Political Ideology Essay Through out the past there have been many different forms of political ideology. With all theses different types of government you have to wonder sometimes which one of theses forms of government would be the best to run the ideal society. In this paper I will compare and contrast; liberalism, social democracy, fascism, communism, and anarchy. Also I will give my opinion on which one of these forms of government would be the most ideal to run a modern day county or society.
Before I can begin comparing and contrasting we need to have a working understanding of all the political ideology’s stated above.The first political ideology that I will discuss is liberalism. Liberalism as defined by Essentials of Comparative Politics is “An ideology and political system that favors a limited state role in society and economy, and places a high priority on individual political and economic freedom. ” Now what do liberals really believe? They believe that liberty and individual responsibility is the base of any civilized society, that the state must always have the citizen’s best interest in mind when making choices, that there must be separation of powers, that in all criminal trails the accused has the right to a public trial and a quick trail.The main ideals behind liberalism are freedom, tolerance, responsibility, social justice and equally opportunity for all.
There beliefs continue to including equal access to education, freedom of speech and press, tolerance of diversity, and equal rights between men and women. So in a nutshell they belief that state exists to serve the people and that there should be equal rights for every person. Social democracy more commonly know as socialism has achieved a very bad image over the years.It is defined as “a political ideology system in which freedom and equality are balanced through the states management of the economy and the provision of social expenditures. ” While springing from the same roots as communism which mission is to destroy capitalism by violent means and replace it with there own system of governing, social democracy wants to regulate capitalism and give the government a role in changing the problems in the capitalist society. Social democracy has kept more with the ideas of Marxism by insisting that socialism will spread with out using violence.
While not widely accepted it is used in a small degree in some countries such as in the United States where it is used to regulate the economy in a small way to prevent monopolies. When you hear the political ideology fascism you think of Hitler’s Germany or Mussolini’s Italy. The fact of the matter is that this is what fascism is. It is defined as “a political ideology that asserts that supports the superiority and inferiority of different groups of people and stress a low degree of both freedom and equality in order to achieve a powerful state.
Fascism sought to get rid of entrepreneurship and the idea of the market place. Also fascism required that owners use their property to help the national interest and if they were apposed they used force to convince them. In fascism, the state controlled all aspects of commerce, manufacturing, finance, and agriculture. Communism is defined as “a political ideology that supports the idea in which all wealth and property are shared to eliminate exploitation, oppression, and, ultimately, the need for political institutions such as the state. In the being of Communism it had ten main points that were written in the Communist Manifesto were “Abolition of private property, heavy progressive income tax, abolition of rights of inheritance, confiscation of property rights, central bank, government ownership of communication and transportation, government ownership of factories and agriculture, government control of labor, corporate farms and regional planning, and government control of education.
” The last form of political ideology I will discuss is anarchy.Anarchy is “a political ideology that stresses the elimination of the state as a way to achieve both freedom and equity for all. ” Anarchists mainly believe that the state is they enemy and in order to be free and equal we have to dissolve the state by force. They all so do not believe in the concept of private property, and that all other form of government should be done away with such as capitalism.
Anarchism has been though as one of the most violent form of government mainly because it seeks to destroy the state and dissolve it.One common theme that I saw between most all of theses political ideologies besides fascism is that they all seek to create freedom and equality. They all go about doing this in very different ways. Both Social Democracy and Communism seek to give freedom to people by treating everyone equal and that no one is better than any one else. Social Democracy goes about this in a more passive way than communism by just accepting the eventually everyone will become socialist by there own choice where Communism forces socialism upon people and imposes them to there government.In liberalism they create freedom and equality not by controlling the system but by allowing there to be free markets, private ownership, freedom of the press, and generally a lot more chances for a person to succeed, or fail.
On the other end of the spectrum is Anarchism which believes that the only true way to have freedom in a government is if you completely destroy the state. Fascism seeks to give more freedom to one group that is considered to be better than the other. In my opinion I think that liberalism is the best political ideology to run a country for several reasons.The first of those being that every one as an equally opportunity to succeeded that you get back what you put into the system.
A perfect example of this is the public school system in America, if you try hard in get better grades you have a greater chance to be able to do what you want to latter in life. Another advantage to liberalism is that it creates a competition between companies. This helps the consumers of these products by driving the prices up and giving more options. An example of this is the feud between Wal-Mart and Target. Because of there desire to get people into there stores they will keep driving down the prices.
The main reason that I believe in this political ideology is because it creates freedom and equality for all only if you strive to achieve. "As mankind becomes more liberal, they will be more able to allow that those who conduct themselves as worthy members of the community are equally entitled to the protection of civil government. I hope to see America among the foremost nations in example of justice and liberality. " George Washington.
This quote sums up my ideas on liberalism and why I think that it is the best political ideology. So what is the best form of government?I have defined liberalism, social democracy, fascism, communism, and anarchy. I then went on to compare and contrast them, and then decided that liberalism was the best for a variety of reasons. In the end each country has different circumstances and there is not one political ideology that would be perfect for the world.
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2009 . "Communism - Marxism & The Communist Manifesto. " allaboutphilosophy. 21 Sep.
2009 . O'neil, Patrick H. Essentials of Compartive Politics. New York, NY: W.
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