Political science: definition, nature and scope
Political Science - Theory and Thoughts · Unit I · Topic 1 of 17 · 6 min read
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Cases checked to exist. Read the judgment before quoting a holding.
Every case cited here has been checked to exist — the citation resolves and names the right parties. The propositions attributed to each case have not been verified line by line against the judgment. Case names link through to the full judgment: read it before quoting a holding in an examination answer, and never carry a proposition from notes into court on trust.
1. Meaning and definitions
The word “politics” comes from the Greek polis, the city-state. For the Greeks the polis was the whole of organised public life, and Aristotle called the study of it the master science, because every other art serves the good of the community. Aristotle’s Politics is the first systematic work in the subject, which is why he is called the father of political science.
Definitions fall into three groups, and an answer reads well if it shows all three.
- Study of the State. Garner: “Political science begins and ends with the State.” Gettell: political science is the science of the State. Bluntschli: the science concerned with the State, which tries to understand its foundations, essential nature and forms.
- Study of government. Seeley: political science investigates the phenomena of government as political economy deals with wealth and biology with life. Leacock: political science deals with government.
- Study of both State and government. Paul Janet: that part of social science which treats of the foundations of the State and the principles of government. Gilchrist puts it the same way. This is the safest definition to adopt, since a State acts only through its government.
Modern writers widen it further. Harold Lasswell treated politics as the study of power and influence (“who gets what, when, how”), and David Easton as the authoritative allocation of values for a society. On these views political science studies political behaviour wherever it occurs, not only inside formal institutions.
2. Nature
The nature of the subject is best explained through the points on which writers agree.
- It is a social science: it studies man as a member of an organised political community.
- It is both descriptive and normative. It describes what the State is and how governments work, and it asks what the State ought to be (justice, liberty, equality).
- It studies the State in its past, present and future. Gettell called it a historical investigation of what the State has been, an analytical study of what it is, and a politico-ethical discussion of what it should be.
- It is a dynamic subject. New concerns (welfare, human rights, environment, globalisation) keep entering it.
3. Scope
The International Political Science Association, set up under UNESCO, adopted a list of the subject’s fields at a conference in Paris in 1948. It is the standard framework for a scope answer.
- Political theory: theory and history of political ideas.
- Political institutions: constitution, national government, regional and local government, public administration, comparative institutions.
- Parties, groups and public opinion: parties, pressure groups, participation of citizens.
- International relations: international politics, organisation and law.
Add to these, in a long answer: the study of the State (its origin, nature, elements and functions), the study of government (organs and forms), the study of rights and duties of citizens, the study of power and political behaviour, and the study of public policy. Each item can be one short paragraph with an example: the Indian Constitution for institutions, elections and coalitions for parties, the United Nations for international organisation.
4. Relations with other sciences
| Discipline | Link with political science |
|---|---|
| History | Supplies the facts from which political principles are drawn. Seeley: “History without political science has no fruit; political science without history has no root.” |
| Economics | Economic policy is made by governments, and political conflict is often about wealth. The older name for economics was political economy. |
| Sociology | Sociology studies all social groups; political science studies the one group that is politically organised, the State. Political sociology joins them. |
| Ethics | Ethics asks what is right; the normative side of politics asks what the State should do. Plato and Gandhi refused to separate the two; Machiavelli did. |
| Psychology | Voting, leadership, propaganda and public opinion are studied with the tools of psychology (Graham Wallas, Human Nature in Politics, 1908). |
| Law and jurisprudence | Law is the command or voice of the State; constitutional and administrative law are shared ground. For a law student this is the most useful relationship to illustrate. |
| Natural sciences | Statistics, computing and survey methods are used in electoral and behavioural research; scientific change (nuclear power, the internet) creates new political questions. |
5. Is political science a science?
Arguments against.
- No agreed terminology or conclusions: writers disagree even on the meaning of the State.
- Controlled laboratory experiments are not possible; human beings cannot be studied like chemicals.
- Human behaviour is unpredictable, so exact prediction of political events is impossible.
- Value judgments and personal bias enter the study.
- Writers who doubted it: Auguste Comte, Buckle, and Maitland, who said that when he saw examination questions headed “political science” he regretted not the questions but the title.
Arguments for.
- It uses a systematic method: observation, comparison, classification and generalisation. Aristotle studied 158 constitutions before writing the Politics.
- History works as a laboratory, and every new constitution or reform is an experiment.
- Some generalisations hold well: absolute power tends to corrupt; a two-party system tends to give stable government.
- Behavioural research since the 1950s (Merriam, Lasswell, Easton) uses quantitative data, surveys and models.
- Bryce compared it to meteorology: an inexact science, but a science.
Conclusion. Political science is a science in the sense of a systematic body of knowledge reached by an organised method. It is not an exact science like physics, because its material is human conduct. That middle position is the expected conclusion.
How this is examined
Every recent paper opens with this topic. January 2026 (100-mark paper): “What is Political Science? Explain the scope and importance of political science” (16 marks). January 2026 (80-mark paper): “Explain the meaning and scope of the study of Political Science” (10 marks). June 2025: “Explain the meaning, nature and scope of political science” (10 marks). For a 16-mark answer, write definitions in three groups, four points on nature, the UNESCO scope list with Indian examples, and close with a short paragraph on importance: it makes informed citizens, explains rights and duties, trains administrators and lawyers, and supports democracy. The other two parts come as stand-alone questions: “Whether Political Science is an art or Science? Discuss” (10 marks, August 2024 and April 2023) and “Relationship and distinction between Political Science and Sociology” (6 marks, August 2024). For the art-or-science question, use section 5 and add that it is also an art, since it applies knowledge to the practical business of governing.
Now try the real questions: Political Science - Theory and Thoughts past question papers.