What is a political party? The obvious answer is the dictionary definition, "an organization made up of people who think alike on various issues that seeks to attain power within a government." (http://www.lwvmi.org/voterpower/voting-terms.html)
Upon trying to further understand what a political party is i found it helpful to look at what usually drives a political party. Is it self interest? Do they think that they know what is best for the good of the people and they should be the ones to make decisions? Pompous? even when its seems that they do not realize this themselves.
As the Federalist 10 and 51 point out there is no separation of what one wants and there own principals and what they strive for the the people. They tend to see it from there point of view. Is it impossible to know one thing is good for you and make the a decision that is not regardless of how good it is for the majority of the people?
There are so many questions and even more answers. I have decided that i will make my own definition of a political party.
Political Party- A group of like minded individuals who have made the decision that they should be responsible for what is best for the greater good of the people and wish to direct society in a view of there own and run for political offices in hopes of gaining power.
The problem here is quite obvious. Most politicians are not like the rest of the society. They are mostly wealthy white males. It is no wonder now that this is why the government of the USA does not service a great majority of the people as well as it could.
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What do Washington and Delay think about parties? Who do you agree with more?
ReplyDeleteDo the political parties and the people that lead them do what they think is best for the greater good of the people or what they think will further them and make them more respected in the minds of the people?
ReplyDeleteI like your definition of "political party" being a "group of like minded individuals."
ReplyDeleteI believe that your questions you personally posed about the motivations behind their actions are best left to the individual, as opposed to the political party as a whole.
In your definition, you stated that members of a political party run for office in hopes of gaining power. Do you believe that this is the main characteristic of a party? By this definition, is it any group of like minded people who run for office?
While most people in Congress are not like the rest of society, there are members of Congress who are unlike the rest of that body.
They may be the ones who hold office without further ambition, and perhaps on a bigger mission of issue awareness.