Q1.
Consider the characteristics below in different forms of government and fill in the blank boxes with Yes or No:
Answer
The book fills the first row for you (Yes, No, No, No). The rest follow the same pattern, because all five characteristics flow from the same source — whether the people are the source of authority.
| Characteristics | Democracy | Dictatorship | Absolute Monarchy | Oligarchy |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Universal Adult Franchise | Yes | No | No | No |
| Equality amongst citizens | Yes | No | No | No |
| Freedom of speech | Yes | No | No | No |
| Separation of powers | Yes | No | No | No |
| Wellbeing and Prosperity of all citizens | Yes | No | No | No |
The reason behind each ‘No'
| Form | Why the column reads ‘No' |
|---|---|
| Dictatorship | One person or a small group has absolute power with no limits imposed by a constitution or law. If there is no law above the ruler, there can be no equal vote, no protected speech and no independent court. |
| Absolute monarchy | The monarch makes the laws, enforces them and judges those who break them — so all three functions sit in one pair of hands and separation of powers is impossible. The throne passes by birth, so there is nothing to vote on. |
| Oligarchy | A small, powerful group makes all the important decisions. Even where elections exist on paper, the real choice belongs to a few — as the 1889 cartoon shows, with the people's entrance marked ‘CLOSED'. |
Read the last row carefully. ‘No' does not mean that no king or ruler ever worked for his people. The chapter gives the opposite example — King Chandrāpīḍa paying a cobbler for his hut, and the ideal of rājadharma. The ‘No' means the system does not guarantee it: in an absolute monarchy the people's wellbeing depends on the character of one person, while in a democracy it is a duty the government can be held to and voted out for failing.
Tip: a democracy scores ‘Yes' on all five as an ideal. Whether a particular democracy achieves them fully is a different question — which is exactly what the last part of the chapter goes on to discuss.