Deck 1: Games Politicians Play

Question 1

An example of the political game of lion and fox is ______.

A) Martin Luther King Jr.'s civil rights protests
B) the crushing of the Melians by Athens
C) Machiavelli's advice statement on how to govern
D) the efforts of the women of Greece to make love, not war

Answer 1

Machiavelli's advice statement on how to govern

Question 2

Which of the following would be considered an example of accommodation in politics?

A) the president of the United States deploying military force to stop aggression
B) a massive public protest against capital punishment
C) a bargained agreement on strengthening gun control passed by Congress
D) a dictator jailing those that oppose him

Answer 2

a bargained agreement on strengthening gun control passed by Congress

Question 3

The author of the treatise On Civil Disobedience was ______.

A) Aristophanes
B) Socrates
C) Henry David Thoreau
D) Mohandas Gandhi

Answer 3

Henry David Thoreau

Question 4

When the Khmer Rouge undertook the restructuring of Cambodian society and killed millions of its fellow citizens, it was practicing the game of ______.

A) lion and fox
B) wipeout
C) civil disobedience
D) none of these

Question 5

During the 1980s, the Solidarity Party used the game of strike to gain concessions from the Communist Party and ultimately to contribute to the party's fall from power in which country?

A) Poland
B) Czechoslovakia
C) Hungary
D) Yugoslavia

Question 6

Which of the following best characterizes the game of lion and fox?

A) The end justifies the means
B) The ultimate use of force in the struggle for power
C) The pursuit of political goals based on a higher moral law
D) The purposeful persecution and ultimately destruction of a specific group of people

Question 7

The tragedy of the Darfur region of Sudan, beginning in 2003, is an example of ______.

A) civil disobedience
B) lion and fox
C) wipeout
D) political bargaining

Question 8

The Watergate scandal concerned ______.

A) a break-in at the Democratic Party's national headquarters and a subsequent cover-up on the part of the Nixon administration
B) accusations that President Bill Clinton and First Lady Hillary Clinton had made shady land deals in Arkansas
C) highly questionable accounting procedures and the inflated reporting of earnings by the Enron Corporation
D) accusations that the Reagan administration had sold weapons to Iran to gain the release of American hostages in Lebanon and then diverted profits from the deal to anticommunist guerillas in Nicaragua

Question 9

Which of the following does not fit with the definition of power?

A) Power is getting political actors to do what they would not normally do.
B) The exercise of power is always destructive.
C) Power can be used for a variety of purposes.
D) Power is central to the practice of politics.

Question 10

A perpetrator of the game of destruction in the Soviet Union was ______.

A) Josef Stalin
B) Adolf Hitler
C) Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
D) Slobodan Milosevic

Question 11

Which of the following statements is not representative of Machiavelli's thinking?

A) Rulers must be adept at the "beastly" game of politics.
B) In the game of politics, the end justifies the means.
C) The prince may be obligated to act against faith, against charity, against humanity, and against religion.
D) Violence should never be employed because it has a tendency to come back to haunt rulers.

Question 12

Which of the following would be considered an example of civil disobedience?

A) intentionally being arrested and going to jail for illegally protesting the ill treatment of illegal immigrants
B) the assassination of a political leader and then escaping to another country
C) kidnapping a relief worker and holding him or her for ransom
D) playing "dirty tricks" in a political campaign to affect the outcome

Question 13

Henry David Thoreau specifically directed his arguments for civil disobedience against ______.

A) corporate greed sweeping the country
B) government corruption in Washington, D.C.
C) slavery and war
D) unfair tariffs

Question 14

The political game of accommodation ______.

A) is marked by cooperation, bargaining, and balloting
B) stresses voluntary agreement and free choice
C) relies on edicts
D) was epitomized by the Watergate scandal

Question 15

Athens's submission of Melos is an example of ______.

A) lion and fox
B) wipeout
C) civil disobedience
D) humane negotiation

Question 16

The labor-based political movement in Poland during the 1980s that challenged communist leadership was known as ______.

Question 17

The two famous works by Niccolò Machiavelli that provide a realistic blueprint for leadership are ______ and ______.

Question 18

The political game of wipeout was practiced by the city of Athens against the island of ______________________.

Question 19

________________________ utilized civil disobedience in his campaign for the independence of India during the 1940s.

Question 20

A form of wipeout that involves the systematic mass destruction of a national ethnic or racial group is called _________________________.

Question 21

An example of an American terrorist group operating after the Civil War was _____________________.

Question 22

Do you agree with Machiavelli that the leaders of states, if they are to engage successfully in the struggle for power, must know how to play the game of lion and fox? Be sure to state the basis for your agreement or disagreement with Machiavelli.

Question 23

Are the political games of wipeout, lion and fox, and civil disobedience typical or atypical of the games you find politicians playing today?

Question 24

Construct an essay that critiques the metaphor of politics as a game with players, stakes, rules, strategies, and tactics. In your opinion does the metaphor trivialize politics, or is it helpful in understanding the world of politics?

Question 25

In your judgment, is civil disobedience, as outlined by Henry David Thoreau, both a desirable and feasible way of dealing with outrageous moral evils?

Question 26

Imagine you are a representative from the city of Melos. How might you try to respond to demands and threats from Athens?

Question 27

In your judgment, should there be moral limits to the use of force in countering perceived threats to national security? For example, is torture permissible in order to gain information? Is the killing of an adversary's civilian citizens permissible? What about the use of nuclear weapons? How about political assassination?

Question 28

Based on your experience and understanding, compare the political effectiveness of any two of the three "games" politicians play - wipeout, lion and fox, and civil disobedience.