Tyler Hunt
December 13, 2016
PSC250
Final
Question One
The United States of America holds a delicate system of three political branches with a series of checks and balances, this meaning that different branches have a way to cancel out or veto something another branch attempts to due to ensure that no branch has absolute authority.
The three branches of the United States political system are the Legislative branch, the branch that holds authority in the matter of writing and passing laws; The Executive branch, the branch that holds authority in the matter of enforcing and protecting laws; And the Judicial branch, the branch that holds authority in the matter of overseeing and evaluating if a law is fair and constitutional.
Inside of these three branches, the American political system is divided into two major ideologies, in which those groups that favor more conservative values are considered “Right,” modernly known as the Republicans or Grand Old Party, and those that favor more ideals leaning towards old Social Democracy being known as “Left,” or modernly the Democratic Party.
One of the founding fathers of the United States of America, Our first President George Washington, spoke out against Political parties. He believed Political Parties were extremely detrimental to political systems in general, but in specifics the United States political system, warning that having this sharp divide between conflicting ideologies would ensure unhealthy disdain in American Politics, with the ideals shifting to that of who can dominate the control of branches and groups with the interest of passing such acts and laws for self interest, in order to spite the other parties’ ideals.
The highly realist view on political parties that George Washington held was for good reason at the time, in a country already weakened by revolution and a failed attempt at a first government system, the worse thing they could do was fragment the people even more, with one party believing in a stronger central government and the other one believing in a stronger state government; However, this fragmentation of American political ideologies may have been a good thing.
Argued by Political Scientist and Author David Mayhew, political divides via groups such as Political Parties is healthy and strengthens a government. Mayhew believes that these parties help strengthen our governments systems of checks and balances, preventing a so-called “deadlock” or stopping of our political functions by constant abuse of these checks or veto powers. In where one group can control and smoothly, ever so hopefully, run the government if granted to them by our electoral system, this helps our government glow. Even if one party fails to dominate the three branches, each branch can cooperate with the others in order to pass more moderate laws that both sides can see to as fair if each controls a set of these checks and balances against one another.
Personally, I hold a set of views more befitting of a Realist, especially on the matter of political Parties. I believe they are a main cause of most of America’s problems, or the lack of swift action on said problems. Where as we have complaints about healthcare, job availability, and our economies slow healing, I believe that with a proper unified Government, or even that of a government with even MORE division, such as a multi-party system that encourages coalitions and cooperation between parties to change the “50-50” split into a even wider variable, would allow the United States to function much more effectively on issues.
Question Two
The American Political system is highly unique, as it is one of the first modern Republics to work in the “Presidential System” well. The other big group of democracies holds a similar, but different, style of government known as a Parliamentary system. In the American Presidential system, two or so parties vote on their Executive leader and representatives that will vote on day to day or important issues for them. This sometimes can be an issue, as we will discuss further into the paper.
In the Parliamentary system, Parliament is voted in by the people, most normally out of a number of political parties and interest groups, and given seats based on the percentage of votes their party received, with those seats going down the “line” and filling them up with Party members. After this is done, the Executive, known as the Prime Minister, is voted from the Majority party into office by Parliament itself. This reliance on Parliament for his office allows the system to run quite rapidly in its manners, with the ability to pass things it wants rather quickly due to the Prime Ministers position in the Party.
In the event that a political party, or Parliament in general, in a Parliamentary system holds disdain or dislike for the Prime Minister, the Parliament can vote him out of office with a vote of No Confidence. While this is not an issue within a Presidential system – Could you imagine a President being voted in more than every four years? – The Presidential system that the United States of America uses is also flawed in manners.
As mentioned earlier in this paper, the election of Representatives and the Executive directly by the people can be problematic in the Presidential system of government, especially in the American presidential system itself. As discussed in the first question, the political parties of the American system can be detrimental to US government and its flow, with the system of checks and balances and the believed normality of parties using such to block each other from having any actual results during a period where one party doesn’t control every branch. As the American people vote in representatives from both parties, and a President from one party, this quickly builds up the slow system of party opposition and the constant checks and balances.
This ideal of lack of progress and divide in the Presidential system is one reason a majority of newly forming democratic governments do not go with a Presidential system, as well as the statistics that show a large amount of said Presidential systems as failing or failed governments, with the ease of a Executive seizing absolute power if the system of checks and balances does not work out perfectly. Such is why when a country is forming as a newly built democracy, the majority of the new states decide upon themselves to be a Parliamentary system, as well as a slight historic background involving the British colonization of the majority of the developing world. These Parliamentary systems allow them to elect their government without fear of a growing capability for dictatorship or the lack of progression via the checks and balances of the Presidential system.
Question Three
International relations and studies are a wonderful field with multiple areas of study, theories, and cases to look into when speaking about systems of government, conflict and security, and global political and economical development. In such, its possible to look at many, if not all, cases of world issues or conflicts and apply these international theories as to what happened, or how these conflicts can be solved.
Taking the civil war in the Ukraine and the Russian Annexation of Crimea for example, International Relations theories and ideals can be put in place for the issue. In 2014, Ukrainians rose up in revolution against their government after multiple political issues and broken promises. Quickly a divide against Pro-Russian presidential supporters and Pro-European Union Ukrainians broke out, leading into fighting and ultimately, the Russian annexation of a region known as Crimea, an area that housed multiple military locations and a large Russian population, as well as the alleged secret military backing of Pro-Russian forces with Russian equipment and troops.
If we analyze this we can see issues from the start. Looking more closely at the political troubles in the Ukraine, we see that the Pro-Russian government was originally making progressive turns towards becoming a functioning member of a Institution known as the European Union, an organization that benefits most countries and allows trade and labor to flow wonderfully. After this government “flip-flopped” on those plans and signed a trade deal with Russia, as many viewed as Detrimental to Ukraine, political unrest and protests began, and were met with police and military.
This initial behavior put lack of trust in a government that quickly turned, in the eyes of the people, tyrannical. In a realist perspective, the State has absolute authority and sovereignty; therefore it can do what it wants to its people, as they are the weak. Following this, we see yet again another Strong Power, in Russia, coming to take land that it has interest in, due to its ethnic Russian population and its strategic value as a military location. These ideals easily fall upon the ideal of Realism, with the strong taking from the weak, as it is their due.
Also taken into perspective is the liberalistic view, in which the Russian government swiftly acted in order to protect the ethnic Russian population from war and conflict, and due to the alleged referendum for independence, and the following referendum that voted to make Crimea part of the Russian Federation, Crimea rightfully made the democratic choice to place themselves into a place that is better for them democratically.
Institutions built to look at these issues and their solutions, such as the United Nations, were able to do very little to due Russia’s position as a major nation, and a permanent member of the Security Council. Following this realist ideal, Russia would have been able to veto any action taken against it or the Ukraine in order to stop this conflict, as it following Russian interests.
Realistically, this situation is highly dangerous and unapproachable, due to the nuclear armament and the Security Council status Russia holds. If any other actor, such as the European Union, tries to take part, Russia is there with its strong military to stop them. If any other Security Council member tries to take economic or political action, Russia is able to veto it. Due to this, Ukraine’s fate is highly unseen, and is one of the most dangerous political issues at this modern time.