Monday, February 2, 2015

SESSION 2- Significance of Politics

Aristotle states; "Man is by nature a political animal’. His point has got merit because diversity of perceptions and scarcity of resources ensures politics to be inevitable.

Politics for sure is a better option than exercising bloodshed and brutality to impose decisions.

Rousseau states that only through the direct and continuous participation of all citizens in political life can the state be bound to the common good, or what he called the ‘general will’. Similarly, Aristotle states that it is within a political community that human beings can live the ‘good life’. From his viewpoint, politics is an ethical activity because through political bargaining, people from all sorts of backgrounds will debate and arrive at a collective decision. Not to forget, the concept has its disadvantages as well; the minority is often given less power in representation which results in a blind eye turned towards them. To counter this problem, designing an intellectual political framework will make sure that the voices of minority groups are heard and acted upon. Therefore denouncing politics as dirty, or as means to manipulation is certainly not right in my opinion because I believe the negativity can be taken out of it through making a proper political framework.






4 comments:

Naush said...

But how can we craft a "proper political framework"? Is it even possible to do so?

Unknown said...

In my opinion politics is general concept which is comprise of wider set of dimension.. It is not only an ethical activity but also affected by social norms, culture and most importantly 'history; of the state. So it the aggregation of all factors which mold the political behavior of a country.

Unknown said...

With all due respect, this perspective, though understandable, seems utopian. There are so many questions that remain unanswered. This passage goes as though to say everything can happen, given 'x' or 'y' is present. It would have been more helpful if x and y were laid down as the necessary constituents for the longed 'intellectual framework'. Furthermore, politics is portrayed as much holier than it already is.

Unknown said...

Although I agree with most of your ideas and the issues that you have listed but the solutions to these problems are still miles away from reality. In my opinion, considering the current scenario of Pakistan, it wont be wrong to say that these solutions are indeed hypothetical.