Pat Parker & Associates
Pat Parker & Associates Relevant Facts Pat Parker was a law school graduate who started a consulting firm called Pat Parker & Associates and specialized in conducting opposition research and writing reports for political candidates, primarily for the Democratic Party. This case is about how Pat Parker developed a research report for Democratic nominee, Dale Jackson for the statewide Attorney General position. Two years later, representatives of the State Academy of Trial Lawyers wanted to buy the same research document on the Republican Attorney General, Terry Paine in what Parker believed to be an effort to inoculate their candidate during an upcoming election. Parker wasn't sure how to proceed knowing that this could potentially jeopardize the political party's candidate or even worse, could be arrested for soliciting the information. The evidence presented in this case was concerned with ownership and the control of research created by one party for use by another. Legal Issues There are several legal issues related to this case. . Would Pat Parker violate either contract or federal copyright laws by selling the research or associated postcards to the State Academy of Trial Lawyers or anyone else who desired to purchase them? 2. Could Pat Parker sell the research to the State Academy of Trial Lawyers without violating the $500 maximum funding limit under the
Is the Liberal perspective on world politics too idealistic?
Is the Liberal perspective on world politics too idealistic? This essay will look at what the liberal perspective on world politics is. It will examine the main theory of liberalism, it will also take a deeper look at the liberal ideology. It will look at the origins of liberalism and the main liberal thinkers. In order to answer the question whether the liberal perspective on world politics is too idealistic one must examine and acknowledge the fact that liberalism has been interpreted in many different ways. Liberalism can be said is a theory opposed to centralization and absolutism. The definition of liberalism has been a much disputed. The actual term can be traced back to the fourteenth century. 'The term liberal has been derived from the Latin word 'Liber' which in English means free'. (Manning D.J, 1976, page 51) One such definition of Liberalism is: 'Liberalism is an ideology, philosophical view, and political tradition which holds that liberty is the primary political value.[1] Liberalism has its roots in the Western Age of Enlightenment, but the term has taken on different meanings in different time periods (for example now in the United States generally it means new liberalism while in the rest of the world has the meaning of classical liberalism'. (Gray, John. 1986) The word liberalism can be interpreted in different ways and has a lot of meanings; it's not
Is consociational democracy democratic?
Politics and Society in Europe Is consociational democracy democratic? Today, democracy is both a pervasive presence and a valued symbol in European politics1. Theorists of the concept generally agree on the fundamental principles of democracy but have tended to differ radically in their conception of popular rule and democratic practices2. Consequently, it was somewhat inevitable that democracy as an ideal emerged in different forms across the diverse societies prevalent in Western Europe. Arend Lipjphart's seminal work on 'consociational democracies'3 contributed to democratic theory - concerned primarily with political stability of democratic regimes in plural societies4. The democratic viability of Lipjphart's theory has recently been called into question however5. What then is 'democracy'? Establishing the benchmarks of the concept at the outset will allow us to evaluate the extent to which 'consociational democracy' can be seen as 'democratic'. An assessment of the key themes of Lipjphart's theory - that of 'grand coalitions', 'segmental autonomy', 'proportionality' and 'minority veto' respectively - will set the structure to the following discussion. Drawing examples from the Belgian and Swiss 'consociational' regimes will provide illustrations of the emerging argument that consociational democracy is undemocratic6. Abraham Lincoln famously described the
Marxism Can Only Be Appreciated Retrospectively
Marx failed to predict the future, but it had many useful insights into the past. Discuss. Marxism was first coined by Karl Marx (1818-1883) and Frederich Engels (1820-1895). It's both a theory and practice based on a scientific method of thought called historical dialectal materialism, meaning there is no one clear answer to a question, instead the theory is based on a certain amount of variables that are always restricted and so most of these theories are limited. Through this historical materialism Marx and other Marxists through time have studied the development of forms of social organisation and consciousness, how they have succeeded one another in history and their interconnections with the development of the forces of production mobilised by social formations at each stage in the unfolding of history. To test the validity of theory, Marx relied on truth as the empirical evidence and so using methodology, Marx and Engels examined history and this led them to examine and explain theories on class struggle, the foundations of social relations through economics and the form of society that would follow capitalism. Most historians who became Marxists from the 1880's onwards did so because they wanted to change the world in association with labour and socialist movements. While the origins of Marxism have been developed over time and enriched by working class history,
Max Weber - German Sociologist and First Analyst of Bureaucracy.
Weber's interest in the nature of power and authority, as well as his pervasive preoccupation with modern trends of rationalization, led him to concern himself with the operation of modern large-scale enterprises in the political, administrative, and economic realm. Bureaucratic coordination of activities, he argued, is the distinctive mark of the modern era. Bureaucracies are organized according to rational principles. Offices are ranked in a hierarchical order and their operations are characterized by impersonal rules. Incumbents are governed by methodical allocation of areas of jurisdiction and delimited spheres of duty. Appointments are made according to specialized qualifications rather than ascriptive criteria. This bureaucratic coordination of the actions of large numbers of people has become the dominant structural feature of modern forms of organization. Only through this organizational device has large- scale planning, both for the modern state and the modern economy, become possible. Only through it could heads of state mobilize and centralize resources of political power, which in feudal times, for example, had been dispersed in a variety of centers. Only with its aid could economic resources be mobilized, which lay fallow in pre-modern times. Bureaucratic organization is to Weber the privileged instrumentality that has shaped the modern polity, the modern economy,
How have political sociologist understood globalization? Globalization is perhaps the central concept of our time. Yet, a straightforward definition of globalization
Written by Gino Seguna, RHUL How have political sociologist understood globalization? Globalization is perhaps the central concept of our time. Yet, a straightforward definition of globalization does not exist, either among academics or in everyday conversation. While most conceptions focus on various aspects of increasing interdependence be it economic, cultural, technological, and the like, at a basic level globalization refers to growing interconnectedness. Most definitions incorporate a notion of a growing magnitude of global flows such that one can truly speak of a global society. Essentially, globalization is a highly complex interaction of forces producing integration and disintegration, cooperation and conflict, order and disorder. But it is this interconnectedness that gave rise for the notion that globalization is changing the nature of human society, was replacing the sovereign state system with a multi-layered, multilateral system of 'global governance.' Regarding the nature of globalization, there is a discussion about whether the world has in fact entered a new, unique historical period. Some scholars certainly do discard the notion that we have entered a fundamentally new era. There are many, however, who see globalization as a genuine restructuring of social organization. Some have questioned how global present conditions really are. In the present era,
Legacies of the totalitarian system and the political transformation of Romanian society after 1989.
LEGACIES OF THE TOTALITARIAN SYSTEM AND THE POLITICAL TRANSFORMATION OF ROMANIAN SOCIETY AFTER 1989. Motto: "A party can only ever be one tool. And there is only ever one purpose: power." - Jean Paul Sartre. EES ON-LINE 2003-2005 MODULE: Politics TUTOR: PROF. Klaus Segbers Author: Maria Cristina MARIN Content of essay: . Legacies of the totalitarian system 1.1 Single party system 1.2 Ideology 1.3 Mobilization 1.4 Leadership 2. A portrait of the democratic change 3. A "sketch" of the future . Legacies of the totalitarian system The basic concept of the totalitarian state was best expressed in Mussolini's well-known phrase, "all within the state, nothing outside the state, nothing against the state." Romanian totalitarian history has begun soon after the WWII. Once the Iron Curtain drawn on the Europe's map, Soviet Union consolidated its grip on Europe by creating satellite states in 1946 and 1947. The creation of NATO in 1949 had the effect of escalating the cold war. One by one, communist governments, loyal to Moscow, were set up in Poland, Hungary, Romania, and Bulgaria. Stalin used Soviet communism to dominate half of Europe, perhaps to simply protect his borders from any intervention on the part of the United States or the allies. A mutual assistance between Romania and the Soviet Union was set on 4th of February 1948. The signature of Warsaw Pact in May
America Liberalism
America Liberalism The United States of America is known throughout the world as the benchmark of a free society. America believes in a complex philosophy of liberalism. The question is where did this complex idea come from? Well one idea is that it was inherited from the early settlers of the American Colonies and it has been transforming ever since and is now the form we see today. My purpose is to prove to an audience that Puritan Theology and culture, Anti-Federalist arguments, and Federalist political thought, have all been profound influences on this idea of liberalism. "By liberalism we mean that Americans tend to look first to the individual as the source of value rather than to an imposed dogmatic creed or hierarchy" (American Political Thinking). According to the way we look at liberalism in America today, there are two strands of it. The first strand is called "Classical Liberalism." This is the idea that peoples' property rights, their protection and a free economic market are more important than human welfare. For quite a long time, this was the only type of liberalism there was, until many people began to think that human rights were more important than any economic prosperity derived from free enterprise. This change in thought is called the progressive movement. This movement was created by a rise in the great concentrations of urban wealth. This
Analyse The Main Features of Classical Liberalism
Analyse the Main Features of Classical Liberalism Liberalism is usually divided into two phases, Classical Liberalism up to about 1880 and New or Modern Liberalism 1880+. This essay will be focusing on Classical Liberalism. The term 'liberal' itself has been in use since the fourteenth century but has had a wide array of meanings. The Latin 'liber' referred to a class of free men. Men, who were neither serfs nor slaves. It has also meant generous, and open mindedness and also became increasingly associated with ideas of freedom and choice. The term 'liberalism' to denote political allegiance made its appearance much later. The term was not used until the early part of the of the nineteenth century being first employed in Spain in 1812. By the 1840s the term was widely recognised throughout Europe in relation to a distinctive set of political ideas. However, it was taken up in the UK more slowly. Although the term Liberalism in a political sense had not existed before the nineteenth century, it was based upon ideas and theories that had developed during the previous three hundred years. Political Liberal ideas resulted from a breakdown of feudalism in Europe and the growth, in its place of a market or capitalist society. In many respects liberalism reflected the established power of absolute monarchs and the landed aristocracy. The views of seventeenth century liberals
How revolutionary were Lutheran and Calvinist theories of authority?
How revolutionary were Lutheran and Calvinist theories of authority? Lutheran and Calvinist theories of authority were revolutionary as they laid the foundations of a radical shift in attitudes towards obeying authority. Political thought changed from a view that it was never legitimate to resist authority to the notion that 'like any other wild animal, a tyrant can be killed.' However it was later Calvinist theories that were more revolutionary than Calvin's own work On Civil government and Luther's On Secular authority. Moreover rather than promoting revolutionary theories of authority, Luther and Calvin were concerned to preserve order. Revolutions occurring throughout Europe in the sixteenth and seventeenth century were to an extent legitimised by Lutheran and Calvinist theories of authority but this was certainly not the original intent of the writings. Luther and Calvin were after all theologians, not political philosophers. The Lutheran and Calvinist theories of authority were a radical departure in political thinking in the sixteenth century in terms of an obligation to submit to authority. The tradition of biblical thought suggested that obligation was fundamental and thus, it was not considered legitimate to resist authority. Christian political theory was underpinned by the divine word of God, which stated 'obey the powers that be.' (Romans 13) The early
