3rd Sem Political science Study Material Kashmir University

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Political and social thinkers have proclaimed a certain conception of system to explain the
phenomenaofpolitics.Marxclassified societies intosystemson the basis modeofproduction
as feudal,bourgeoisand proletarian;Weber divided societies into systemsofauthority: traditional,
Charismatic and rational -legal. Unlike Marx, who thought that system change was dialectical,
Weber believed that it was evolutionary.
Classical writersviewed monarchies, aristocracies and democraciesas political
classified political systemsinto primitive, traditional,transitional and modem. Coleman spoke of
competitive, semi-competitiveand authoritarian systems and later divided them into dictatorial,
oligarchical and representational systems.
Eisenstadtsuggested a long listofprimitive, patrimonial, feudal, bureaucratic, democratic, autocratic,
totalitarian and underdeveloped systems. Edward Shills classifies systems into political
democracies, titular democracies, modernising oligarchies, totalitarian oligarchies and traditional
oligarchies.
Classificationsof systems reveal a variety of interpretations. The emergence of many new nations,
the amassing of new data and technologicaladvances has increased the complexity subject.
Manysocial scientists now use system as the basic concept political analysis.