Question

I'm studying the Western political thought, Please help define it...

Answer 1

It's probably useful to distinguish it from Eastern and from Roman political thought. Eastern thought has tended to emphasize consistency of politics with communal principles and/or religion, meaning (for example) Chinese political thought has tended to emphasize the conformity of politics with Confucian ideals of ethics and community spirit.

Classical Roman (and Greek) political thought tended to emphasize the proper role of citizens, and the right of sufficiently well-born, well-educated and otherwise enlightened citizens to lead the nation and govern its actions. From this well we draw many of our modern ideas about how to select leaders, how they should be checked, and how they should exercise power.

Western thought, to the extent it differs from Classical thought (from which it draws extensively) , probably draws extensively from the ruling traditions of Germanic tribes in Western Europe and Scandinavia, just outside the boundaries of the Roman Empire. These streams of thought tend to emphasize the liberties of the individual, and his right to be, as far as possible, free of unnecessary coercion from any central power. It is this stream of thought that has tended to check the idea (which is fully consistent with Roman tradition) that government should be permitted to do things for the greater good even if they conflict with individual good.

For example, in English and American tradition, there is the thought "better that 100 guilty men go free than that one innocent be convicted." This is directly from the tribal Germanic tradition, emphasizing the right of the individual to be free of harm from government, and flies in the face of Roman tradition, which would argue that the "good of the many" (to be free of 100 criminals among them) should outweigh "the good of the few" (to be free of wrongful conviction and imprisonment).

Answer 2

Another good example of Western thought is the US First Amendment protections on free speech. Again, the Romans would have held that only the best citizens, the leaders, should be completely free to speak, and that it would be perfectly appropriate for the government to monitor and censor the speech of the common folk, in the interests of public order. The Roman Empire would never have had a FIrst Amendment that applied to absolutely everybody, including slaves and foreigners.

Answer 3

okay thanks! :)