Hello comrades! I totally forgot to write about what happened during my second day of PoliSci. I was so tired and instantly passed out when I got back.

Anyway, I don’t suspect I’ll be writing about every single class I have, only the ‘eventful’ ones. And class number two was kinda spicy!

So this class was about Democracy. We went over definitions and the differences of authority:

Authority - perceived right to rule, brings moral obligation on the ruled to obey.

Traditional Authority - based on history and bloodlines. Basically the monarchy. England and Saudi Arabia were brought up as examples.

Legal Rational Authority - aka Bureaucratic Authority. Based on the election. Not much was said to be honest.

Charismatic Authority - super human qualities of the leader. An ability to awe with words. My professor brought up Hitler as an example, he said Castro’s name but was interrupted by a student asking if Trump fit the bill.

Legitimacy - Rightfulness to rule and exercise power with the consent of the people. A girl from Türkiye in my class used Kim Jung-Un as an example, stating he was illegitimate because he only rules on account of birthright.

My professor surprisingly pushed back on this talking about how the people seem to want him as leader. Then another girl talked about how they are all brainwashed—with a guy chiming in that North Koreans are too scared to speak out against the government. My professor laughed both of these statements off! Basically stating that we don’t have enough information about North Korea to be making these judgements.

We went over Substantive and Procedural democracy. Substantive encompassing civil liberties, basic rights and freedoms. Political equality. Procedural being about elections, which is minimalist and does not mean a system is democratic on its own. Both Substantive and Procedural work together.

Putin was brought up when we were discussing Substantive democracy, basically stating that the people of Russia do not have the freedom to criticize Putin due to the risk of being “disappeared”. I’ve heard this statement a lot over the years but I genuinely have no idea if it’s true. I made sure to write a little note for myself so I wouldn’t forget to mention it here.

The rest of the class was about Liberal Democracy and the differences between The Parliamentary System and Presidential system. Which was fine but did get me thinking about how a lot o countries have both a President and a Prime Minister, so how the hell does that work?

Anyway that’s all I have for now, if any of you have any questions I am more than happy to answer.

Edit: I apologize for any grammatical and/or spelling mistakes. I am typing this on a new keyboard so I’m getting used to the different size, button weight, and formatting. It’s an iPad Bluetooth keyboard so it’s smaller and the keys have different inputs than what I’m used to.

  • KiG V2
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    151 year ago

    Wow, I don’t know if he’s a comrade but saying “we don’t know enough about North Korea to judge it” is a pretty decent baseline I wish more people would have. So sick of everyone always being an expert on every country they’ve seen headlines on.

    • Catradora-Stalinism☭
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      101 year ago

      honestly the fact they aren’t calling for the complete destruction of the DPRK is a step up for a westerner

    • @fruityloop
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      51 year ago

      The bar is under the ground but I was also surprised to see that from a westerner.

      • @SpaceDogsOP
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        41 year ago

        My professor seems to be in a unique category: he’s Canadian and is a very prominent figure in Canadian politics, but he’s also not from my specific province. I know this because he has an accent that is not regional. I don’t know if he’s from Quebec or somewhere else but either way I think that puts him in a different light than other polisci professors.

  • @ComradeSalad
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    9
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    1 year ago

    For the quick side note about criticizing Putin, I will say that the Western narrative about “10 million disappeared and thrown in gulag and executed” is complete propaganda. The truth is that protest will usually get you locked up for a day or two and given a fine, and no one wants to risk that as its to much of a financial and social barrier to have happen. Putin is also no saint and is just a bourgeoisie puppet that seeks to secure his control and protect the power of the corporations he supports. Which is why he receives VERY critical support from Marxists; he is not an ally.

    I’ve also had a few questions I’ve wanted to ask since your last post. If it’s alright for me to ask, what do you plan to do after you graduate with your psychology/political science degree? Do you have a particular job or work field that has caught your interest? I remember you mentioning you wished to receive your PhD, so do you see yourself in academia, or education? Any particular discipline? Though you also mentioned working through local politics, is that part of the plan or as side interest? Sorry for the deluge of questions.

    I’m currently in the college hell of trying to determine what to major in, and more importantly pursue in the future as a career or field. Hearing other people’s ideas and plans is pretty helpful as I’m quite lost and extremely anxious going through this. I feel that most of my interests are laughable and/or translate to poorly paying jobs, or are social “negatives” that can only be rarely applied in a very niche collection of spaces in a capitalist system (i.e. Marxism). For example I was very interested in political sciences, but jobs are one in a million if I weren’t to pursue academia or law which I’m not particularly interested in. Even then what little jobs there are are pretty much all for neoliberal, conservative, and imperialist; corporations, thinktanks, and government institutions.

    Sigh, I’m just very confused and its destroying my mental health. This process in soul sucking. The very idea of working 40 hours a week with no vacations, no sick days, playing a capitalist rat race, not enough money to save up and support myself, and not having enough time or money to do anything interesting or worthwhile; feels like an absolute hell. On top of it all I can’t even decide what I like, I don’t enjoy anything useful like Comp Sci or Medicine, and I don’t feel a particular strong passion for any field, even ones that don’t pay well or are rare. For example I have a friend in art school, which while an unconventional and poorly respected path in the capitalist hellscape they find great passion and interest in what they do and love every moment of it. Letting them pay little attention to the future.

    I feel trapped and cursed.

    • @SpaceDogsOP
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      61 year ago

      Ah, so the protesting thing is like in most other places? I know I heard about Putin seemingly having his political opponents assassinated but I’m staying skeptical. I hope I didn’t come off as a Putin defender, I am well aware he is not an ally, I am just untrustworthy when it comes to mainstream western media making comments on him.

      Now on to your college questions. So after I get my PhD I want to become a clinical psychologist, though working in academia would be nice too. For the politics side I’d start at the municipal level, such as becoming a city councillor and then building up from there. I believe having the research skills will help me better persuade and educate people on Marxism, I’d like to publish many papers as well à la The Federalist Papers. While I don’t think that having a degree is what makes one powerful, but unfortunately in this day and age people look at that paper and will listen more intently. Political Science doesn’t lend itself to many occupations, which is unfortunate, but it can give you a more in-depth background into what the current political landscape is which can aid you in navigating it. At least, that’s what I’m studying it for. The fact that almost every prominent individual with a PhD in media happen to be fascists/fascist-adjacent (I.e. Jordan Peterson) is not lost on me, if I can use this opportunity to even the scales I’ll take it.

      The psychology aspect is due to my wanting to help others. I’ve seen so much injustice around me that I feel this great urge to help people. Psychology and Political Science are incredibly linked and the impact of capitalism on mental health is astounding. But not enough people are talking about it. When they do, they are censored. I’ll repeat it again as I am prone to do: those that are the figureheads of modern politics and intellectuals are hard right, al information made available to the general public is capitalist propaganda. But I’m preaching to the choir here.

      Where I am at in my undergrad I am unable to declare a major and minor just yet, but soon I will. I’ve had the encouragement and guidance of my therapist when it comes to what I want to take in school; he was actually the one to push me into going back to university. From your comments it seems like you’re still in your earlier terms meaning you can’t declare a major. The first year is dedicated to taking courses in different areas to feel out what you want. Some people go in with a plan already in mind while others take the time to dabble in a little bit of everything. I don’t know how it is at your school but in my province, pretty much every post secondary institution has breadth requirements needed to complete an undergrad, no matter what your bachelor is: Arts, Science, Commerce, Business, etc. they all have to do the breadth requirements. These are courses that students can choose from each department to complete their degree. Most students get them out of the way so they can focus on what their major is. In a nutshell the breadth courses are: 6 credits in English, 6 credits in a second language, 6 credits in science, 6 credits analytical studies, 6 credits in social sciences, 6 credits in humanities, and 3 credits in arts. This is designed to give students a broader idea about what is out there and to hopefully aid in a student figuring out what they want to do. If your school does this system then take advantage of it, but don’t overload yourself. My first year (when I was 18 straight out of high school) I took a full course load and was instantly overwhelmed, leading me to drop out after completing my first year, I’m 23 now having transferred my credits and continuing where I left off but this time not taking as many classes this semester to give myself some breathing room. I think you should do this too. I tried to rush through but university/college is completely different from high school.

      Play around with some classes in each department and see what interests you the most. There is no shame in dropping classes either, it’s better to drop it then stay and make yourself miserable. It’s hard finding a shining light in this capitalist hell scape, but there is hope. If your college offers mental health support than take advantage of that, if you have your own therapist like I do than keep booking appointments. You don’t need a degree in Political Science to be a influential Marxist. Hell, I believe that a degree isn’t required at all! You need to find yourself first. Go easy on yourself, you’re a dedicated and capable comrade. You’ll be okay. Take this time and opportunity to explore what academia has to offer: History, sociology, astronomy, anthropology, linguistics, and so many more are available for you to play with. My major and minor just happen to be linked to politics explicitly, but yours don’t need to be. Hell, you could major in a language which opens up a whole world of culture and insight. All paths, to me, are equal.

      I can’t say I have all the answers, far from it to be honest. I’m also battling my own mental health problems and existential crises. My social anxiety is my biggest hurdle right now. While I have other issues, this is one I want to tackle first, one day at a time. Doing to much all at once will seldom get you anywhere close to your goals, on the contrary, it’ll push you farther back. So try to take each day as it comes.

      I hope this rambling was even the slightest bit helpful and I apologize for how confusing it reads. I wrote this over a few days and I tend to get lost in the sauce. Hopefully uni will help me fix that.

  • ☭CommieWolf☆
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    61 year ago

    Many parliamentary democracies have presidents because there needs to be some sort of head of state usually, and generally they don’t have much power but are typically there to take pictures with other leaders and wave during parades. India is a good example, the prime minister has all the power but the head of state is the president, who most Indians probably don’t even know her name.

  • @knfrmity
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    61 year ago

    Lots of countries have a President and a PM, much like the Canada has a PM and a representative the British throne (Governor General), or how US has a President and a Speaker of the House.

    One is elected more or less directly, the other more indirectly via the party representatives sent to the Parliament. Maybe the Canadian Governor General is a bad example here (appointed rather than elected) but I think you get where I’m going.

    Depending on the specific model, either one of these offices can have more power. For example Germany has a president, but all he does is meet fancy high class people and stuff up festivals with cops and security. Technically the German president is the head of state, but functionally he does absolutely nothing of significance. The Chancellor (or PM in other words) is effectively the head of state. Whereas in France the President is the head of state and the PM is the head of the parliament or legislative body.