The History Square

Register to Vote Online

Now registering to vote has got even easier! For those busy Americans who don't have the time to go to the DMV or other state offices offering the services, now we can take full advantage of the technological age. The website Declare Yourself has made it possible to do the registration process online, and all it requires is to mail in the form!

Voting is one of those inalienable rights that we have as citizens of this country; many, many people have fought for this and we are blessed with free elections. Please take advantage of this process and get out and express your opinion! Everyone has an opinion about something that is important to them, but it may not be your opinion, why let someone else have their say for you?? If we can vote for American Idol, or Dancing With the Stars, surely the importance of local and federal elections will hit home!

More on Voter Registration

What Power Do You Possess??

Some Components of Comparative Politics:

--Some common methods of election fraud are:

     ballot destruction

     multiple voting

     vote suppression

     ballot stuffing

     prestuffed ballots

     result fabrications

     harassment of opposition

     unequal access to Media

         *See also, gerrymandering and electoral geography

Seven Major Consequences of World War II:

1: The End of the European Age.

2: The rise of the US to superpower status.

3: The expansion of the Soviet Union and its rise to superpower status.

Internal Wars

Definition of Internal War-an armed conflict involving combatant groups that reside within a single country- a “civil war”; 80-90% of all wars are internal

Examples-Afghanistan

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India

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Lebanon

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Rwanda

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Sierra Leone

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Haiti

People Power

Nonviolent Civic Resistance –“People Power Revolutions”, involves the use of forceful, but nonviolent, political tactics to generate political change;

Comparative Politics: States and Nations

Definition of State

• In Comparative Politics: A country’s governmental institutions, personnel, laws and procedures.

A state has four purposes that come out of the government: the protection of life, property, and liberty, and the promotion of general welfare

National versus State Government

Institutions of the State:

The People: Political Culture and Public Participation

Define Political Culture –the norms, values, beliefs, and attitudes toward government that predominate in a country and the impact these have on the content of the political system.

Different forms of Political Culture (Almond and Verba typology):

-Participant Culture- the people (participants) are usually knowledgeable and interested in politics, they also support a democratic system and are often active in civic life, such as organizations and voting.

Articles of Confederation: A Short Identification

     The Articles of Confederation were the original governmental system, and they were written after it was realized that the US needed a government system. It was called a Federal system of government, rather than a National system because it needed to be differentiated from the colonial system. A committee was established in 1776 to draw up the Articles, and appointed chairman was John Dickinson, who drafted the Articles of Confederation and Perpetual Union.

Political Economy

Political economy – definition: the study of how the political decisions made within a country affect economic development, the distribution of wealth, and the nature of the economic system.

Economic Development – definition and attributes: economic growth that improves the living standards such as: increases in income, improvements in access to and quality of: food, health care, housing, education, and technology.

Describe the American response to the Stamp Act and explain why the colonists reacted as they did?

     The Stamp Act was created as a tax on paper goods, for example: all government papers, such as marriage licenses, writing paper and playing cards, etc. and one was already established in England at the time. People would buy the paper that they needed as normal, but they would then pay a tax on it before printing whatever it was they needed, and depending on the type of paper bought determined the amount of tax paid. The idea was that the money would be kept in America to help pay for the troops currently stationed here, and it was felt that this would be better received by the colonists.