Introductory Material
Democracy (dI ma' krU si)
—government by the people, in which the supreme power is vested in the people and exercised directly by them or by their elected agents under a free electoral system.
Throughout history, man has struggled with governing himself and his civilizations. Around 380 BCE, Plato penned his Republic in which he discussed the many facets of government. John Stuart Mill's On Liberty explores the definition of liberty in 19 th century Britain, while The Federalist Papers, published anonymously beginning in October of 1787 and later acknowledged by Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, and John Jay, explain the Constitution thoroughly to the citizens. The mid-nineteenth century brought Alexis de Tocqueville from France to record his outsider's view of American government in Democracy in America. Modern thinkers have also contributed to the library of material on democracy adding probing discussions on new topics as they arise, such as Ian Shapiro's Democracy's Place, and his book on the death tax, Death By a Thousand Cuts with Michael J. Graetz.
As long as there is government there will be changes, discussions, and improvements or changes to the detriment of the system. As each generation comes to adulthood, the laws governing the society in which it exists will come under scrutiny. Laws which were once valid and necessary may be repealed or abolished while the need for new legislation will arise. The combination of forms of government allows a society to function in its best interests. The chart in Appendix B shows that the pure definitions describe only a component of any given government. as most governments are a hybrid of two or more of these defined governments. Beginning with these definitions, students can classify how their own country is run as well as the other major international powers. The earliest governments were formed when a group of people realized the need to regulate and control goods and services. Ancient civilizations were centered on meeting the basic human needs of providing food, shelter, and clothing. Of all the needs, water was the essential one, and while governments could not make it rain, they could monitor use of water and take steps to preserve existing supplies through construction of dams and underground storage systems which prevented evaporation.
As needs arose in societies, the role of government expanded. Societies need to defend their living spaces and resources and may wish to establish trade with other people. This all seems simplistic, but if one would imagine what it would be like to be completely dependent on what a small group of people could gather, grow, invent, and construct it makes sense to imagine that there is another group that has something you don't have and that you have an abundance of something they don't have that can be traded.
There is a wealth of material on politics and political history from which to draw in order to construct a study of how different governments are structured and run. For the English teacher, it may be helpful to review some of these before trying to explain them to the students. In my experience, students always come up with questions I haven't anticipated, and the more I have read on the subject in advance, the better. The resources I explored in preparing to write this unit were assigned as part of a seminar at the Yale National Initiative. All the books and articles are included in the bibliography with annotations for the teacher who wishes to read more about it.
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