hey guys uh today we're going to focus on some of the basic ideas and concepts of government we're also going to address five basic questions first one is why do we have governments what is a sovereign state who rules a government what is the importance of civic virtue and finally why should government power be limited one of the first Concepts we had throughout the year was this idea that if there was no rules no laws no government if we were living on a desert island what would happen uh if there was no Authority whatsoever we came to the conclusion that it would definitely be difficult people would probably fight each other people might be naturally selfish want to look out for themselves and in Thomas hobb's view he would call that a state of nature no government people are constantly going to be fighting really brings out the worst in people he Hobs also was one of the first to come up with this concept of a social contract and basically what he thought is that people give up rights and power to the government and in exchange for that the government would provide protection and they would protect against this constant Warfare that typically happens in a state of nature one of the first images we looked at throughout the year uh was this book cover called the ithan and we did a primary source activity looking at the cover trying to figure out what Hobs wanted to communicate to people who read this book and his argument in the book is that if you have a strong ruler uh a powerful ruler as the illustration shows uh that's the only person that can prevent warfare that's the only person that creates order and stability in society so you know people are going to agree to have this government but once you have it that's it strong ruler lays down the law and you can't change it okay one of the other philosophers we discussed was John Lock and one of his ideas was the the concept of the tabularasa and that means that the mind is a blank State and that at Birth you basically fill your life with certain experiences and those experiences shape who you are as an individual but he also thought that we share a human nature that is the same for everyone and this laid the foundation for his a later concept of natural rights Theory Lo has a different view um he thought look uh people when they're born they have certain things and those can be life liberty and property we're all born with these um you don't buy them somewhere um everyone has these rights he believes and government plays a role in that okay and government's role according to lock is not just to keep order but it's also to protect natural rights and this is where he deviates a bit from Hobbs is that where Hobbs was more concerned about control and order lock was more concerned with the idea of government protecting those natural rights of life liberty and property also unlocks idea if we're going to enter into this social contract um we're giving up absolute freedom to do whatever we want but that's because we all share this idea that we want our rights protected and the government's role is to protect those natural rights the second part of his Co social contract theory is the idea that if the government fails to protect your rights you have the right to revolt okay now in a uh an undemocratic system that would actually mean a violent revolt against or or a takeover of of government however in a modern system of democracy the right to revolt is translated into voting and then just voting elected officials out of office and then redoing that social contract with new Representatives our next section of unit one involved this idea of a sovereign state and when we went through our reading there we found that a sovereign state has four components population territory sovereignty and government and we'll get into those okay so when you mention a state do you mean like Connecticut or Rhode Island no uh even though that's what we think of normally here living in the US um in a global sense we're thinking more of a country almost so the word State and Country sort of used interchangeably here so in our case in a government class when we say state for this purpose we're referring to really uh a a country okay so not a state like the United States like the 50 just a state as in a nation state a country correct okay okay one of the first elements of a state or a sovereign state is that it has a population this is defined by a group of people who have membership or they members or citizens of a state territory it's going to be those land areas with set boundaries in which a state's rule applies we all are familiar with the boundaries of the United States um other states around the world have very similar uh Geographic boundaries whether it's rivers oceans up next to other countries uh we know what a territory is okay uh what if there's a dispute over the territor is it still a state yeah well sometimes we see that carried out um through various Wars or conflicts sometimes people may have conflict over natural resources um if there's a territory dispute for example take like uh with the Crimea region of Ukraine um well that played out where Russia actually took that over so that's no longer part of Ukraine um we'll see if anything else comes of that and so territories can change and shift all the time they can change they're not set in stone forever clearly the territory of the us when you take us history expanded from the original 13 all the way to the 50 States today so okay the third element is sovereignty and sovereignty means the ability to rule absolutely within a territory and to to simplify that that just means that no one else outside of your country can tell you how to run your own a lot of times they try to the US is a culprit of that uh trying to make other countries do certain things uh but for the most part if you have a sovereign state the government of your country is the one who makes the rules no outside force can dictate the interworkings of your country the government itself Civics is a citizenship and government class but what exactly does it mean to have a government um we're going to take a look at the four roles that government has but really it's that organization inside the state that's going to control basically what happens inside your state the four roles of a government or any government are the first is to make laws second is to protect the state okay that means to protect it from foreign countries and invasions the third is to keep order and that is similar to protecting the state but that's within the country so how do you keep security and Order within uh your nation states boundaries and then lastly provide services such as schools hospitals Transportation uh so those are the four things that just about every government does in order to be considered a government to to try to bring this into some current events when we looked at what's happening in Iraq and Syria right now the question we asked all of you is is the Iraqi government fulfilling those four main roles and you had to take a look at the evidence that was there look at the situation with Isis and come to the conclusion are they fulfilling the roles of government no yeah okay they are not particularly in Northern Iraq they cannot satisfy all of these things so hopefully from the US perspective they can gain control over that but as of now they is simply not a a functioning government in the northern part of the country our next section involves who rules and this took a look at a number of different types of governments that we have around the world and one of the first ones that we looked at is um any form of government with a single ruler would classify as an autocracy now that's going to be divided into two main types where one person has all the power with a monarchy and a dictatorship okay let's start with monarchy that's the traditional king and queen ruling the country and power is inherited through family line typically the firstborn son uh and a lot of the you know if you've taken European history you just know about uh the kingdoms there they started out as an absolute monarchy where the Monarch would have complete control over the country since then they still have monarchies in Europe but they're constitutional monarchies which means that the monarchs are still the head of state they do a lot of the diplomacy and things like that however it's really more of a ceremonial position there's still a constitution they still have a republic they vote for uh Parliament and and certain Representatives but there still are existing monarchies throughout the world dictatorship is the one we're probably the most uh familiar with certainly in uh sense of former dictator Saddam Hussein in Iraq uh Adolf Hitler um Bashar al-assad of Syria we hear that word dictator ship one leader is absolute control over citizens lives um United States ousted Saddam Hussein uh several years ago when we invaded Iraq um people now are questioning you know if you had to pick a poison is it better to have a Hobs Viewpoint to have someone like that in control it's not the best but it keeps stability in the region or what happens when you try to create a democratic government you have different people competing yeah that's a good point I mean do you have would is it better to have a dysfunctional dictatorship that violates people's rights but keeps order versus a completely dysfunctional democracy that is closer to Anarchy right and uh in really neither of them are good situations but the goal is to try to get towards a more uh um secure and and orderly State without having to take away everyone's rights ab and that's the goal of each government yeah we'll take a look at democracy Now um citizens hold the political power two types of democracy we're going to have representative democracy and direct okay representative democracy is the type that we have at our federal level our national level of government in that type of democracy people have the power but people don't uh engage in the day-to-day running of government or decision-making they elect representatives to do it for them in a country of more than 300 million people it would just literally be impossible for us to have a direct democracy on a large scale so instead what we do is we vote in elections to elect leaders that represent us the form of democracy that would probably work best in maybe smaller communities uh we showed pictures of ancient Greece where you can have everyone directly participating in making the laws now do we have forms of direct democracy today sure uh at the state level citizens can actually get enough signatures and on a ballot um they can come up with their own initiatives where they can vote directly and make the laws directly so we do see it today uh in various forms and in certain states around the United States another example locally in the New England region they have a lot of town meetings still that determine budgets and and things like that and every citizen in the town can go to the meeting and has their own particular vote they don't have a representative at all they vote themselves in those elections correct okay an oligarchy is a small group that has all the power uh an example of that would be a military hun and that is where small groups of officers take over a government overthrow the established regime whether it be a dictatorship or or democracy or any other type of government and then they controlled the country by Brute Force they weren't elected they didn't get it by uh family ties or or or heredity they just take over the country with the military yeah are there any examples of military hunas today well uh usually we would see something like this uh in maybe central Africa um we do see governments that have broken down and as a result it's it's honestly who has the most guns or who has has experience in the military and is then taking that uh for their own personal gain a group of Military Officers I know in our reading they mentioned the country of Myanmar or Burma for a while had a military hun ruling the country and uh you could even maybe make the argument South Africa not a military hun but certainly an oligarchy where maybe one group in the case of different races having political power for a while during the apartheid era okay that's a good example an oligarchy doesn't have to be a military there's other types of small group rule in throughout the world okay uh theocracy this is where we involve religion with this type of government now with that we see uh mostly Islamic republics uh typically have theocracies but just because if you have a theocracy does that mean that you're a dictatorship or you're a monarchy or you're a democracy um does it apply to all of them is it just one why don't we take a look at where theocracy actually applies okay well one one example would be like you mentioned Iran and that is an example of in a republic they have elections and they have Representatives but they also have Islamic law okay so they are a theocracy uh God's law is actually translated into you know their their civilian law um but they still have elections and representative it's not a dictatorship or any type but so just know that theocracy that's where you have the infusion of of of religion and uh civilian life and government unlike in the United States where we have a clear separation of church and state which is debatable um which we'll get through uh later in the year but uh for the most part the United States separates church and state meaning separates religion from government some countries do not of course uh very similar to a state of nature is anarchy no government no control no one's in charge complete chaos um there are no rules no laws Anarchy is just that um and if any of you watch that show Sons of Anarchy um it's about a motorcycle gang that kind of goes around so uh we do see the term now and then and as far as a country having Anarchy as a government it doesn't exist because remember one of the four parts of a sovereign state is a government so if there is no government Anarchy doesn't actually qualify as a sovereign state the only time that you get Anarchy is when a state literally breaks down like sometimes uh throughout the last 20 years parts of somal have had no government control that's been basically Anarchy uh in parts of Northern Iraq and Syria once the Syrian regime fell there's been Anarchy in those places and that's where groups such as Isis and different Al-Qaeda cell have been able to establish controls because there was no government functioning in those regions if you take a look at this chart here who rules this is pretty helpful just in the sense of organizing how can we uh organize government and what are the different forms so if you just take a look at this across we just went through these various forms but I think this is helpful in a visual sense where you may have no one ruling all the way along the Spectrum to many people get to participate certainly the United States we would fall onto the right side of that Spectrum with a represent democracy and some components of direct democracy here and there yeah one thing to not is that the type of government that we left out there was the theocracy and that's because theocracy could apply to any of these except for Anarchy okay but we could have theocracy that is one fewer all but just know that these are the main types of government that we see throughout the world today our next section involves civic virtue in the common good two terms we use a lot of paintings to try to illustrate these points and for the common good doing what's best for the community as a whole um we'll take a look at how these ideas are played out in some of the paintings that we looked at okay similar to common good the concept of civic virtue that means putting the common good or the good of the community you're doing that but you're also doing it above your own self-interest so an example of that would be so the basic idea of paying taxes that money that you pay in taxes you could use that to spend on any anything you'd want however you pay your taxes because uh it's going to be dispersed and used for some type of government service or the common good whether it be defense or or other services like hospitals or roads but there are other examples too that will go through uh throughout the year that demonstrate how you do things that maybe don't help you uh at the moment but they will help you in the end because as you help the common good through civic virtue and do some sacrific it will come around and help create a better Community which in turn makes your life better the story of cincin is and we use this painting uh to show a citizen of Rome who was called upon by his country to help lead his country and be Victorious uh against the enemy now knowing what we know about human nature most people after being Victorious and given an opportunity to take power or to be a leader or to have everything that you ever wanted most of us or people out there we would think would take that opportunity cincinnus fights for his country defends Rome and says I'm G to go back I'm going to retire and I'm just going to go back to my farm I did my duty it's in the best interest of Rome as a whole for me to step back and let the government be um we use him as a case study because in a country like ours or in any government we would hope that the people who are in charge uh possess this degree of civic virtue okay we also brought up the concept of George Washington as an example of civic virtue how did he demonstrate this concept throughout history right very similar people called George Washington a modern day cincinnus and in fact uh there's a society called the the Society of the Cincinnati uh which was formed with uh family members related to Revolutionary War generals if you look it up it's it's pretty interesting but going back to Washington After the Revolutionary War he had an opportunity to pretty much do what he wanted um control the military and throughout history military people have gone on to seize power Washington as his painting showed hands in his military commission and retires to his farm on Mountain Vernon it wouldn't be until years later where he would be called back uh to serve on behalf of his country and become our first president but uh the king of England even said George theii if if what he has done is true he'll be the greatest man who ever lived and um he does rank high among among our presidents in in US history and certainly a modern day cincinnus indeed and he also once he was President he demonstrated this again how did he do so uh at the end of his presidency you know in the Constitution it doesn't it didn't say originally that you have to have only a maximum of two terms um Washington set the precedent so after two terms he said you know what I'm done step down Adams became the next president um but nowhere in the original Constitution did it say you had to only serve twice uh again stepping down for the good of the country country okay governments must be limited to prevent the possible abuse of power and we do this because throughout history there's been countless examples of governments actually doing this and abusing power so by the time the founders sat down during the uh the convention to establish this we had a lot of history and precedent set of people abusing it so they specifically set up our constitution to try to limit this possible abuse in the future Constitution well what is it we had our constitution today and everyone got a pocket Constitution it's a rule book it's a framework lays out what a country's government is okay so this rule book has a few different parts so the Constitution limits governments because it says exactly what it does have the power to do uh so it starts out by saying what type of government we're going to have how it functions how laws are made as well as the rights and responsibilities of citizens so all of these things they seem like they're adding Powers but at the same time they're also limiting it beyond the scope of those powers that are listed in the Constitution another idea that we have of limiting government is with the rule of law look not even the president the leader of a country our government officials no one is above the law and we have this concept because we have to create limitations even on those who we elect to be in power so it's enforced it's fair it applies to everyone Okay the third concept of limiting government is the separation of powers and that's the concept of taking different types of power and giving assigning it to different people in government and our government divides it into three branches we have a legislative an executive and a Judicial some countries do it a little differently but those are the three basic ways that most countries separate their powers you have one group of people that enforce the laws the executive one group that makes the laws the legislative and then one group that interprets the laws which in our case is the judicial system consent of the Govern pretty much means if you're going to enter into a social contract or you're going to uh agree to set up a government you got to provide your consent and how do we give our consent uh every two years every four years Etc uh mostly through voting right uh we provide our consent we approve of who's in the government through voting and even if we don't like uh the way something is set up we can amend the Constitution we can change laws um provide our consent that way so voting is how we do that good and for for an example of that there's actually a ballot question coming up in in my state of Rhode Island in which we're going to choose whether or not to have another constitutional convention in the state of Rhode Island to actually rewrite the State Constitution which is kind of wild to think of but uh but on a local level we may actually be making some uh some changes to either amending it or just changing the text of the con constition itself wow okay rights of the minority and this concept means that majority rule doesn't mean that you can abuse the rights of the minority okay so uh say there's a small or unpopular group in society just because they lose an election or they're on the other side of the democratic system it doesn't mean that you can just do what you want to that group or completely ignore or violate their rights to life liberty and property thanks for watching this video about the basic ideas of government I will be going over this in more detail throughout the year and if you have any questions please let us know in class send us an email uh and we'll see you soon