The Historical Approach in the Study of Politics

The Historical Approach in the Study of Politics

The evolution and origin of politics defines by the formal political description as to the historic development of the state and government. The interesting part in the study of government and state is the political rulers' initiative to persuade and influence the subjects (people) as to the doctrine of the political power and authority to rule the society.It is an approach in politics to present the political thought in the past as the main governmental reference to rule the state. The ability to persuade and influence to secure the political power and authority vested on the following historical grounds:

a) The divine rights of the kings and emperors to gain absolute political powers as to influence and persuade the subjects (people) to obey the rulers.

In politics, the divine rights of kings and emperors are no longer politically advocated as to influence and persuade the people to obey them. This was historical reason in the past that they revolted against the political rulers as a consequence on the suppression of the human freedom, extravagance by the rulers, and the life of the poor people became miserable.

b) The royal blood and dynastic rule has the political capability to rule the state as related to the social stratification for the nobility class has the solemn political rights to rule the society.

Even in contemporary time, the noble blood means the parents and ancestors had been the members of the royal family in the past. The concept of politics along this line provides the theoretical framework to impose the noble rights of the young generation to rule the state. There are political cases in the state and government to honor the noble blood to represent the country in case there is a vacuum of the political power in the society. This elitist principle of governance based on royal blood and dynastic blood provides the political stability of the state when extreme case of political vacuum is present within certain group of society.

c) The historical lesson of political rulers has the right to overthrow them when they corrupted the political power given to them based on the social contract theory.

The age of enlightenment in Europe has been a good example as to the application of the historical approach in politics in relation to the concern of graft and corruption, abuse of political powers, exploitation of the masses, and suppression of collective constitutional rights of the people. It simply states by the political thought of Rousseau, Locke, and Hobbes