Программа по формированию навыков безопасного поведения на дорогах и улицах «Добрая дорога детства» 2
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Systems of Government Governments can be classified in many ways. The most time-honored system comes from the ideas of the ancient Greek philosopher, Aristotle. It is based on a key-question: Who governs the state? Under this system of classification, all governments belong to one of the three major groups: autocracy — rule by one person; oligarchy or aristocracy— rule by a few persons; or democracy — rule by many persons. Any system of government in which the power and authority to rule are in the hands of a single individual is an autocracy. This is the oldest and the most common form of government. Historically, most governors or autocrats maintain their positions of authority by inheritance like in monarchies or the ruthless use of military or police power like in totalitarian dictatorships or tyranny. In a monarchy a king or a queen or an emperor exercises the supreme powers of government. Absolute monarchs have complete and unlimited power to rule their people, but absolute monarchies are rare today. With various functioning mechanisms of government — cabinet, parliament, ministers, and parties having been established in many monarchies, the power of the monarch has been dramatically limited. An oligarchy or aristocracy is a system of government in which a small group holds power. The group derives its power from wealth, military power, social position, or a combination of these elements. Sometimes religion is a source of power. The term oligarchy is rarely used now to refer to contemporary political systems. Both dictatorships and oligarchies often claim they rule for the people. Such governments may try to give the appearance of control by people. They might hold elections, but offer only one candidate, or control the election results in other ways. Such governments may also have some type of legislature or national assembly elected by or representing the people. These legislatures, however, only approve policies and decisions already made by the leaders. As in a dictatorship, oligarchies usually suppress all political opposition. A democracy is any system of government in which rule is exercised by people. Democracy may take one of two basic forms: direct or representative, the former existing only in very small societies where decisions may be taken by general vote. In a representative democracy, the people elect representatives and confer on them the responsibility and powers to legislate and conduct government on their behalf. The ancient distinction between monarchies, oligarchies and democracies is no longer descriptive of political life. The notions and ideas concerned have been altered and the same types of governmental machinery often function very differently. Exercise 5 Look back into the text and answer the following questions:
Exercise 6 Look through the text again and point out which topical vocabulary appears in it. Exercise 7 Find in the text: a. derivatives of the word ‘govern’ and word combinations with this word. What is the meaning of the word ‘government’ in each case? Is it the same? Which synonym of the verb ‘govern’ is used in the text? b. the word-combinations with the word ‘power’. Is the meaning of the word the same in all of them? Exercise 8 Point out the sentences in which the following word-combinations occur and suggest the Russian for them. The most time-honored system of government power and authority to rule to maintain the position of authority by inheritance ruthless use of military power to exercise the supreme powers of government complete and unlimited power to rule people to give the appearance of control by people to suppress political opposition to confer responsibility to legislate to conduct government Exercise 9 Give equivalents from the text to the following: An important question; to work; to rule; to change partially; main; to carry out; to relate to; to make laws; to maintain / to state; to crush or hold back by power; to accept policies; a problem Exercise 10 Match the English word-combinations related to government with their Russian equivalents. A.
B.
Exercise 11 Read the text that follows and give written answers to the questions below, try not to quote the text.
Constitutional Government Constitutional government is defined by the existence of a constitution that effectively controls the exercise of political power. The control of power is distributed among several state organs or offices in such a way that they are each subjected to reciprocal controls and are forced to cooperate in formulating the will of the state. The contemporary political systems that combine constitutionalism and democracy accord primary significance to the will of the majority of peoples as expressed in free elections. And in such systems, political parties are key institutions, for they are the agencies through which majority opinion in a modern mass electorate is mobilized and expressed. The essential functions of political parties in a constitutional democracy are the integration of a multitude of interests, beliefs, and values into one or more programmes or proposals for change and the nomination of party members for elective office in the government. In both functions the party serves as a link between the rulers and the ruled. It is worth mentioning that few states in the modern world have constitutional arrangements that are more than a century old. Indeed, the vast majority of all the world's states have constitutions written in the 20th century. This is true of states such as Germany, Italy, and Japan that were defeated in World War II and of other states, such as the successor states of the Soviet Union, and China that have experienced civil war and revolutions in the course of the century. Actually Great Britain and the United States are almost alone among major contemporary nation-states in possessing constitutional arrangements that predate the 20th century. Britain is the classic example of the parliamentary system. The British constitution has evolved over many centuries. Unlike the constitutions of most other countries, it is not set out in any single document. Instead it is made up of statute law, common law and conventions, which are derived from the historical events through which the British system of government has evolved. While the British Parliamentary system provides for the integration of legislature, that is Parliament (the Queen, the House of Commons and the House of Lords) and executive (Her Majesty's Government), the U.S. presidential system is based on the doctrine of separation of powers. Moreover the United States is the leading example of the presidential system of constitutional democracy, which, according to Woodrow Wilson, was «simply an adoption of English constitutional system of government)). The U.S. presidential system distinguishes sharply between the legislature, the latter being Congress with the Senate and the House of Representatives, and the executive, which is the President and his Cabinet. In fact the prestige of constitutional democracy was once so great that many thought all the countries of the world would eventually accede to the examples of the United States or Great Britain and establish similar arrangements. However the collapse of the Weimar Constitution in Germany in the 1930s and the recurrent political crises of the Fourth Republic in France after World War II suggested that constitutional democracy carries no guarantee of stability. The failure of both presidential and parliamentary systems to work as expected in less-advanced countries that modeled their constitutions on those of the United States and Britain resulted in a further diminution in the prestige of both systems. Functioning examples are located throughout the world, though these are generally poorly institutionalized outside of those countries with direct historical ties to Western Europe. Japan is a notable exception to this generalization, as are Costa Rica, India, and several other states to a lesser extent. Curious enough that even in Britain and the United States, the 20th century has seen much change in the constitutional government especially as far as the relationship of legislature and executive is concerned. In the United States, for example, the relationship of legislature and executive at both the national and the state levels has been significantly altered by the growth of bureaucracies and the extension of the executive's budgetary powers. In Britain, even far more reaching changes have occurred in the relationship between the prime minister and Parliament and in Parliament's role in supervising the executive establishment. Furthermore in both countries, the appearance of the welfare state, the impact of modern technology on the economy, and international crises have resulted in major alterations in the ways in which the institutions of government function and interact. The adoption of new constitutions is also a major aspect of political change in almost all of the states of Eastern Europe. All systems, moreover, even without formal constitutional change, undergo a continual process of adjustment and mutation as their institutional arrangements respond to and reflect changes in the social order and the balance of political forces. The question for many constitutional regimes is whether the limitation and balance of power that are at the heart of constitutional government can survive the growing enlargement of executive power. (from Civilization on Trial by Toynbee) Notes to the text: 1. Welfare state — a state whose government is responsible for the wellbeing of its citizens through such measures as social security, free medical care, old-age pensions, and providing education, housing, and the like. — Государство социального благополучия. 2. Woodrow Wilson — the U.S. president at the end of the 19th century. 3. Weimar Constitution — the constitution adopted in Germany inl919 abolished monarchy and institutionalized general election, an elected head of government— president. It ceased to exist with the establishment of fascist dictatorship in 1933. 4. The Fourth Republic in France— was proclaimed in 1946 after the adoption of a democratic constitution. |
