slogan of ‘personal is
political’. Many influential liberal thinkers and leaders, such as J.S.Mill, in 19th century
started supporting political rights of representation to women. Despite growing protests,
women were denied voting rights in Europe during 19th Century.
• New Zealand became, in 1893, the first country in the world to allow women to vote.
Subsequently, voting rights were granted to women in Australia (1902), Finland (1906),
and Norway (1913. Finland was the first country to have a woman elected to its national
legislature, in 1907.
• World War I and post-war period speeded up the suffrage (voting rights) of women in
Europe and elsewhere. England granted limited and then full voting rights to women in
1918 and 1928 respectively. USA gave full voting rights, but only to white women, in

1920. Many European countries, including Russia, granted voting rights to women during
1917-25. Between 1914–39, women in 28 countries, mostly in Europe, got voting rights.
• But the real push in enfranchising women came after world war II. De-colonization saw
emergence of many new post-colonial states. Almost all of the gave full voting rights to
women.
• In 1952, UN adopted Convention on the Political Rights of Women which provides that
women would get voting rights equal to men, without any discrimination.
• Currently, voting rights to women are available in almost all countries, including UAE and
Saudi Arabia, which gave voting rights as late as in 2015.
Methods (affirmative actions) adopted to increase women’s political

representations:
Following 3 methods are used worldwide to increase women’s political representations:
Reserved seats:
• The oldest but least commonly used method
• Some seats are reserved in legislative assemblies for women. Each Political Party is allotted
these reserved seats in proportion to its share of the total votes; the party selects women
members for the reserved seats allotted to it.
• For example, in Pakistan, 60 of the 342 seats in the National Assembly are reserved for
women. In Rwanda, which has the world’s highest proportion of female legislators, 24 of
80 seats in the lower Chamber of Deputies are reserved for women;
Party quota system
• The most common and popular method; mostly adopted by European nations.
• A party adopts a quota (typically 25–50 per cent) for women candidates( in its party list)
and other parties follow in order to avoid being seen as anti-women.
• In party list PR voting, parties may be required to place women high on a party’s list or
nominated for winnable constituencies (in FPTP).
Legal mandate (of party quota for women)
• Most recent method, which is particularly common in Latin America
• Same as party quota system but this is compulsory by law.
• Argentina was the first country in the world to adopt such a law, in 1991. Since then, almost
every other Latin American country has adopted this method.

• The legal quota for women ranges from 50 per cent in Bolivia, Costa Rica, Ecuador,
Mexico, and Panama to 30 per cent in Argentina and Brazil, and 20 per cent in Paraguay.
Gendered dimensions of political representation of women:

Politics defined with Masculine attributes
• Politics is defined as interaction of interest & power, both of them have masculine
overtones. Power is defined as domination of one over other, capacity to get someone do
something against their wishes. Authority, hierarchy, competition, brute use of
force/power/coercion, etc are essential attributes of politics.
• Thus, by definition politics is considered to have masculine attributes (features). Naturally,
women lacking in masculine attributes are considered unfit for politics.
Gendered nature of modern nation-states
• State is defined as sovereign political institution having monopoly of use of violence and
coercion(force).
• War & violence has been the process through which most of nation-state evolved. Nation
and state building are carried out through violent and forceful means.
• All these make modern nation-state as masculine and violent political institution. Social
construct of gender assign feminine attributes to women, making them unsuitable to
participate in institutions of nation-state.
Gendered political institutions
• Legislative assembly, government, courts, army, police, etc are deeply gendered
institutions. Norms of behaviours, preferred attributes, values, rules & regulations all have
masculine overtones. For example, bureaucracy, having its features of impersonality,
hierarchy, command & control, expertise, etc. have definite masculine overtones. Police &
army are considered highly muscular organizations.
• Even legislature and judiciary are having more features closer to masculinity than
femininity. Patriarchy is deeply ingrained in working of all these institutions.
• All this makes state institutions highly gendered. Women find themselves largely excluded
or marginalized in these state institutions.
Other issues related to political representation of women:

• Currently, women got voting rights equal to men. They are also exercising this right shown
by almost equal voting percentage by women as men in most of the nations.

• But beyond voting, women lag behind men in formal political participation. Men tend to
dominate political party activities, making direct contact with politicians and bureaucrats,
and protest activities.
• When it comes to holding political offices, women are found disproportionately at the local
rather than the national level. Higher the political office, the more likely it will be held by
a man.
• Women’s representation in legislative assemblies is growing, but high-level politics
continues to be dominated by men.
• Globally, the number of women holding cabinet positions has also grown, with several
countries, such as, Finland, France, Iceland, Norway, Spain, South Africa, Sweden, and
Switzerland, etc., having achieved, or coming close to achieving, an equal number of
women as men in cabinet.
• But even when women are included in cabinet, they are given ‘soft’ ministries such as
education, child and women welfare, etc.
• The number of women being elected to the highest offices has grown in recent times. Post-
world war II, more than four dozen countries have had women as head of the
state/Government. But still majority of head of state/Government are men.
• Thus, despite more political representation to women in recent years, in a large majority of
countries, most ministers and legislators – as well as most top bureaucrats and business
executives – are still men.
• Not only that, because of the gendered nature of most of the political institutions, women
find it hard to excel in them even if they get entry into them.
Conclusion:
Social construct of gender is in root of politics, nation-state and its institutions. All these
have definite masculine overtones. This resulted into exclusion of women from politics and
political representation, since beginning. In modern era, under the liberal ideology, women
were allowed entry into politics, were given equal voting rights, of course after a long
struggle and protests, were also given entries into legislatures, government, judiciary,
armies, militaries and other state institutions.
For this many countries brought the affirmative action policies, such as, reserved seats or
quota. Because of all these efforts, today women have equal voting rights in almost all
countries. Many countries have women as head of state/Government. Many countries have
equal numbers of women in cabinet. Women’s representation in legislative assemblies are
steadily increasing, many countries have about 50 % of women representatives.

But despite all this, effective participation of women in politics and state institutions are
still marginal. They find difficult to excel in these political institutions as they are highly
gendered. Most of them are defined in such a way that they attain muscular attributes and
overtones. Social norms of gender have denied the masculine attributes to women. This
makes them at odd with these state institutions.
Hence, unless the social norms of gender and patriarchy are overturned to usher new
gender-neutral social order, women’s political representation would continue to be nominal
and ineffective.

SECTION 2
SAMPLE
PAPERS

SAMPLE PAPERS
SET 1
Total 6 questions. Attempt any four questions:
1 Discuss Unitary and Federal forms of Government, highlighting their features, types,
merits & demerits.
(Hint: straight forward question, refer to answer at page 7)
2. Define electoral System. Distinguish between the ‘First Past the Post (FPTP) system and
Proportional Representation system with suitable example.
(Hint: For 1st part refer to answer at page 31. For 2nd part refer to answer at page 41.)
3. Define party and party system. Discuss the Historical contexts of the emergence of the
party system
4.What is nation–state? Discuss the historical evolution of nation-state in post-colonial states

5. What do you mean by gendering Comparative Politics? How gender can play important
roles in comparative studies of conflict & peace?
(Hint: For 1st part refer to key points at page 93. Second part is a paraphrased (slight change of
words) question; essentially it asks how experience and roles of men & women in conflict & peace
are shaped by gender norms. For 2nd part refer to answer at page 97.)
6. What do you mean by political regime? Discuss the populist regime, highlighting its
features with suitable example?

SAMPLE PAPER
SET 2
1: What do you mean by political regime? Discuss the democratic regime highlighting
differences between presidential and parliamentary form of governments.
2.Highlight the major features and types of Proportional Representation system with
suitable example
3.What do you mean by party system? Discuss the merits and demerits of a two-party system
compared to a multi-party system
4.What are the major debates on nation and state?

(Hint: This is very general question; you should first differentiate between nation and state; then
point out issues related to nature of nation-state, how it is Eurocentric, and problems of
superimposition of European nation-state template on post-colonial states. You may also write the
debate on state and nation building in post-colonial state and how are they related to point raised
above. refer to answer at page 90, you will get many points.)
5: Discuss women’s political representation from gender perspective.


6: In recent times differences between unitary and federal forms of Government have
blurred (unclear). Discuss.
(Hint: World over federal Government is witnessing more centralization and unitary Governments
more decentralization and devolution of powers. This has diluted the difference between unitary
and federal form of Government in practice. You should elaborate the point with examples, India
and UK being very good example of centralized federalism and decentralized Unitary form of
Government. refer to answer at page 12, you will get many points to answer this question.)

SAMPLE PAPER
SET 3
1: Compare and contrast Authoritarian and Totalitarian regimes.

2. What is an electoral system? Explain mixed representation system with examples.

3. Examine different types of political parties. Differentiate party from party system.
(Hint: For 1st part refer to key points at page 48. For further details on types of parties please
refer to Pol Social contract Help Video on comparative party politics link
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9rro3QekKjg&t=2057s ; For 2nd part refer to answer at page
51.)
For your convenience, parts of the content of that video are preproduced here, on types of political
parties; for explanation plz watch the video:
Types of political parties: on the basis of membership, and Party at ground, at public office,
and party at central office
Cadre Party Mass Party Catchall Party

Such parties developed in Generally, caters to Such parties are loosely
initial phases of particular class/section – bound to one ideology – de-
representative democracy workers/labour class ideologized
from Factions, Cliques • Ex: Socialist Parties • They would appeal to
th
around noblemen, trader, in 20 century the median voter in
merchant, etc Europe- German society as opposed to
• Ex: Whigs, Tories in Social Democratic a specific section of
th
England in 18 Party (SPD) and the the electorate
Century UK Labour Party • Unlike mass party,
• Party at ground and • Party in central office they don’t rely on
public office- weak or and at ground more personal
non-existent central important than party contact/mobilization
office at public office of voter- they use

• Party funds from • Party funds from mass mass media, leader’s
wealthy members membership fee charisma
• Lose party • Tight organisation • Main aim is to win
organisation and and discipline elections.
discipline Focus on recruitment and Strong party in central office
Now Cadre denote trained organization than on ideology and party in public office
and professional party and political conviction
members who exhibit a high
level of political commitment
and doctrinal discipline- Ex:
communist party
General categorisation of political parties:

Types of Parties:
• On the basis of ideology or position on ideological spectrum
• Left parties
• Communist, Socialist, Social Democrats ( center-left), Green,
Liberals(center-left on Social issues)
• Right Parties
• Conservatives, Liberals(economy),Fascist, Christian Democrats(centre-
Right), Nationalist
• On the basis of organization and target voters
• Cadre, Mass, Catch-all, Party
• Cadre party: elite parties in the beginning of democracy in UK and USA.
small size of membership limited to few, those having property, social
status, personality, etc.. for example, Whigs and Tories in UK and
Federalists and anti-federalists in USA
• Mass party: Parties offering membership to masses, raises national issues,
and have wide electoral base; for example, Socialist Parties in 20th century
Europe; German Social Democratic Party (SPD) and the UK Labour Party
• Catch-all party: Parties which aim to get votes from all class/sections/
interests; for example Congress and BJP in India
• Ideological attachment ( by Hitchner & Levine)
• Pragmatic parties, Doctrinal parties and Interest parties.
• Constitutional vs. Revolutionary parties

• Constitutional parties: who believe in constitution and work within its

framework: Congress, BJP, and all mainstream parties in the world
• Revolutionary party: Hindustan Socialist Republican Army by C.S.Azad;
Revolutionary Socialist Party ; currently many political parties uses the tag
‘revolutionary’, world over, but they don’t reject the constitution completely.
• Representative and Integrative parties (by Sigmund Neumann (1956))
• Representative: reflect, represent, and channelize public opinion- Catch all parties
• Integrative: shape public opinion by political mobilization- Socialist Parties
• Party of Government vs Party of Opposition
• Liberals, Conservatives, Christian Democrats and Social Democrats- habitually
governing parties
• Communist, Regionalists, Environmentalists and Nationalists - habitually opposing
parties
4: Differentiate between nation and state. Discuss the challenges of nation-building and state
building in post-colonial state
5: How roles and experiences of men and women are different in conflict and peace?
6: Differentiate between nation-states of western Europe and Post-colonial States. How the
historical evolution of nation-states in these regions contributed to these differences?
(Hint: For 1st part you should explain the difference between nation-states of western Europe and
Post-colonial States; For 2nd part refer to answer at page 79 & 82.)
Some of the differences are: (only indicative, you may find out more)
Difference point nation-states of western Europe nation-states of Post-colonial States
Homogeneity Highly homogeneous- one Highly heterogeneous- multiple

religion, one language, one religion, language, culture,
culture, one worldview ethnicity

Evolution Time Took centuries to evolve Came all of a sudden as part of de-
colonization
Basis One religion, one language Unified opposition to colonial ruler
Nature of evolution Endo-genetic (came from Exo-genetic (adopted from

within, inside) European nation-state)
Relation to culture, In tune with prevailing cultural Mostly out of synch with prevailing
especially political norms and political culture of cultural norms and political culture
culture these regions of these regions.
Geographical Size Generally smaller size Generally larger size
Political Ideology Most of them follow liberalism Diverse- from socialism to

and capitalism capitalism
Nation-building Complete many years before Still continuing

SECTION 3
ANSWER
WRITING TIPS &
TRICKS

Scoring Answer Writing Tips
How to Write Best Answers in Open Book

University Exam?
BA Hons Pol Sc Exam Help
• Yes, one may score better marks by writing strategically. Essay type answers require
different skills than MCQs. Structure (Template), organization, flow, and style matter in
essay types of answers. Here are my Tips:
• OBE require few different strategies than normal memory based exams.

STRATGIES FOR OBE
• Unlike memory-based exam you are allowed access to books, notes, guides.
• Instead of 8 questions, you get only 6 questions; 4 are to be answered
• You need to focus more, as you are appearing from your home.
• Strategies:
1. Do extensive study- don’t leave any theme/topic, as only 6 questions are asked.
2. Questions may be off-beat, different than previous years, as the question setter feels
that you have access to books!
o To tackle off beat question, read them at least 5 times, very slowly, with full
attention. You will find the crux of the question. Then find the similar answers in
this guide or your notes/books. Get some relevant points quickly and build an
answer around those points.
o You should note that off beat questions are good marks fetching! Yes ! Why?
o Because they are tough for all; hence overall quality of answer decreases. If you
have included some good points, as explained above, you will get good marks.
o Another strategy is watching Pol Sc Help videos very carefully, multiple times.
As they are made after an extensive research and cover much more than usual
syllabus, you have better chance of cracking the odd, off beat questions.

OTHER ANSWER WRITING TIPS:
1ST Tip: use the question as answer clue!
Answers are
Attentively read Provide standard
expansion of ideas,
question at least 3 Answers to twisted
issues stated in the
times, yes 3 times! questions
questions
• Answers are hidden in the Questions!
• While framing the question, the examiner is thinking about the answer. Hence, by carefully
and on multiple reading you can visualize the answer hidden in the question.
• And, yes, also read the Hindi translation of the question. Sometime, you may not know
exact meaning of the key word in the question. Hindi translation may give the meaning.
Also, many a times, wording of Hindi question disclose more about the hidden answer.
This is due to translation issue. Take advantage of questions in two languages.

2nd Tips: cleverly organise your answers
Write 1st answer on your best Choose 2nd best topic as last
prepared topic question
Because examiners pay more

Least prepared topics as 2nd attention to your first
and 3rd answers; Why? question, then the last, and
least to middle answers…yes!
• Yes, examiners actually browse through your answer, they don’t read word by word.
• Also, they assess your standard by your 1st answer. 2nd and 3rd answer may not change
your assessment. They assign you marks in range in accordance with the bracketing they
do in the 1st answer.
• Hence, write your best prepared topic as 1st answer. 2nd best as last, why? Because
examiner try to put some attention while browsing your last answer. Make use of his
attention. He may revise the marks bracket he decided while reading your 1st answer.

3rd Tip : Strategic writing?
How many words per

question? No fixed rule- Use standard answer
Normally, 800-1200 words structure (template)
(4-6 pages)
Numbered or bulleted Sprinkle and underline key

points in ‘Body’ phrases
• How many words to write?

• Actually, it shouldn’t matter. But unfortunately, in our country it does matter.
• Average writing speed is 25 words per minute. In a 180 minute (3 hour) exam, one may
write for about 160 minute, leaving 20 minutes for reading paper and organizing thoughts.
Therefore, in 160 minutes, maximum 4000 words can be written. This comes to 1000 words
per question.
• Write in bigger font, maximum 200 words in one page. Use bullets/number and
indenting. Leave good space between paragraph. They consume space.
• Examiners are used to see answers written in a particular template(structure). Follow them.
Carefully observe how I have tried to write in a fixed structure. I have given a standard
structure in next slide.
• Yes, insert standard phrases in your answer, sprinkle (scatter) them across your answer.
Why? Examiners are interested in seeing the key words/phrases in your answer, this help
them quickly browsing your answer. If the found them they assume that rest of your answer
is also okay.

• And finally, repeat key phrases. Yes! You may write the key phrase in Introduction, in
body and in the conclusion. Why? Simple, because examiners are compelled to note the
key phrase/concept in your answer even if he is browsing through the answer. Hence, don’t
hesitate to repeat. It pays.
• Points, bullets or paragraph? No fixed rule! You may choose any one or mix them, even
in same answer. You may also insert tables, and flow chart. These days examiners don’t
mind them.

TIPS ON ANSWER TEMPLATE
• Introduction is where you should focus most. Why? Because examiner read first few lines
of Introduction carefully. It is here he is putting you in a bracket or grade for marking.
About 20-25% of words should be in the Introduction.
• Conclusion is basically introduction in other words (paraphrased introduction). Both give

an overview/summary of the theme, explain a bit about the question asked and give very
brief of their final argument. Difference is in wording. Introduction says I will explain or
as explained below, whereas conclusion say, as I have explained above and so on. 15 to
20% of words in the conclusion; and if it includes discussion, 25-30 % of total words.
• Body should contain remaining 50 to 65 % of words. You can break the body of the answer
in two parts. One informative and other analytical. In the latter part you may critically
analyse the statement or theme in context of the question. You may even merge these two
parts into one.
• You may combine discussion with conclusion. In this case, analysis and discussion follows
conclusion under the heading ‘Discussion & Conclusion’.
• Carefully note how I have used these strategies in building the Answer Template in the
guide.

Comparative Study Part 1

Uploaded by

Document Information

Original Title

Copyright

Available Formats

Share this document

Share or Embed Document

Sharing Options

Did you find this document useful?

Is this content inappropriate?

Copyright:

Available Formats

Comparative Study Part 1

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

Pol Sc Help Exam Guide Comparative politics Semester 4 2021 Edition

New Syllabus COMPARATIVE POLITICS:

• Chapter wise Key points and

• 3 sets of Sample Papers with

• Tips for Writing Answers in

PLEASE SPARE FEW MINUTES TO READ THIS

Dear students…WELCOME BACK!

THEME 1: FORMS OF GOVERNMENT

1.A: CBCS SYLLABUS

Regime Types: Democratic, Authoritarian, Populism and Totalitarian

All rights reserved @polschelp.in 4 dupolschelp2018@gmail.com

All rights reserved @polschelp.in 5 dupolschelp2018@gmail.com

All rights reserved @polschelp.in 6 dupolschelp2018@gmail.com

1.C ANSWER TEMPLATES OF PAST YEAR’S AND OTHER

All rights reserved @polschelp.in 7 dupolschelp2018@gmail.com

Federal form of Government, in comparison of Unitary form of Government, is recent

Features of federal form of Government:

All rights reserved @polschelp.in 9 dupolschelp2018@gmail.com

Features of Unitary form of Government:

Two models of Unitary form of Government:

All rights reserved @polschelp.in 10 dupolschelp2018@gmail.com

Difference between federal and Unitary form of Government

Difference point Federal form of Government Unitary form of Government

Separation of Both horizontal (between 3 organs Only Both horizontal (between 3

All rights reserved @polschelp.in 11 dupolschelp2018@gmail.com

Nature of Divided territorially- both central Undivided sovereignty. Only one

Nature of the Generally large and culturally Generally compact and

Timeline of Recent political phenomenon; first As old as concept of state. Since

Representative USA, Canada, Australia, Russia, UK, France, Spain, Netherlands,

All rights reserved @polschelp.in 12 dupolschelp2018@gmail.com

Q.2: What do you understand by political regimes? Compare and contrast

All rights reserved @polschelp.in 13 dupolschelp2018@gmail.com

Features of Authoritarian regimes:

All rights reserved @polschelp.in 14 dupolschelp2018@gmail.com

o As per the Economist Intelligence, top 21 Authoritarian regimes in world currently

Types of Authoritarian regimes:

All rights reserved @polschelp.in 15 dupolschelp2018@gmail.com

Totalitarian Regimes: Types and Features:

All rights reserved @polschelp.in 16 dupolschelp2018@gmail.com

Difference Between Authoritarian and Totalitarian regimes

Difference point Authoritarian Regime Totalitarian regimes

State Ideology No state ideology A well-defined state ideology

All rights reserved @polschelp.in 17 dupolschelp2018@gmail.com

Socio-cultural No attempt for social Attempts for total social

Mass mobilization No mass mobilization, people mobilizes the whole population in

Popularity of the supreme Low popularity Very high popularity. Supreme

Legitimacy of the Low legitimacy High legitimacy

Consent and Political Force and threat of Manufacture consent by

Institutionalization and Low level of High degree of Institutionalization

Nature of the regime Political Cultural and ideological

All rights reserved @polschelp.in 18 dupolschelp2018@gmail.com

All rights reserved @polschelp.in 19 dupolschelp2018@gmail.com

co-existence of multiple interests, ideologies), minority rights, and multi-culturalism. Thus,

All rights reserved @polschelp.in 21 dupolschelp2018@gmail.com

Difference between Populism and liberal Democracy:

Difference point Populism and Populist Liberal Democracy

Ideology Populism, nationalism Liberalism- toleration, pluralism,

Treatment of Elites Anti-elitist Elites are valuable leaders and

Treatment of ‘the common Consider majority Consider them as mass, to be guided,

All rights reserved @polschelp.in 22 dupolschelp2018@gmail.com

rights of minority and marginalized

Leadership Charismatic and Preference to institutional rules, norms

Nationalism Closely related to right Believes more on international