7 10 13 Examples of free riding o You don t pay your taxes for national defense o You pollute the clean road because its easier than holding trash in your car to throw away later o You overfish the bay and deplete fish stocks The phrase tragedy of the commons originates from situations where a public good exists but risks being destroyed if over using free riders are not controlled But there are solutions to the free riding problem Potential solutions Selective Incentives o Provide special benefits of membership o Ex access to privately built marina dockside grill only if you agree to monitoring of fishing catch Coercion o Remove someone s property rights if they free ride o ex if you don t pay your taxes the government will arrest you and take your stuff o If you resist arrest they will injure kill you Participatory Benefits o Provide personal satisfaction for participation o Ex create a culture of feeling righteous moral for those who don t polite clean up roadside trash among the community that uses the road Many people think political science is not a science partly because their only exposure to political science is taught as the history of politics o But political science is a science it s a social science like econ or psychology o Political science uses the methods like theory building hypothesistesting experiments data analysis replication of results etc These are used in different ways in political science because people are different in regards of how they approach do things Why is it necessary to study politics scientifically o Science the search of the truth Without this we cant resolve competing claims about politics If you and I disagree about who gets what when and how how can we discover who is correct without science EX suppose you think Congress is full of good honest people IF we approach it scientifically we might define our terms and then collect evidence Political scientists start by creating theories A theory is a statement of general beliefs and assumptions abou the state of the world It also implies several testable predictions about the world A hypothesis is a descriptive statement or cause effect statement about the world that can be proven wrong What hypothesis does cartel theory suggest o If the majority in the House only let bills get voted on that a majority of its members supports HASTER rule then we should never observe a bill passing in the House that a majority of the majority party opposes Deductive reasoning o start with assumption you know to be true o proceed logically from there o come up with hypothesis suggested by theory Inductive reasoning o observe interesting patterns in the political world o come up with a theory that explains those patterns o see what other hypotheses that theory suggests What methods do political scientists use to analyze politics and test hypothesis o statistical analysis use survey data economic data and data on events o formal theory logic and math to derive the hypothetical implications of assumptions rules and preferences o case studies focusing on specific illustrative examples in great depth to trace out how political processes work ex analyzing the entire history of a single bill in Congress to explain relationship between Congress and the President when passing laws French and Indian war o France loses but gets to keep most of its colonies in Western Hemisphere England has spent a lot of money needs to get some back imposes taxes on colonists and asserts more direct control Salutary neglect ends and laws that are rarely enforced are now Policies forced on colonists there relative freedom is gone There is public outrage among political business leaders 2 trends emerged from oppressive English rule From all this we get the development of a national identity Also debate over nature of government and representation Colonies had begun to think of themselves in terms of group identity but now have a common enemy in England Development of national identity over colony state identity and tension between them is a key part of pre and post Revolutionary America At the time of the Revolution The Enlightenment had been occurring for over 100 years Anger with England before Revolution spurred additional consideration and debate over several key ideas among population in general but especially founding fathers Many of these ideas later shape the Constitution These ideas were o Why government forms Government forms because life in a state of nature is nasty brutish and short Hobbes John Locke social contract theory o Government forms solely for the purpose of security and people trade away some rights to government in exchange for protection from criminals and foreign thugs o But people retain natural rights among them life liberty and property o Government that violates the social contract by infringing on natural rights lose legitimacy o Natural rights are rights given by God that you inherently have on the basis of being human Locke Probably the most influential political philosopher for the Founders and the Constitution The nature of representation of government o During time of revolution there was a debate over whether the kings had a divine right to rule as they saw fit o This debate occurred in America England and continental Europe Founders were heavily influenced by ideas that o Government had to include some elected representatives for the people Many of these ideas were due to Rousseau French philosopher Experience with England only underscored this idea No taxation without representation Founders agreed on 2 big ideas about government Legitimate government is o To some degree elected and representative o Limited Limited government o Is formed for and has a specific purpose security o Small and has specified restrictions on what it can do and can t do o Cannot infringe on the people s natural rights o Is accountable to the people o Can be dissolved if it violates people s natural rights and the social contract These ideas came from the writings of Locke Adam Smith economist and Thomas Jefferson among others