Have you ever been in an awkward bargaining situation where you felt at a distinct disadvantage? Perhaps it’s because the product you were negotiating over was too complex for you to understand—like that rocket you wanted for your next business idea to transport space tourists into orbit? If that’s you, chances are you are likely …
How can we best classify places that share similar characteristics? No doubt the most familiar one is through nationalities or areas enclosed by national or political boundaries. But geographers have gone beyond this to use cultural regions that can be quite powerful at getting deeper insights into a people’s identity, sense of place, and connection …
A pseudo-democracy, also known as tactical liberalization, is a political order designed to put on a democratic façade. Such regimes imitate a democratic system by holding regular political elections without any genuine intentions of offering the country’s citizens a voice. In most cases, a ruling party consolidates power with an aim of monopolizing the state’s …
An integral tenet of contemporary conservation biology discourse is the ongoing biodiversity crisis. Approximately 65 species go extinct daily, translating to an annual extinction rate of around 30,000 species. Although biological factors such as disease outbreaks and fierce interspecies competition contribute to this issue, increased human activity is to a great extent the leading cause …
The contemporary global society is rife with feelings of contempt for liberal democracy due to a persistent rise in societal, economic, and political inequalities. As a result, countries from all corners of the world are increasingly abandoning this democratic approach to governance for alternative political movements, such as nationalism, populism, and more worryingly, illiberal democracy. …
What are your options as a person under an absolute monarchy where you hardly have a voice in how you get governed? Pretty much nothing. That describes the bleak world before the winds of liberalism came blowing. For centuries, Europe was ruled by monarchs (or sometimes aristocrats) who based their legitimacy on the so-called divine …
Parliamentary democracy is arguably one of the most dominant forms of governance across the globe, with 51 out of 195 sovereign nations adopting this administrative system. In this kind of democracy, the legislature and executive branches of government are intertwined. The executive is held accountable to, and derives its permissibility from, the legislature. What’s more, …
If the pursuit of pleasure is the central motivation for your life then, well, you are a hedonist. This is not just plain pleasure when you are done with whatever you call work but you are the type that seeks pleasure and avoids pain as much as possible even when you are at work. This …
When you think of a concept such as bird, what example from this category immediately comes to mind? Is it a finch, a parrot, or perhaps a chicken? Even though all the three share several features that make them belong to the category called birds, people tend to think of one of them as the …
Would you boil a baby in order to save a million people? Some people would object most likely with shock. Boiling a baby would be morally unacceptable under any circumstances for them. Yet others would justify it for the sake of saving a million lives. This dicey situation introduces us to a concept in ethics …
