11.5: Key Terms
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- Ahimsa
- a foundational principle in Indian philosophy to refrain from harming oneself or others.
- Alienation
- in Marxism, the estrangement of workers from their work and from themselves due to capitalist exploitation.
- Anarchism
- a state of no governance or political oversight.
- Aristocracy
- a class of people considered to be elite members of society.
- Capital
- money and commodities.
- Democracy
- government either by elected representatives of the people or directly by the people themselves.
- Divine rule
- a doctrine of political authority in which the legitimacy of the monarch or ruler is derived from the will of the divine.
- Egalitarianism
- the notion that all individuals enjoy equal status and moral worth and that any legitimate system of government should reflect this in its policies and procedures.
- Legitimacy
- in governance, acceptance of one’s right to rule by the people being ruled.
- Mohism
- the philosophy of the Chinese philosopher Mozi or the teachings of the Mozi, a book thought to be a collection of writings by followers of Mozi’s teachings.
- Monarchy
- a system of rule by one individual, who usually inherits their position.
- Natural law
- moral law naturally intuited by humankind, according to the rationality given to them by God.
- Negative liberty
- a state in which one is neither constrained to act nor obligated to refrain from acting in a specific way.
- Political philosophy
- the branch of philosophy that investigates concepts of justice and legitimacy as well as the relationships among political systems, governments, and the people.
- Social contract
- an agreement among members of society to cooperate and allow some limits of their natural rights in exchange for protection and mutual benefits provided by government.
- Totalitarianism
- a system of government that exercises complete control over its people in terms of both their personal and their public lives.
- Veil of ignorance
- an imagined scenario in which a person deliberately remains unaware of any personal traits and does not know what social, political, or economic group they are in.