Unit II

Assignments:

1. Read and translate the text.

Early History

Most scholars would agree that 4th-century BC Greek philosopher Aristotle was the earliest forerunner of the political scientist. His study of types of regimes in his Politics has remained a major influence on the discipline. Over the centuries, other classics of the field were written by Greek philosopher Plato, Roman statesman Cicero, Italian statesman Niccolo Machiavelli, British philosophers Thomas Hobbes and John Locke, French writer Jean Jacques Rousseau, and German philosophers Immanuel Kant and Karl Marx. Almost all of these authors dealt with the possibility that a society could provide the conditions for a good life for all its people.

Development in the United States

Political science emerged in the United States as a separate field of study in the late 19th century. The new breed of political scientists, often college professors, insisted that a genuine understanding of governments could be gained only through study of the actual process of politics, using careful methods to observe, gather, organize, and explain the facts.

Many political scientists believed that if they developed explanatory [Ik'splxnqt(q)rI] theories, the study of government and politics could become as much a scientific endeavor as the established laboratory sciences. These scholars joined researchers in the fields of sociology and psychology.

From sociologists they borrowed statistical methods of collecting and analyzing data on people's political behavior. From psychologists they took definitions, propositions, and concepts to help in understanding why human beings act in certain ways.

Contemporary Political Science

The scientific approach finally began to dominate the field after the mid-20th century. Political scientists polished their skills in applying the methods of social science, including public opinion surveys, content analysis, statistical techniques, and other means of collecting and systematically analyzing political data. Some political scientists developed sophisticated models of human activity to guide their research, frequently drawing on computer technology for concepts as well as hardware.

Others created a burgeoning subfield of policy analysis, which they promoted as an independent discipline. It calls for the mastery of scientific methods to enable policy analysts to judge what alternatives would and would not work in coping with public problems.

2.Interpret the following in English (on your own):