Chapter Summary

A variety of forms of government are to be found among the more than two hundred countries that inhabit the world. In Chapter 10, we look at the ways political and governance systems other than the American system deal with the constant struggle for power within a nation. How and to what degree do various political systems promote cooperation, advance accommodation, and handle conflicts in domestic politics?

The chapter focuses on four different types of political states in five different countries: a parliamentary system in Great Britain, an authoritarian system in Nazi Germany, a mixed system in China, and a failed or fragile system in Zimbabwe and Somalia.

We note that parliamentary governments are a very common form of democratic government, with legislative bodies called parliaments that serve as the center of governmental power. Unlike the American system of government, the executive (the prime minister in the British case) and his or her cabinet are also members of the parliament, usually the leaders of whatever party has the most seats in that legislative body. Because of this arrangement, we have a connection of powers, not a separation of powers as in the United States. The British do have an independent system of courts, but unlike the U.S. courts, they have no power to declare an act of Parliament unconstitutional.

Authoritarianism is a form of rule in which the ruler (or rulers) imposes his or her own beliefs or values upon the society, regardless of what members of that society think or desire. In this sense, authoritarianism is the opposite of democracy. A common form of authoritarianism is dictatorship, a form of government in which power is centralized under the control of a single person or possibly a small group of people. Perhaps the most extreme form of authoritarian rule is totalitarianism, where the regime rigidly controls all aspects of life, including economics, education, transportation, the arts, communications, and more. It is so extreme that some political scientists make a clear distinction between authoritarianism and totalitarianism, considering them, in fact, two different forms of government.

Nazi Germany, which lasted from 1933 to 1945, was an example of an authoritarian regime that boasted a certain ideology called fascism, a totalitarian or political ideology characterized by dictatorial leadership; an oppressive one-party system; glorification of the nation-state and its people; aggressive militarism; and political, economic, and social policies designed to overcome the weaknesses of liberal democracy, the threat of anarchy, and the fear of communism. The fascism that characterized Germany under Adolf Hitler’s dictatorship also included anti-Semitism, a prejudice against or dislike of Jews that led to the genocide of six million people in the Holocaust.

Modern-day China is an example of a mixed system containing elements of both authoritarianism and democracy, at least that part of democracy which is manifest by a relatively open market economy. From 1949 until the mid-1970s, China was a purely communist state with a strong authoritarian bent under the leadership of Mao Zedong. After Mao’s death in 1976, China moved away from the heavy personalist Maoist model of governance and, in fits and starts, began opening up its economy to the forces of the free market. Today, the Communist Party still controls the government and some elements of the economy. But enormous shares of the economy are subject to the principles of the free market. One of the most important political questions of the twenty-first century is how China will balance (or fail to balance) the practices of capitalism with the demands of a one-party state.

Failed or fragile states are countries in which the system of government has or is failing to perform essential tasks normally undertaken in stable democratic, communist, or authoritarian systems. Often what government exists is chaotic and corrupt, with limited respect for the rule of law or human rights. The economy is not simply stagnant but declining or even collapsing. Two contemporary examples of this type of system are Zimbabwe and Somalia, both on the African continent.