Portal:Politics

Portal topics: Activities; Culture; Geography; Health; History; Mathematics; Nature; People; Philosophy; Religion; Society; Technology; Random portal

Introduction

Politics (from Ancient Greek: πολιτικά, translit. Politiká, meaning “affairs of the cities”) refers to a set of activities associated with the governance of a country, or an area. It involves making decisions that apply to members of a group.

It refers to achieving and exercising positions of governance—organized control over a human community, particularly a state. The academic study focusing on just politics, which is therefore more targeted than general political science, is sometimes referred to as politology (not to be confused with politicology, a synonym of political science).

In modern nation-states, people have formed political parties to represent their ideas. They agree to take the same position on many issues and agree to support the same changes to law and the same leaders.

An election is usually a competition between different parties. Some examples of political parties worldwide are: the African National Congress (ANC) in South Africa, the Conservative in the United Kingdom, the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) in Germany and the Indian National Congress in India.

Politics is a multifaceted word. It has a set of fairly specific meanings that are descriptive and nonjudgmental (such as “the art or science of government” and “political principles”), but does often colloquially carry a negative connotation. The word has been used negatively for many years: the British national anthem as published in 1745 calls on God to “Confound their politics”, and the phrase “play politics”, for example, has been in use since at least 1853, when abolitionist Wendell Phillips declared: “We do not play politics; anti-slavery is no half-jest with us.”

A variety of methods are deployed in politics, which include promoting one’s own political views among people, negotiation with other political subjects, making laws, and exercising force, including warfare against adversaries. Politics is exercised on a wide range of social levels, from clans and tribes of traditional societies, through modern local governments, companies and institutions up to sovereign states, to the international level.

A political system is a framework which defines acceptable political methods within a given society. The history of political thought can be traced back to early antiquity, with seminal works such as Plato‘s Republic, Aristotle‘s Politics and the works of Confucius.

Read more…

Show new selections’

Selected article

The Power of Nightmares is a BBC documentary film series, written and produced by Adam Curtis. The series consists of three one-hour films, consisting mostly of a montage of archive footage with Curtis’s narration, which were first broadcast in the United Kingdom in late 2004 and have been subsequently aired in multiple countries and shown in several film festivals, including the 2005 Cannes Film Festival. The films compare the rise of the American Neo-Conservative movement and the radical Islamist movement, making comparisons on their origins and noting strong similarities between the two. More controversially, it argues that the threat of radical Islamism as a massive, sinister organised force of destruction, specifically in the form of al-Qaeda, is in fact a myth perpetrated by politicians in many countries—and particularly American Neo-Conservatives—in an attempt to unite and inspire their people following the failure of earlier, more utopian ideologies. The Power of Nightmares has been praised by film critics in both Britain and the United States. Its message and content have also been the subject of various critiques and criticisms from conservatives and progressives.

…Archive/Nominations

More…

Featured picture

Credit: Muhammad Mahdi Karim

Salman Khurshid (born 1 January 1953) is an Indian politician belonging to the Indian National Congress, a lawyer, and a writer who has been elected from Farrukhabad Lok Sabha constituency in the General Election of 2009. He belongs to the Farrukhabad area. He is presently the Cabinet Minister of the Ministry of Law and Justice and Ministry of Minority Affairs.

…Archive/Nominations

More…

Selected quote

The 20th century has been characterized by three developments of great political importance. The growth of democracy; the growth of corporate power; and the growth of corporate propaganda against democracy.

— Alex Carey, Taking the Risk out of Democracy, 1997

…Archive/Nominations

More…

News and Current Events

Wikinews on Politics and conflicts

Selected biography

Richard Nixon (1913–94) was the 37th President of the United States, serving from 1969 to 1974. He graduated from Whittier College in 1934 and Duke University School of Law in 1937, returning to California to practice law. He served in the United States Navy during World War II. Nixon was elected to the House of Representatives in 1946 and to the Senate in 1950. He served for eight years as vice president, from 1953 to 1961, and waged an unsuccessful presidential campaign in 1960, narrowly losing to John F. Kennedy. In 1968, Nixon ran again for president and was elected. He initially escalated the Vietnam War, but ended US involvement in 1973. Nixon’s visit to the People’s Republic of China in 1972 opened diplomatic relations between the two nations. Though he presided over Apollo 11, he scaled back manned space exploration. He was re-elected by a landslide in 1972. A series of revelations in the Watergate scandal cost Nixon much of his political support in his second term, and on August 9, 1974, he resigned as president. In retirement, Nixon’s work as an elder statesman^{[disambiguation needed]}, authoring several books and undertaking many foreign trips, helped to rehabilitate his public image.

…Archive/Nominations

More…

Did you know…

…that anarchism once was the strongest current in the Cuban labor movement?

…that “Tippecanoe and Tyler too” (campaign banner pictured) was called the “Marseillaise” of the 1840 United States presidential election?
…that the events of Polish October together with Hungarian November shook the Eastern Bloc in 1956 and set the course for the Revolutions of 1989?
…that the current constitution of Nicaragua, the ninth in the country’s history, was the final step in the institutionalization of the Sandinista regime?

…that co-founder of the Saudi Civil and Political Rights Association Mohammed al-Bejadi spent most of 2011 in prison?

…that when the Tennessee Center for Policy Research, a “free-market think tank,” criticized Al Gore's energy use, CNN mistakenly called the organization an environmental group?

…Archive/Nominations

More…

In this month

April 1, 1979 – Iran‘s government becomes an Islamic Republic by a 98% vote, overthrowing the Shah officially.
April 9, 1948 – the period known as La Violencia begins with the assassination of Colombian Liberal Party leader Jorge Eliécer Gaitán. For the next ten years Liberals, Communists and Conservatives would fight each other in the conflict.
April 9, 2003 – Government of Saddam Hussein overthrown by American forces in Iraq.
April 19, 2006 – Han Myung-sook becomes South Korea‘s first female Prime Minister.
April 24, 2005 – Presidential elections in Togo return Faure Gnassingbe to power two months after he was installed by the military following the death of his father, Gnassingbé Eyadéma.
April 28, 1937 – Saddam Hussein, the President of Iraq is born.
April 30, 1945 – Adolf Hitler and his wife of one day, Eva Braun, commit suicide as the Red Army approaches the Führerbunker in Berlin. Karl Dönitz succeeds Hitler as President of Germany; Joseph Goebbels succeeds Hitler as Chancellor of Germany.