Society and Politics
The public arena is shaped and structured by two main players: Society and Politics.
Society and Politics are intertwined, at times they seem to be one, sometimes they move so far apart that one has to make an effort to find the connection between them. But for the vast majority of the time they nourish each other, influence and are influenced by each other and actually create the reality in which we live. It is difficult to overstate the impact of these two elements, Society and Politics, on our lives. Moreover, they not only shape the public space, but also dramatically affect the individual, way of thinking, worldviews, opinions and insights about life and in general.
Society
Along with Marx and Weber, French sociologist Emile Durkheim (1858 - 1917) is considered one of the founders of sociology. One of Durkheim’s primary goals was to analyze how modern societies could maintain social integration after the traditional bonds of family and church were replaced by modern economic relations.
Durkheim believed that society exerted a powerful force on individuals. People’s norms, beliefs, and values make up a collective consciousness, or a shared way of understanding and behaving in the world. The collective consciousness binds individuals together and creates social integration. For Durkheim, the collective consciousness was crucial in explaining the existence of society: it produces society and holds it together. At the same time, the collective consciousness is produced by individuals through their actions and interactions. Society is a social product created by the actions of individuals that then exerts a coercive social force back on those individuals. Through their collective consciousness, Durkheim argued, human beings become aware of one another as social beings, not just animals. (source: socialsci.libretexts.org)
Durkheim, in his research on religion, God and faith and his attempts to find the common denominator for beliefs and religions in the world, defined believing in God -
- God has a greater power over man, yet is presents and influences man's life.
- God influences, for good and bad on man, however man can influence God and God’s actions on man (through prayers, observance, doing the right deeds in the eyes of God and moving away from deeds forbidden by God).
- God determines what is right and how one should behave, what is moral and what are the norms believers should go and live by.
Durkheim pointed out the interesting matter that if we switch the word God with the word Society, it will all still make the same sense.
So, do people believe in Society when they believe in God? Do people pray to Society when they seek for assistance or cure for their fears or pain?
According to Wikipedia, Society is: “A group of individuals involved in persistent social interaction, or a large social group sharing the same spatial or social territory, typically subject to the same political authority and dominant cultural expectations. Societies are characterized by patterns of relationships (social relations) between individuals who share a distinctive culture and institutions; a given society may be described as the sum total of such relationships among its constituent of members. In the social sciences, a larger society often exhibits stratification or dominance patterns in subgroups.”
There are many definitions for Society and many attempts to put the finger and to draw the lines that frame this abstract, yet very clear, term – Society.
What do you think? What is your opinion?
What do you think Society is?
What do we know about Democracy?
One would think that if you ask a person who lives in a democratic country "Do you know what Democracy is?", this person would say, right away, "Yes!".
But what would this person answer if you ask: "What is Democracy?"
So, what is Democracy?
Democracy is a very good example for the term: "Hegemonic Ideology", which refers to an ideology which is so obvious for the people who live it, to the point they experience it as the reality itself, and they don't think, in their daily life, there are other realities, other ideologies, people live in.
The Dictionay's definition for Democracy is -
"Government by the people; that form of government in which the sovereign power resides in the people as a whole, and is exercised either directly by them (as in the small republics of antiquity) or by officers elected by them. In mod. use often more vaguely denoting a social state in which all have equal rights, without hereditary or arbitrary differences of rank or privilege."
Can we define all democracies as above?
Can we define all non-democracies as not as the above?
Democracy is not measured dichotomously. The measurement of the level of democracy is the result of the weighting of many indices, each of which is on a continuum (scale, range).
The Economist Intelligence Unit’s index of democracy By Laza Kekic, director, country forecasting services, Economist Intelligence Unit (2007):
Defining and measuring democracy –
"There is no consensus on how to measure democracy, definitions of democracy are contested and there is an ongoing lively debate on the subject. The issue is not only of academic interest. For example, although democracy-promotion is high on the list of American foreign-policy priorities, there is no consensus within the American government on what constitutes a democracy. As one observer recently put it, “the world’s only superpower is rhetorically and militarily promoting a political system that remains undefined and it is staking its credibility and treasure on that pursuit” (Horowitz, 2006, p 114).
Although the terms “freedom” and “democracy” are often used interchangeably, the two are not synonymous. Democracy can be seen as a set of practices and principles that institutionalize and thus ultimately protect freedom. Even if a consensus on precise definitions has proved elusive, most observers today would agree that, at a minimum, the fundamental features of a democracy include government based on majority rule and the consent of the governed, the existence of free and fair elections, the protection of minorities and respect for basic human rights. Democracy presupposes equality before the law, due process and political pluralism. Is reference to these basic features sufficient for a satisfactory concept of democracy?
As discussed below, there is a question of how far the definition may need to be widened. Some insist that democracy is necessarily a dichotomous concept—a state is either democratic or not. But most measures now appear to adhere to a continuous concept, with the possibility of varying degrees of democracy. At present, the best-known measure is produced by the US-based Freedom House organization. The average of its indexes, on a 1 to 7 scale, of political freedom (based on 10 indicators) and of civil liberties (based on 15 indicators) is often taken to be a measure of democracy. The index is available for all countries and stretches back to the early 1970s. It has been used heavily in empirical investigations of the relationship between democracy and various economic and social variables. The so-called Polity Project provides, for a smaller number of countries, measures of democracy and regime types, based on rather minimalist definitions, stretching back to the 19th century.
Freedom House also measures a narrower concept, that of “electoral democracy”. Democracies in this minimal sense share at least one common, essential characteristic. Positions of political power are filled through regular, free, and fair elections between competing parties, and it is possible for an incumbent government to be turned out of office through elections. Freedom House criteria for an electoral democracy include:
1. A competitive, multiparty political system.
2. Universal adult suffrage.
3. Regularly contested elections conducted on the basis of secret ballots, reasonable ballot security and the absence of massive voter fraud.
4. Significant public access of major political parties to the electorate through the media and through generally open campaigning.
The Freedom House definition of political freedom is somewhat (though not much) more demanding than its criteria for electoral democracy — ie, it classifies more countries as electoral democracies than as “free” (some “partly free” countries are also categorized as electoral democracies).
At the end of 2005, 122 states were classified as electoral democracies; of these, 89 states were classified as free. The Freedom House political-freedom measure covers the electoral process and political pluralism and, to a lesser extent, the functioning of government and a few aspects of participation.
A key difference in the various measures of democracy is between “thin” or minimalist ones and “thick” or wider concepts (Coppedge, 2005). The thin concepts correspond closely to an immensely influential academic definition of democracy, that of Robert Dahl’s concept of polyarchy (Dahl, 1970). Polyarchy has eight components, or institutional requirements: almost all adult citizens have the right to vote; almost all adult citizens are eligible for public office; political leaders have the right to compete for votes; elections are free and fair; all citizens are free to form and join political parties and other organizations; all citizens are free to express themselves on all political issues; diverse sources of information about politics exist and are protected by law; and government policies depend on votes and other expressions of preference. The Freedom House electoral democracy measure is a thin concept. Its measure of democracy based on political rights and civil liberties is thicker than the measure of electoral democracy. Other definitions of democracy have broadened to include aspects of society and political culture in democratic societies."
Civil Society
The term "Civil Society" usually refers to the set of voluntary civic organizations and activities that are not subject to the state's power structure, family ties or market interests. Under the wings of this category can be found, for example, religious organizations, movements supporting one social purpose or another, Non-Governmental Organizations, unions, support groups, charities, sports clubs and more.
The engagements and connections that take place in the arena of the Civil Society are open and public, and no less important - free, and hence also lacking permanence. Indeed, the identity of the factors that make it happen and the interactions that take place between them are subject to constant changes and processes of disassembly and assembly, of expansion and reduction. It is a restless arena, in which the power relations, as well as its connections to the other spheres, seldom excel in regularity and stability. And yet, an active and strong Civil Society often has a solid normative core, around which all its components are united, despite the disputes that prevail between them.
The existence of a common political, legal and cultural denominator is a necessary condition for curbing chaos in the vibrant public ground. Civil society's willingness to crystallize around certain principles explains why it has the ability - despite its chaotic nature - even though it sometimes functions as an area of opposition to the state's governmental power - to actually strengthen the existing order and protect it from collapse.
The contribution of civil society to the state's resilience was emphasized by the Marxist theorist Antonio Gramsci, who identified in it the main reason for the delay of the proletarian revolution in the established of western countries. In lists he wrote during his stay in the Italian prison between 1929 and 1930, Gramsci explained that the power of bourgeois democracy rested not only on the coercive mechanisms of the state, but also, and in fact mainly, on the production of consensus in the complex set of Civil Society, "operating without sanctions and without decisive 'constraints' that do not exert collective pressure."
Thanks to the agreement reached by means of persuasion and negotiation, democracies enjoy internal resilience, which allows them to survive severe blows. A direct revolutionary attack, of the kind that defeated the authoritarian tsarist state in Russia, would be of no use in the face of such a form of political and economic organization.
Gramsci realized something that had gone unnoticed by a large portion of critics of democratic regimes; He perceived that the dense and dynamic networks of Civil Society, sometimes seen as a chaos of conflicting desires and interests, could be used when necessary as a means of stopping shocks. The backing they give to the political order comes out from a free choice and is therefore particularly strong. Therefore, in certain crisis situations, it is precisely the organized disharmony of liberal democracy, where a strong, healthy, free and authentic Civil Society can grow and act, that proves to be a more robust governing structure than the centralized mechanism of autocracies.
Source: Assaf Sagiv. 2007. "State of Emergency and State of Liberty."
Politics – what is it really ?
The origin of the name Politics is in Greek - Πολιτικά, politiká,' which means Affairs of the cities, and in many cases, next to the opening sentence ("the origin of the name politics"), one can find the definition of Politics: Politics is the set of activities that are associated with making decisions in groups, or other forms of power relations between individuals, such as the distribution of resources or status. The academic study of politics is referred to as political science
However, we know the use of the term Politics is much broader than just the above classical definition. If so, what is politics really and is it possible at all to define it in a clear universal frame?
In the view of Harold Lasswell, politics is "who gets what, when, how"
For David Easton, it is about "the authoritative allocation of values for a society"
To Vladimir Lenin, "politics is the most concentrated expression of economics"
Bernard Crick argued that "politics is a distinctive form of rule whereby people act together through institutionalized procedures to resolve differences, to conciliate diverse interests and values and to make public policies in the pursuit of common purposes"
According to Adrian Leftwich: "Politics comprises all the activities of co-operation, negotiation and conflict within and between societies, whereby people go about organizing the use, production or distribution of human, natural and other resources in the course of the production and reproduction of their biological and social life "(source: Wikipedia-politics).
I find that there is truth in all the definitions above but there is also an over-accuracy in each of them. My definition of politics: An action whose results may affect more than one person and has two planes: a visible plane and an invisible plane, which visible to some of those concerned.
The political arena sometimes receives unflattering criticisms for its behavior; immoral, unethical, aggressive, sometimes even cruel, acting out of ego and non-material considerations.
Sometimes, the political actors win an unflattering criticism with some justice, but in many cases it is necessary to look at the political system as an arena which issues concerning large audiences are thrown in, issues which could not be resolved in any other arena (social, communal, legal, etc.). In fact, the political system is the arena that is supposed to make decisions where other arenas are incapable to make or have tried and failed. If we add into this dish the fact that these are usually large budgets, positions of power and influence and a great influence on social norms with strong effects on what is normative, we get a perfect recipe for unpleasant feelings to the outside observer, and some say to some inside observer as well.
Saying that, it is important to remember Politics is the main kitchen that tries to cook a good dish, where other kitchens do not want get involved or got involved and their dish was un-eatable.
Nationality
The main feature that indicates the modern nation and everything related to it is modernity. This feature seems well understood today, but the assumption that nationalism is actually natural, primary, permanent and prior to history is also very prevalent. Examination of the linguistic definitions in different languages of the term "national" has revealed that the use of the term is not at all uniform and certainly does not have a uniform meaning throughout the various periods in modern history. Either way the problem of the connection between a state and a "nation" and even an "extended nation" but originating in language, remained an unresolved problem, because it was clear that in ethnic or linguistic terms, or in some other terms, most large states are not homogeneous and therefore not equivalent to nationalities. The Dutch language dictionary emphasizes the special fact of English and French, which use the word "nationality" in the teaching of people who belong to a particular country, even though they do not speak the same language. A discussion of this issue, in 18th-century Germany, suggests that even there the word "nationality" in its original and actual meaning is a union of several burgers, who have a common body of customs, values, and laws. According to this view, the word can not have a territorial meaning, because people with different lifestyles and customs live in the same region of the country.
In any case, the meaning of the word "nationality" in the period of revolutions, in all its forms and shades, is completely different from its modern meaning. The concept of "nationality" in its modern and political sense is a historically young concept. Support for this conclusion can be drawn from the new "English Oxford" dictionary, which in 1908 indicated that the old interpretation of the word saw before its eyes the ethnic unit, but later use rather emphasizes the "idea of political unity and independence." The initial modern meaning of "nation" was political, this meaning placed in the equation the people and the state, this equation is familiar from concepts such as: "nation state" and "united nations". During the Revolution, U.S. political discourse preferred to speak of the "people," "union," "confederation," "our common land," "public," and "community," in order to avoid the centralized and unifying implications of the term "nation" versus their rights. Of the member states of the Confederacy, because in the era of revolutions the term was part of the concept of nationality according to the French conception, and to be perceived as "one" and "indivisible". "Nationality" according to this conception was a body of citizens With their political expression. "Nationality", in this way, was also other things, but did not lack the element of citizenship and the participation or choice of the masses. John Stuart Mill did not content himself with defining "nationality" in the existence of a national emotion, A national entity aspires "to have the same government itself", and wants "to have this government solely by themselves or by part of themselves." The equation with = state = nation, and especially sovereign, connected "nation" to territory, because the structure and definition of states became, in period The revolutions, mainly territorial.
The concept of "nationality" of the age of revolutions cannot be interpreted in a sense similar to the later national meaning of the nation-state; Definition of the concept according to criteria such as ethnicity, common language, religion, territory and common historical memories. At the beginning of the 19th century the number of nation-states was small, and it was difficult to estimate which of the populations in Europe classified as a "national entity" on one basis or another, would acquire a state for themselves, and which existing states would adopt "nation-state" characteristics.
Hobsbaum Eric. Nationalities and nationalities since the era of the revolution. Tel Aviv: Wrestling, 2006.