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The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to politics and political science:

Politics – the exercise of power; process by which groups of people make collective decisions. Politics is the art or science of running governmental or state affairs (including behavior within civil governments), institutions, fields, and special interest groups such as the corporate, academic, and religious segments of society.

Political science – the field concerning the theory and practice of politics and the description and analysis of political systems and political behavior.

Fields of study of political science

Comparative politics
Development studies
Geopolitics and political geography
- Area studies
- Globalization studies
Gender and politics
Institutional theory
- New institutionalism
International relations
- Security studies
Nationalism studies
Political behavior
- Political activism
  - Political movement
Political economy
Political fiction
- Political satire
Political research methodology
Political sociology
Political theory and philosophy
- Political spectrum
Positive political theory
- Game theory
Postcolonialism
Psephology – study of elections
- Voting theory
- see § Electoral systems
Policy analysis and Policy studies
- Foreign policy analysis
- Public administration and local government studies
- Public law
Strategic studies

Related disciplines

Political theory

Anarchist schools of thought hold that all forms of hierarchy and authority are illegitimate.
- Social anarchism views individual freedom as interrelated with mutual aid.^[1]
- Individualist anarchism
Democratic theory
- Athenian democracy a form of Greek democracy in which free male citizens had a direct vote on all government actions.
- Republicanism a strain of political thought which was common among the city-states of the Italian Renaissance, such as the Republic of Venice.
- Representative democracy
- Direct democracy
  - Initiative
  - Referendum
- Radical democracy
  - Deliberative democracy
  - Participatory democracy
- Liberal democracy
- Illiberal democracy
International relations theory
Majoritarianism
Marxist schools of thought
Metapolitics
Peace and conflict studies
Political geography
Political symbolism
Postcolonialism
- Decoloniality
  - Blue water thesis
- Three-world model
  - Third-Worldism
Theories of state

Decision-making

Political institutions

Government

Government
Legitimacy
Authority
- Tripartite classification of authority
Rule of law
Constitution
State (polity), a centralized political organization that regulates law and society within a territory.
- Sovereign state, a sovereign polity in international law, commonly referred to as a country.
  - Microstate, a sovereign state having a very small population or land area, usually both.
  - Multinational state, sovereign entity that comprises two or more nations or states.
- Nation state, a state where the majority identify with a single nation (with shared culture or ethnic group)
- Constituent state, a political subdivision of a state.
- Federated state, constituent states part of a federation.
- Fragile state, characterized by weak state capacity or weak state legitimacy leaving citizens vulnerable.
- Failed state, a state which has lost its ability to fulfill fundamental security and development functions, lacking effective control over its territory and borders.
- Vassal state, any state that has a mutual obligation to a superior state or empire.
- Buffer state, a country geographically lying between two rival or potentially hostile great powers.
- Stateless nation, an ethnic group or nation that does not possess its own sovereign state.

Branches of government

The separation of powers is typically set in the constitution or basic law in order to achieve checks and balances within government. The typical model has three branches, and is referred to as the trias politica.

Legislature, deliberates and passes laws.
Executive, executes laws.
- Head of state, formal, often symbolic, leader of state. Sometimes has veto power over proposed legislation.
- Head of government, the person(s) in charge of day-to-day affairs of the state. Usually heads a cabinet, a Council of Ministers or a Council of State.
Judiciary, often involved in politics through judicial review.
- Supreme court
- Constitutional court

Political parties

Party systems
Party coalition governments
- Hung parliament
- Confidence and supply
- Minority government
- Rainbow coalition
- Grand coalition
- National unity government
- Majority government

Political behavior

Theories of political behaviour

Political culture
- Civic political culture
- Parochial political culture
- Patrimonialism, a political culture which sees no difference between personal and political power.
  - Neopatrimonialism
  - Prebendalism
Peace and conflict studies
- Aggressionism
- Greed versus grievance
Political psychology

Political strategy

Voting behavior

Political dysfunction

Types of polities and forms of government

By level of social organisation

Traditional authority, political society which has not gone through state formation.
- Band society
- Big man
- Chiefdom
- Empire (before New Imperialism).
Local government
Unitary state (Unitarism)
- City-state
- Nation state
Federalism
- Confederation
- Federation
Regional integration
Global governance
- World state

By formal power structure

By source of power

Autocracy, the source of power is the leader.
Democracy, the source of power are the people through popular sovereignty.
Ethnocracy, the source of power is ethnicity.
Meritocracy, the source of power is talent.
- Noocracy, talent is measured by wisdom.
- Technocracy, talent is measured by expertise.
Stratocracy, the source of power is the military.
- Military dictatorship
- Military junta
Theocracy, the source of power is God(s).
Oligarchy, the source of power is the elite.
- Aristocracy, the elite are hereditary.
- Gerontocracy, the elite are the elderly.
Plutocracy, the source of power is wealth.

Political ideologies and philosophies

Authoritarianism
- Absolutism
- Totalitarianism
Left-wing politics, usually focused on increasing egalitarianism.
Centrism, usually defined by highly pragmatic politics.
Liberalism, defined by high valuing of liberty.
- Classical liberalism
- Conservative liberalism
- Neoliberalism
- Social liberalism
- Modern liberalism (in the United States)
Right-libertarianism, often defined as high valuation of private property
Right-wing politics, often defined by opposition to social change, and a veneration of tradition.
- Centre-right politics
- Conservatism
- Far-right politics, political ideas which are described as reactionary, ultranationalist, chauvinistic, xenophobic or racist.^[3]
  - Alt-right
  - Fascism
  - Nazism
Identity politics, political ideologies concerned with the interests of the members of a specific group.
- Black power
- Feminism
- Gay pride
- Indigenism
- Islamism
- Nationalism, based on the centrality of the nation.
- Zionism
Environmentalism

Governments of the world

Political issues and policies

Rights

Economic policy

Foreign and security policy

Social policy

Politics by continent

Foreign relations by continents

Political parties by continent

History of politics

Political scholars

Influential literature

The Art of War – by Sun Tsu (c. 544–496 BC)
History of the Peloponnesian War by Thucydides (c. 460 – c. 400 BC)
The Republic and Laws – by Plato (427–347 BC)
The Politics and Nicomachean Ethics – Aristotle (384–322 BC)
Arthashastra – Chāṇakya^[4] (c. 350–283 BC)
Meditations – Marcus Aurelius, Roman Emperor 161–180 CE
The Prince – by Niccolò Machiavelli (1469–1527)
The Book of Five Rings – Miyamoto Musashi (c. 1584––1645)
Leviathan – Thomas Hobbes (1588–1679)
The Wealth of Nations – by Adam Smith (1723–1790)
On War – by Carl von Clausewitz (1780–1831)
The Communist Manifesto – by Karl Marx (1818–1883)

References

^ Suissa, Judith (2001). "Anarchism, Utopias and Philosophy of Education". Journal of Philosophy of Education 35 (4). pp. 627–646. doi:10.1111/1467-9752.00249.
^ Mill, John Stuart (1861). "Chapter VII, Of True and False Democracy; Representation of All, and Representation of the Majority only". Considerations on Representative Government. London: Parker, Son, & Bourn.
^ Carlisle, Rodney P., ed., The Encyclopedia of Politics: The Left and the Right, Volume 2: The Right (Thousand Oaks, California, United States; London, England; New Delhi, India: Sage Publications, 2005) p. 693.
^ Mabbett 1964 "References to the work in other Sanskrit literature attribute it variously to Viṣṇugupta, Cāṇakya and Kauṭilya. The same individual is meant in each case. The Pańcatantra explicitly identifies Chanakya with Viṣṇugupta."
^ "Oxford Handbook of Political Theory". Oxford University Press. 27 Aug 2006. ISBN 9780199270033. Archived from the original on Mar 5, 2016.
^ Walsh, Mary (1 May 2008). "The Oxford Handbook of Political Theory". Contemporary Political Theory. 7 (2): 232–234. doi:10.1057/cpt.2008.2.