introduction

• Political Science is a systematic study of state and government.
• Political Science originates from the Greek word “polis” meaning, “city” or equivalent to sovereign city and Latin word “scire” meaning, to know.
• Political Science deals with those relations among men and groups which are subject to control by the State.
• Political Theory is the entire body of doctrines relating to the energy, form, behavior and purpose of the state.
• Public Law is the organization of governments, limitations upon government authority, powers and duty of the government offices and officers and the obligation of one state to another.
• Public Administration focuses upon the methods and techniques used in the actual management of state affairs by executive, legislative, and judicial branches of government.
• The goal in the study of Political Science is education for citizenship, essential parts of liberal education and knowledge and understanding of government
• Political Science contributes to the development of essential parts of liberal education, including knowledge and understanding of government.
• A state is a community of persons more or less numerous, permanently occupying a definite portion of territory, having a government of their own to which the body of inhabitants render obedience, and enjoying freedom from external control.
• The Philippines is a state.
• Elements of a state include the people, the territory, the government, and sovereignty.
• The people are the mass of population living within the state.
• Territory includes not only the land but also the rivers and lakes therein, a certain area of the sea which abuts upon its coast and the air space above it.
• Government refers to the agency through which the will of the state is formulated, expressed and carried out.
• Sovereignty is the supreme power of the state to command and enforce obedience to its will from people within its jurisdiction and to have freedom from foreign control.
• Sovereignty can be manifested internally as the power of a state to rule within its territory, and externally as the freedom of a state to carry out its activities without subjection to or control by other states.
• The origin of a state can be traced back to Divine Right Theory, which posits that the state is of divine creation and the ruler is ordained by God.
• Another theory of state origin is Necessity or Force Theory, which suggests that states must have been created through force.
• Paternalistic Theory attributes the origin of state to the enlargement of the family which remained under the authority of the father or mother.
• Social Contract Theory posits that states must have been formed by deliberate and voluntary compact among the people to form a society and organize a government.
• A nation is a group of people bound together by certain characteristics such as common social origin, language, customs, and traditions.
• A state cannot exist without government, but it is possible to have a government without a state.
• The state, as long as its essential elements are present, remains the same, but a government may change its form.
• Government is only the agency to which the state expresses its will.
• Forms of government also include Unitary Government, where control of national and local government is exercised by the central or national government, and Federal Government, where powers of government are divided for national and the other for local affairs.
• Monarchy - the supreme and final authority is in the hand of a single person.
• Absolute Monarchy - ruler rules by divine right.
• Limited Monarchy - ruler rules in accordance with the constitution.
• Aristocracy - political power is exercised by a few privileged class.
• Democracy - political power is exercised by a majority of the people.
• Indirect / Pure Democracy - will of the state is expressed directly through mass meeting.
• Indirect / Representative / Republican Democracy - the will of the state is formulated or expressed through the agency of a small selected body, chosen by the people to act as their representative.
• As to relationship between the executive and legislative branches of the government: Parliamentary Government - the state confers upon the legislature the power to terminate the tenure of office. Presidential Government - the executive is constitutionally independent of the legislature.