75 MCQs with Answers & Explanations
Section A: Meaning, Nature & Scope of Political Theory
1. Political theory mainly deals with:
A) Political facts
B) Political values and ideas
C) Political institutions only
D) Administrative rules
✅ Answer: B
📘 Political theory studies ideas, principles, and values that shape political life.
2. Which of the following is a normative question?
A) What is the voter turnout?
B) Should liberty be restricted for security?
C) How many seats are in Parliament?
D) What is the GDP growth rate?
✅ Answer: B
📘 Normative theory asks “what ought to be,” focusing on moral or value judgments.
3. The empirical approach in political theory focuses on:
A) Values
B) Data and observation
C) Ideology
D) Moral reasoning
✅ Answer: B
📘 Empirical theories are based on facts and data, not value judgments.
4. Which statement is correct?
A) Political theory is only descriptive.
B) Political theory is both normative and empirical.
C) Political theory is about administration.
D) Political theory rejects values.
✅ Answer: B
📘 Political theory includes both moral principles and scientific analysis.
5. Who said, “Political theory is a master science”?
A) Plato
B) Aristotle
C) Machiavelli
D) Hobbes
✅ Answer: B
📘 Aristotle called politics the “master science” because it organizes all others.
Section B: Concepts
Liberty
6. Liberty means:
A) Absence of law
B) Absence of restraint with reasonable control
C) Doing whatever one wants
D) Power of the ruler
✅ Answer: B
📘 Liberty = freedom within law, not anarchy.
7. Positive liberty means:
A) Freedom from interference
B) Freedom to act or realize oneself
C) Economic freedom only
D) Political freedom only
✅ Answer: B
📘 Positive liberty = freedom to achieve self-development.
8. The idea of “negative liberty” is linked with:
A) Marx
B) Isaiah Berlin
C) Rousseau
D) Gandhi
✅ Answer: B
📘 Berlin distinguished between positive and negative liberty in his essay (1958).
9. “Over himself, over his own body and mind, the individual is sovereign.” –
A) Hobbes
B) Locke
C) J.S. Mill
D) Rousseau
✅ Answer: C
📘 J.S. Mill in On Liberty (1859) defended individual freedom and limited state control.
Equality
10. Equality means:
A) Same income for all
B) Absence of privilege and discrimination
C) Uniformity
D) Economic parity only
✅ Answer: B
📘 Equality ensures fairness and equal opportunities, not identical outcomes.
11. “From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs” was stated by:
A) Lenin
B) Marx
C) Engels
D) Owen
✅ Answer: B
📘 Marx’s principle of economic equality and communism.
12. Political equality means:
A) Equal property
B) Equal political rights like vote
C) Equal wealth
D) Equal income
✅ Answer: B
📘 Equal right to vote, contest elections, and hold office.
Justice
13. Justice primarily means:
A) Punishment
B) Fairness
C) Rule of law
D) Equality of income
✅ Answer: B
📘 Justice = fair and just distribution of resources and opportunities.
14. John Rawls defines justice as:
A) Fairness
B) Freedom
C) Discipline
D) Efficiency
✅ Answer: A
📘 Rawls’ A Theory of Justice = justice as fairness.
15. Rawls’ “difference principle” allows inequality only when:
A) It benefits the least advantaged
B) It helps the rich
C) It ensures economic growth
D) It increases taxation
✅ Answer: A
📘 Inequality is justifiable only if it improves the position of the poorest.
Rights
16. Rights are:
A) Moral claims not recognized by state
B) Demands recognized and enforced by society/state
C) Only legal claims
D) Privileges of rulers
✅ Answer: B
📘 Rights are legally and morally justified claims.
17. Who said, “Rights are conditions necessary for the development of personality”?
A) Laski
B) Marx
C) Locke
D) Bentham
✅ Answer: A
📘 Laski emphasized social rights for personal development.
18. Natural rights theory was given by:
A) Hobbes
B) Locke
C) Rousseau
D) Burke
✅ Answer: B
📘 Locke: rights to life, liberty, and property are natural and inalienable.
Democracy
19. “Government of the people, by the people, for the people” –
A) Lincoln
B) Aristotle
C) Rousseau
D) Mill
✅ Answer: A
📘 Classic definition of representative democracy by Abraham Lincoln.
20. Democracy’s key element is:
A) Monarchy
B) Rule of Law and Participation
C) Bureaucracy
D) Elitism
✅ Answer: B
📘 Democracy is based on rule of law, equality, and participation.
Power
21. Power means:
A) Physical strength
B) Ability to influence others
C) Authority only
D) Money
✅ Answer: B
📘 Power = capacity to influence or control behavior.
22. Max Weber defined power as:
A) The monopoly of violence
B) Ability to achieve one’s will despite resistance
C) Legitimate authority
D) Institutional control
✅ Answer: B
📘 Weber’s famous definition from Economy and Society.
23. Steven Lukes’ third dimension of power is:
A) Decision-making
B) Agenda-setting
C) Manipulating beliefs and preferences
D) Legal control
✅ Answer: C
📘 Power also works through controlling ideas and perceptions.
Citizenship
24. Citizenship means:
A) Living in a country
B) Legal and political membership of a state
C) Birthplace identity
D) Voter ID
✅ Answer: B
📘 Citizenship = membership with rights and duties.
25. The concept of “global citizenship” emphasizes:
A) National loyalty
B) Rights of only citizens
C) Universal human rights
D) Corporate identity
✅ Answer: C
📘 Global citizenship = rights beyond borders.
Section C: Political Traditions / Ideologies
Liberalism
26. Liberalism primarily emphasizes:
A) Authority
B) Individual liberty
C) Equality only
D) Class struggle
✅ Answer: B
📘 Liberalism = freedom and limited state power.
27. The father of classical liberalism is:
A) Marx
B) Locke
C) Mill
D) Hobbes
✅ Answer: B
📘 Locke → natural rights & limited government.
28. Modern liberalism supports:
A) Laissez-faire economy
B) Welfare state
C) Monarchy
D) Military rule
✅ Answer: B
📘 Modern liberals emphasize state intervention for social welfare.
Conservatism
29. Conservatism stresses:
A) Radical change
B) Revolution
C) Tradition and gradual reform
D) Anarchy
✅ Answer: C
📘 Burke → “Change must preserve continuity.”
30. Edmund Burke opposed:
A) French Revolution
B) Industrial Revolution
C) Reformation
D) American Revolution
✅ Answer: A
📘 Burke saw the French Revolution as chaotic destruction of tradition.
Socialism
31. Socialism seeks:
A) Private property
B) Equality and cooperation
C) Market competition
D) Inequality
✅ Answer: B
📘 Core of socialism = collective welfare.
32. Democratic socialism emphasizes:
A) Revolution
B) Violence
C) Gradual reform within democracy
D) Dictatorship
✅ Answer: C
📘 Achieve socialist aims peacefully through democracy.
Marxism
33. Marx considered history as:
A) Struggle between good and evil
B) Class struggle
C) Cultural conflict
D) Economic competition only
✅ Answer: B
📘 “History of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles.”
34. The base in Marxism refers to:
A) Ideology
B) Economic structure
C) Political system
D) Religion
✅ Answer: B
📘 Base (economy) determines the superstructure (law, politics, culture).
35. Alienation refers to:
A) Political disinterest
B) Separation of worker from product and self
C) Religious freedom
D) Class unity
✅ Answer: B
📘 Alienation occurs when workers lose control over their work and creativity.
36. Marx predicted the ultimate stage of society as:
A) Capitalism
B) Communism
C) Feudalism
D) Democracy
✅ Answer: B
📘 Classless, stateless, communist society → Marx’s end goal.
Feminism
37. Feminism seeks:
A) Women superiority
B) Gender equality
C) Abolition of marriage
D) Patriarchy
✅ Answer: B
📘 Feminism = equal rights and representation.
38. “The personal is political” relates to:
A) Liberal feminism
B) Radical feminism
C) Socialist feminism
D) Postmodern feminism
✅ Answer: B
📘 Radical feminists argue private life also reflects patriarchal power.
39. The book The Second Sex was written by:
A) Mary Wollstonecraft
B) Simone de Beauvoir
C) Betty Friedan
D) Germaine Greer
✅ Answer: B
📘 Seminal work in feminist theory.
Ecologism
40. Ecologism focuses on:
A) Industrial growth
B) Environmental balance
C) Capitalist development
D) Urbanization
✅ Answer: B
📘 Emphasizes sustainability and harmony with nature.
41. Deep ecology was propounded by:
A) Vandana Shiva
B) Arne Naess
C) Foucault
D) Kymlicka
✅ Answer: B
📘 Arne Naess → deep respect for intrinsic value of nature.
Multiculturalism
42. Multiculturalism supports:
A) Uniform culture
B) Cultural diversity and group rights
C) Assimilation
D) Racial superiority
✅ Answer: B
📘 Promotes recognition of cultural pluralism.
43. Will Kymlicka is associated with:
A) Marxism
B) Multiculturalism
C) Feminism
D) Conservatism
✅ Answer: B
📘 Kymlicka wrote Multicultural Citizenship.
Postmodernism
44. Postmodernism rejects:
A) Diversity
B) Grand universal theories
C) Pluralism
D) Language
✅ Answer: B
📘 Postmodernists deny universal truths or metanarratives.
45. Which thinker is linked to postmodernism?
A) Foucault
B) Marx
C) Rawls
D) Locke
✅ Answer: A
📘 Foucault emphasized power-knowledge relationship.
Section D: Thinkers & Comparative Ideas
46. Locke justified revolution against:
A) Tyranny
B) Democracy
C) Capitalism
D) Religion
✅ Answer: A
47. Hobbes’ state of nature was:
A) Peaceful
B) State of war
C) Cooperative
D) Harmonious
✅ Answer: B
📘 Hobbes: life was “solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short.”
48. Rousseau’s social contract aimed at:
A) Private property protection
B) General will
C) Dictatorship
D) Religious law
✅ Answer: B
📘 Sovereignty lies with the general will (collective good).
49. Bentham is known for:
A) Rights theory
B) Utilitarianism
C) Idealism
D) Marxism
✅ Answer: B
📘 “Greatest happiness of the greatest number.”
50. For Plato, justice means:
A) Equality of income
B) Doing one’s own duty
C) Freedom of expression
D) Voting rights
✅ Answer: B
📘 Justice = harmony; each class performing its proper role.
51. Aristotle considered man as:
A) Economic animal
B) Political animal
C) Religious animal
D) Moral animal
✅ Answer: B
📘 “Man is by nature a political animal.”
52. Marx’s classless society =
A) Stateless and propertyless society
B) Dictatorship
C) Welfare state
D) Oligarchy
✅ Answer: A
📘 Communism abolishes state and class distinctions.
53. Machiavelli is often considered the father of:
A) Modern political philosophy
B) Liberalism
C) Marxism
D) Idealism
✅ Answer: A
📘 He separated politics from morality.
54. Hannah Arendt is known for her analysis of:
A) Feminism
B) Totalitarianism
C) Capitalism
D) Socialism
✅ Answer: B
📘 Her book The Origins of Totalitarianism.
55. Who emphasized “citizenship and civic virtue”?
A) Machiavelli
B) Hobbes
C) Mill
D) Rawls
✅ Answer: A
📘 Republican tradition → active civic participation.
Section E: Miscellaneous & Modern Applications
56. Who defined democracy as “competitive elitism”?
A) Schumpeter
B) Dahl
C) Rawls
D) Mill
✅ Answer: A
57. The concept of “power elite” was introduced by:
A) Karl Marx
B) C. Wright Mills
C) Weber
D) Foucault
✅ Answer: B
58. Political obligation refers to:
A) Paying taxes
B) Obedience to laws of the state
C) Joining parties
D) Electing leaders
✅ Answer: B
59. The theory of “justice as fairness” was given by:
A) Marx
B) Rawls
C) Mill
D) Nozick
✅ Answer: B
60. Nozick’s Anarchy, State and Utopia supports:
A) Minimal state
B) Welfare state
C) Communism
D) Dictatorship
✅ Answer: A
61. “Social contract” theory unites:
A) Locke, Hobbes, Rousseau
B) Marx, Engels, Lenin
C) Mill, Bentham, Rawls
D) Aristotle, Plato, Burke
✅ Answer: A
62. The feminist slogan “equal pay for equal work” is part of:
A) Radical feminism
B) Liberal feminism
C) Socialist feminism
D) Ecofeminism
✅ Answer: B
63. The notion that environment and humans are interdependent belongs to:
A) Ecologism
B) Feminism
C) Marxism
D) Realism
✅ Answer: A
64. The idea of participatory democracy emphasizes:
A) Voting only
B) Active citizen involvement in decision-making
C) Party loyalty
D) Economic growth
✅ Answer: B
65. Which thinker linked democracy and development as “freedom”?
A) Rawls
B) Sen
C) Marx
D) Mill
✅ Answer: B
📘 Amartya Sen → “Development as Freedom.”
66. “Man is born free, but everywhere he is in chains.” –
A) Rousseau
B) Marx
C) Mill
D) Hobbes
✅ Answer: A
67. Feminist political theory critiques:
A) Capitalism
B) Patriarchy
C) Democracy
D) Globalization
✅ Answer: B
68. According to Marx, the state is an instrument of:
A) Justice
B) Ruling class domination
C) Equality
D) Freedom
✅ Answer: B
69. The “end of ideology” thesis was advanced by:
A) Daniel Bell
B) Marx
C) Nozick
D) Arendt
✅ Answer: A
70. “End of History” thesis (liberal democracy as final stage) –
A) Rawls
B) Fukuyama
C) Huntington
D) Marx
✅ Answer: B
71. Postmodernists believe knowledge is:
A) Absolute
B) Relative and socially constructed
C) Scientific only
D) Divine
✅ Answer: B
72. Deliberative democracy emphasizes:
A) Electoral competition only
B) Deliberation and reasoned discussion among citizens
C) Rule by experts
D) Centralized authority
✅ Answer: B
📘 Explanation: Deliberative democracy (Habermas, Cohen, Rawls’ later work) stresses public reasoning and discussion as central to legitimate democratic decisions.
73. A Vindication of the Rights of Woman was written by:
A) Simone de Beauvoir
B) Betty Friedan
C) Mary Wollstonecraft
D) Gloria Steinem
✅ Answer: C
📘 Explanation: Mary Wollstonecraft (1792) is an early feminist classic arguing for women’s education and equal rights.
74. Civic republicanism primarily emphasizes:
A) Individual economic rights
B) Civic virtue, public-spiritedness, and active participation
C) Market freedom
D) Elimination of the public sphere
✅ Answer: B
📘 Explanation: Civic republican tradition (Aristotle → Machiavelli → contemporary republicans) focuses on citizen engagement, civic virtue, and freedom as non-domination.
75. The doctrine that highlights separation of powers and the rule of law was famously advanced by:
A) Hobbes
B) Rousseau
C) Montesquieu
D) Marx
✅ Answer: C
📘 Explanation: Montesquieu (The Spirit of the Laws) argued for separation of powers (legislative, executive, judicial) to prevent tyranny and uphold the rule of law.