Meaning, nature and relevance of political theory

Introduction

Political theory is the part of the study of politics concerned with the principles on which political life should rest. The question asks what it means, what kind of enquiry it is, and why it is relevant.

What political theory is

Political theory is the systematic study of the ideas and principles on which political life rests: the values that shape constitutions, governments and everyday social life, and the arguments by which thinkers defend or criticise them. Its work has three sides. It is constructive, proposing how institutions and policies ought to change to become more democratic; critical, testing whether the institutions we actually deal with live up to the values they profess; and conceptual, clarifying what values such as freedom, equality and justice mean and why they matter. Underneath all three lie the basic questions of collective life: what government is for, how a society should be arranged, and what rulers and citizens owe each other.

It is not the same as the everyday activity called politics. Politics, in its wide sense, is the continuing negotiation by which a society reaches collective decisions in the face of different visions of what is just and desirable; political theory is the reflection on that activity and on the principles that ought to guide it. The DU syllabus places exactly this question at its opening: what is political theory and what is its relevance.

Nature and scope

1. It is concept-centred. Its core subject-matter is a set of ideas of two kinds: values and ideals (rights, democracy and secularism as well as liberty, equality and justice), and constitutional principles such as judicial review, the separation of powers and the rule of law.
2. It is argument-based. Its method is to examine the reasoning of thinkers (from Plato and Aristotle to Rousseau, Marx, Gandhi and Ambedkar, in the NCERT list) rather than to collect opinions.
3. It is normative as well as analytical. Political theory does not only describe how institutions work; it asks what ought to be done and which arrangements can be justified by reasons. The syllabus itself names the aim as to analyse political arguments and debates normatively and critically.
4. It is historical, empirical and evaluative at once. The syllabus asks for a historical, normative and empirical understanding of the subject: ideas must be placed in their time, tested against facts about how institutions work, and judged against values.
5. It is practical. It asks how far ideals such as freedom or equality are present, or absent, in the institutions people meet every day: a ward office that answers some callers and ignores others, or a college admissions desk that treats applicants unevenly, is a question for political theory.

Relevance

1. Ideals are never finally achieved. India is free and has a democratic constitution, yet equality may exist in the political sphere (equal votes) without existing in the economic or social spheres, so the questions never close.
2. Meanings change. Constitutional rights are continually reinterpreted as new situations arise: the right to life has been read by the courts to include the right to livelihood, and a right to information has been added by law. Theory supplies the reasoning by which such developments are judged.
3. New dimensions of freedom and new threats appear. Global communications help activists network but also criminals; internet commerce raises questions of privacy and regulation.
4. It trains citizens. Its stated objective is to train citizens to think rationally about political questions and to assess the events of their time. A citizen who can ask which constraints on freedom are justified? or which differences in treatment are fair? is better able to take part in public debate.
5. It connects ideas with institutions. The Indian Preamble's commitment to freedom and equality, the abolition of untouchability and the Directive Principles all rest on ideas first debated by thinkers.

Conclusion

Political theory means reasoned reflection on political values; it is normative and conceptual, drawn from arguments of thinkers and tied to practice; and its relevance is that it keeps those values alive, interpreted and defended.