107年 - 107 東吳大學_碩士班招生考試_政治學系：政治學英文#101962

1. Although socialist ideas can be traced back to the Levellers and Diggers of the seventeenth century, or to Thomas More's Utopia, or even Plato's Republic, socialism did not take shape as a political creed until the early nineteenth century. It developed as a reaction against the emergence of industrial capitalism. Socialism first articulated the interests of artisans and craftsmen threatened by the spread of factory production, but it was soon being linked to the growing industrial working class, the 'factory fodder' of early industrialization. In its earliest forms, socialism tended to have a fundamentalist, Utopian and revolutionary character. Its goal was to abolish a capitalist economy based on market exchange, and replace it with a qualitatively different socialist society, usually to be constructed on the principle of common ownership. The most influential representative of this brand of socialism was Karl Marx, whose ideas provided the foundations for twentieth century communism. During much of the twentieth century, the socialist movement was thus divided into two rival camps. Revolutionary socialists, following the example of Lenin and the Bolsheviks, called themselves communists, while reformist socialists, who practised a form of constitutional politics, embraced what increasingly came to be called social democracy. This rivalry focused not only on the most appropriate means of achieving socialism, but also on the nature of the socialist goal itself. Social democrats turned their backs upon fundamentalist principles such as common ownership and planning, and recast socialism in terms of welfare, redistribution and economic management. Both forms of socialism, however, experienced crises in the late twentieth century that encouraged some to proclaim the 'death of socialism' and the emergence of a post-socialist society. The most dramatic event in this process was the collapse of communism brought about by the eastern European revolutions of 1989-91, but there was also a continued retreat of social democracy from traditional principles, making it, some would argue, indistinguishable from modern liberalism.

2. Most forms of idealism are underpinned by internationalism: that is, the belief that human affairs should be organized according to universal, and not merely national, principles. This, in turn, is usually reflected in the assumption that human affairs, on both the domestic and international levels, are characterized by harmony and cooperation. One of the most influential forms of idealism has been found in liberalism. Although liberals have traditionally accepted the nation as the principal unit of political organization, they have also stressed the importance of interdependence and free trade, arguing quite simply that 'war does not pay'. Such internationalism is also reflected in a faith in collective security and international law, which is embodied in organizations such as the League of Nations and the United Nations. President Woodrow Wilson of the USA, for example, argued that the First World War had resulted from the 'old politics' of militarism and expansionism pursued by multinational empires. In his view, the best antidote to war was the construction of a world of democratic nation-states that were prepared to cooperate in areas of common interest and had no incentive to embark upon conquest or plunder. After years of ridicule and denigration at the hands of realist theorists, idealism was revived in the late twentieth century. What has usually been called neo-idealism reflects disenchantment with the amoral power politics of the superpower era. An early example of this was the attempt by President Carter in the 1970s to restore a moral dimension to US foreign policy by emphasizing that economic and military aid depended on the human-rights records of recipient regimes. The theme of international cooperation and common security was taken up more boldly in the late 1980s by the Soviet president Mikhail Gorbachev, who spoke of a 'common European house', and proclaimed that the doctrine of human rights transcended the ideological rivalry between communism and capitalism

1. Policy stakeholder.

2. Public Private Partnership.

三、After reading the following article from Nature, what is your opinion toward this issue? Do you agree
with the budget cut? Why? Please elaborate your opinion in English and focus on the possible impacts on political scientists, students, and the society.

NSF cancels political-science grant cycle
US funding agency said to be dodging restrictions set by Congress.

Beth Mole
02 August 2013

US political scientists are usually busy in early August, polishing proposals for grants from the US National Science Foundation (NSF). But not this year.

Less than one month before an annual mid-August application deadline, the funding agency has scrapped new political-science funding for the rest of 2013. The NSF declines to explain its reasons for eliminating the grant call, one of two that typically take place each year. But leaders in the field are blaming Congress,which on 21 March passed a bill requiring that NSF-funded political-science research benefit either national security or economic interests.

“It’s hard to imagine that it’s not a factor in the decision,” says Michael Brintnall, executive director of the
American Political Science Association in Washington DC, who describes the funding cut as “troubling”.
Brintnall says that the NSF notified him about the cancellation on 25 July. Other calls for funding in the NSF division of social, behavioural and economic sciences — which includes political science — are continuing
as usual.
The NSF’s decision removes one of the main financial lifelines for political-science research. “This is
somewhere between devastating and crippling,” says Henry Farrell, a political scientist at George
Washington University in Washington DC and an author of the Monkey Cage, a widely read political-science blog. But Farrell blames the political climate rather than the funding agency for the cut. “The NSF is in an extremely awkward situation,” he says.

The requirements for NSF political-science spending came during eleventh-hour negotiations for the 2013 omnibus spending bill. Some of the law’s language, proposed by Senator Tom Coburn (Republican,Oklahoma), prevents the NSF from “wasting federal resources on political science projects, unless the NSF Director certifies projects are vital to national security or the economic interests of the country.”

Since then, NSF officials have struggled to translate that language into rules for evaluating grant proposals and spending its roughly US$10-million budget for political science. On 7 June, the agency said that peer-review panels would take into account the extra requirements in their evaluation of grant proposals. But the cancellation of the August funding call suggests that the agency buckled under the uncertainty of how to interpret the law's stipulations, says John Aldrich, a political scientist at Duke University in Durham, North Carolina.

John Hart, a spokesman for Coburn, says that he is uncertain whether Coburn’s efforts can be linked to the NSF’s decision. But Coburn has vocally supported getting rid of political-science funding altogether. On its website, the NSF cites budget uncertainties as the reason behind its decision. NSF spokeswoman Deborah Wing declined Nature's request to interview Brian Humes, a political-science programme director, and she would not answer questions about the cancelled grant cycle.

The agency’s website says that it will hold its call for political-science proposals in January as usual. Aldrich says that this suggests that the funding shutdown is a response to the Congressional requirements, which are set to expire on 30 September — the end of the 2013 fiscal year. Avoiding the August funding round may be a strategic move by Humes to see whether the constraints disappear when the next spending bill is passed,says Aldrich. “If he can save the money and spend it later when there’s more clarity, that would be helpful,”Aldrich says.

Other researchers agree. “I think they’re probably worried about upsetting Congress,” says Rick Wilson, a political scientist at Rice University in Houston, Texas, and editor of the American Journal of Political
Science. “So why not pull the plug rather than risk it?”

Nature doi:10.1038/nature.2013.13501

107年 - 107 東吳大學_碩士班招生考試_政治學系：政治學英文#101962

試卷資訊

選擇題 (0)

申論題 (5)