Self-study
Political scientist: Support The dissemination of political theories is in principle able to cause change in existing social structures. ████████ ███ █████████ ████████ ███ ██████████ ██ ███ █████████████ ██████████ ███████ ██ ███ ███████████ ███████ ██ ██████████ ████████ ████ ██ ██████████ ██ ████ ███████████ ███████ ████████ ███ █████ ██ █████████ ██████ ██ ███████ ██ ███████ █████ ████ ███████ ██ █████████ ███████ █████ ██ █ ███████ ████ ███ █████ ███████ ███ ██████████ ███████ ██ ██████ ██ ████ ███████████ █████ █████████
Summary
The political scientist concludes that there is a special role for non-academics to put political theory into clear, accessible language. Why? Because although the spread of political theory can lead to social change, political theories always develop within academia. This leads to inaccessible language that alienates non-academics who would contribute to social changes.
Notable Assumptions
The political scientist assumes it’s important for political theory to truly be able to lead to change, rather than just theoretically having that potential. Otherwise, it would be hard to say that people who would facilitate the change process have a “special role.”
The political scientist also assumes that political theory can only be put into clear, accessible language by non-academics. Otherwise it wouldn’t make sense to say that non-academics have that “special role.”
16.
Which one of the following ██ ██ ██████████ ██ █████ ███ ████████ ████████
a
Persons outside academic ████████ ███ ███ ████ █████████ ██████ ██ ██████ ██ ███ ██████ ██████████
The argument doesn’t depend on any ideas about which agents of change are the most important, just that certain of them are important.
b
Persons within academic ████████ ███ █████████ █████████ ████████ ███████ ██ ██████ ████████ ██████ ███████████
Whether or not academic political theorists are trying to create social change is irrelevant to whether and how those theories can actually create social change.
c
Persons outside academic ████████ ███ ██████ ████ ███ ██ ███ ███████ ███████████ ██ █████████ █████████
Even though theory formulation happens within academic, there’s no reason that it can’t involve non-academics. Either way, nothing in the argument depends on whether non-academics can or should be involved in formulating political theories.
d
Persons outside academic ████████ █████ ██ ████ ████ ████ ███ █████████████ ██ █████████ ████████ ████ ███████ ███████
Who stands to gain the most from spreading political theories is irrelevant to the argument, which never discusses different people’s motivation or potential benefit.
e
Persons within academic ████████ ███ ████ ███████ ██ ████ ████ ████ ███████ ███████ ██ █████ ██ █ ███████████████ ████
This gets at the assumption that only non-academics are able to put political theories into clear, accessible language. If academics could do it themselves, then there would be no “special role” for non-academics to do so.