| A | B |
|---|
| Autocracy | a form of government in which a single person holds unlimited power. |
| Citizen | a member of a state or nation who owes allegiance to it by birth or naturalization and is entitled to full civil rights. |
| colonialism | the control of one nation over foreign lands. |
| compromise | an adjustment of opposing principles or systems by modifying some aspect of each in order to find the position most acceptable to the majority. |
| confederation | a joining of several groups for a common purpose. |
| dictatorship | form of government where those who rule cannot be held responsible to the will of the people. |
| division of power | basic principle of federalism; the constitutional provisions by which governmental powers are divided on a geographic basis (in the United States, between the National Government and the States). |
| federal government | a form of government in which powers are divided between a central government and several local governments. |
| feudalism | a loosely organized system in which powerful lords divided their land among other, lesser lords. |
| free enterprise system | an economic system characterized by private or corporate ownership of capital goods; investments that are determined by private decision rather than by state control and determined in a free market. |
| government | the institution through which a society makes and enforces its public policies. |
| legitimacy | the belief of the people that a government has the right to make public policy. |
| majority rule | in a democracy, the majority of the people will be right more often than they will be wrong, and will be right more often than will any one person or small group. |
| mercantilism | an economic and political theory emphasizing money as the chief source of wealth to increase the absolute power of the monarchy and the nation. |
| oligarchy | a form of government in which the power to rule is held by a small, usually self-appointed elite. |
| parliamentary | a form of government in which the executive branch is made up of the prime minister, or premier, and that official's cabinet; this branch is part of the legislature. |
| presidential government | a form of government in which the executive and legislative branches of the government are separate, independent, and coequal. |
| public policies | all of the things a government decides to do. |
| sovereignty | utmost authority in decision-making and in maintaining order of a state. |
| state | a body of people, living in a defined territory, organized politically (that is, with a government), and with the power to make and enforce law without the consent of any higher authority. |
| unitary government | a centralized government in which all government powers belong to a single, central agency. |
