Political thoughts are not descriptive, but normative perspectives; meaning that they do not aim to find out how things are, but attempt to convince us how things ought to be. In such attempts, concepts and methods constitute the unique pillars of political thoughts and theories. In fact, they are the primary underpinnings, and sometimes sources of persuasiveness, of all thoughts and theories in social sciences. They provide an essential informational basis to give meaning to thoughts that usually contend and conflict with each other and theories that systematically advocate a particular way of approaching political issues. Therefore, both thoughts and theories cannot sufficiently be grasped without being adequately informed about their conceptual and methodological frameworks.

Since the formation of the first social groups, human beings have always been in need to reflect upon three issues concerning the politics: Power and authority, the way rulers should act/decide and how the system of ruling should be formed, revised or challenged.

Ancient Greek tradition of political thinking produced a canon in both senses of the term: the first is a collection of works and ways of approaching to the “political”, deemed as inspiring sources of reference, and the second is pieces of melodies (regarded as themes) which are reproduced and imitated in other parts of the musical compositions (regarded as works of political theory). The canon of political thought, in other words, relied on a series of thinkers and their ideas on the state (back then the city-state, i.e. polis), society, power, history, justice and the forms of government to evaluate and understand political developments and transformations.

Various views of the Ancient Greek philosophers have been the ground for modern political thinking for a long time. They have double effect on political thinking: First, their ways of approaching the concepts and issues provided the tools for succeeding philosophers, who attempted to handle pervasive problems of politics. Second, the Ancient Greek philosophers drew the dominant framework and determined the themes of political thinking to a great extent.

Political thought can be studied in manyways. Throughout the consolidation of academic boundaries between different disciplines of social sciences, empiricism has gained strength, particularly during the Cold War in quite a number of respected universities of Western world. Analysing the political behaviour via observation and empirical studies started to define the boundaries of political research. Since scientific endeavour was strictly referred to the analysis of “what is”, any debate on “what ought to be” was labelled as political speculation. Natural sciences ruled supreme, and social sciences were expected to follow similar methods to reveal laws of history and society.

Despite the dominance of empiricism in political science, there occurred significant contributions to the study of political ideas and history of political thought in the post-war era. Contextual approach was one of these contributions. In broad terms, the contextual approach stresses the need to historicize the works of political theory in order to understand the particular historical moment and its impact upon the political thinking. According to such an approach to the political thought, the way great philosophers grasp society and the spirit of their own times, the others who address their works, and their sources of influence carry significance only within a contextualized perspective towards the political ideas. It claims that the political target of the philosophers and their wish to change or preserve the social and political order in which they live should be taken into consideration for a better analysis of political thinking.

Two major criticisms were directed to the contextual approach in the narrow sense: One line of critique stemmed from the earlier historical materialist tradition which shared the view on the importance of the social history of ideas. Rather than accepting ideas as constitutive in the historicist sense of the Cambridge School, renewed attempts to enrich historical materialism started with acknowledging that those questions confronting political thinkers acquired specific historical forms. Therefore, a better understanding of political theory should dwell on the social background of ideas and the human interactions on the societal level to explore the historical forms assumed by the apparently long-lasting political questions such as justice, social order, human development and the best form of government to provide these elements. Such a way of historicising political ideas benefited from the materialist perspectives regarding the study of history. These perspectives presented material and social circumstances as the ground on which particular political ideas flourished. In such close historical scrutiny, people’s access to the material conditions of life sets the background of political debate. Expressing this through a famous statement, a well-known historical materialist, namely Karl Marx, claimed that “mankind always takes up only such problems as it can solve; since looking at the matter more closely, we will always find that the problem itself arises only when the material conditions necessary for its solution already exist or are at least in the process of formation”. From a general perspective, followers of historical materialist tradition perceived the social circumstances as putting their stamp on the way people formulate their problems regarding social justice, equality, social order and good government. Not the ideas that derive out from historical conditions and intellectual context, but the material conditions and the inherent contradictions within material circumstances were constitutive with regards to the history of mankind and history of political ideas. The contextual approach to the history of political thought, in a broader sense, shares the contextual emphasis of the historical materialism. However, it also attributes ideas a more notable role in the historical development. 

The other criticism was related to the Straussian approach. According to many social scientists and political thinkers, contextualizing great classics and canonical texts of philosophy has led to ignoring the significance of these works and their timetranscending nature. In other words, as it denies significance beyond the time in which these texts had been written, the contextual approach is criticised with closing eyes of the reader to the nature of human beings and perennial questions such as order and justice that are supposed to be independent of time and social circumstances.

The contextual approach helps students of political thoughts to grasp the trajectories of political ideologies and benefit from the dialogue over the course of thousands of years. A researcher, reader or student can formulate her/his own answers to the recurring themes of public good, social order, equality justice and so forth. At the same time, however, s/he should bear in mind that these themes and political ideas are discussed and explained by each thinker in timebounded and contextual frame. Through a contextual reading of the problems that philosophers face and their striving to overcome political dilemmas, it may also be possible to locate development of political ideas in historical context and avoid the pitfalls of positivistic empiricism of the social science.

Renowned scholar Leo Strauss had a considerable level of impact upon the interpretation of political classics in the post-war era. Explicitly criticising historicism and positivism, he recommended reading between the lines and unorthodox ways of interpretation according to the standards of his own time. For Strauss, studying political thought is “primarily and in a way chiefly... listening to conversations between the great philosophers... the greatest minds, and therefore... studying the great books.”

Any endeavour to put great minds of political philosophy into historical context would mean, according to Strauss, limiting their significance and undermining the potential political implications of their thought that transcended historical boundaries. For this reason, refurbishing anti-historicism, followers of Leo Strauss emphasized that many political ideas were expressed in rather esoteric terms to avoid political pressure. Grasping the meaning in these political texts required detailed reading which aimed to reach a political wisdom independent from time and place; and this was possible because of the fact that there were commonalities in human experience irrespective of time and place. In other words, caging an idea in social circumstances which formed the ground of that particular idea denies the significance of the idea beyond those circumstances. By denigrating the contextualization of political ideas, the Straussian approach points out the need to conceive universal human condition in an abstract form that aims to evaluate it independently from time and place.

Employing some fundamental concepts, one way or another, political thought deals with the relations between the ruled and the rulers. These concepts themselves serve as the means to transmit the political ideals of the philosopher or researcher while they do also serve as subjects of contemplation and reflection.

In ancient Rome, the elderly and the prominent members of the society, most of who were actual members of the Senate were thought to have auctoritas. The term implied that their words were to be trusted and they should be respected. The word authority comes from auctoritas and can be defined as legitimate power. A political figure who has authority is someone whose ways of framing political struggle are accepted by her followers and who is seen as fit to rule. Yet again, authority should not be seen as limited to political affairs.

Max Weber, in its ideal typical classification delineated three sources of legitimacy. For Weber, charismatic authority is the type in which the authority is believed to have unnatural superiorities or exceptional characteristics. People, according to Weber follow the charismatic figure “by virtue of his mission” and charisma sets its own limits. Nevertheless, it has a temporary character as charisma will wane into an institution, eventually being routinized. Traditional authority, on the other hand, feeds upon customs and convention. Being a source of conservatism, this type of authority also rests on identification with owner of the authority. Occupying the foreground is not, however, the transformative capacity of the rule or the organization, but rather provision of stability and preservation of social order. Legal-rational authority, as the third type of Weber’s classification, provides a source of legitimacy on a de-personalized and formal basis. The authority of the organization or the political figure rests upon legality and bureaucratic organization acting in legal-rational terms. The legal-rational authority is mostly identified with the modern nation state by social scientists.

Legitimacy can be defined as rightfulness. It should not be limited to being legal, or in accordance with the laws, despite rightfulness to a great extent stems from the legal framework. One of the most frequent and broad definitions of the concept of legitimacy underlines its characteristic of rightfulness. In political terms, legitimacy requires people’s positive perception of the political system and leader. In relational terms, legitimacy requires the people’s approval and conceiving the government as rightful to govern.

The term government comes from the Latin gubernare and Greek kubernan. It means steering a ship and implies that the path taken by the society and the state is determined by those who govern. In modern terminological usage of the political philosophy, government refers to the group of people who has the authority to steer the state. Though government action is limited with law and subject to judicial review, government implies a top-down and linear relationship in which the elected committee determine the faith of those governed.

Despite the country specific differences of political regimes and the various trajectories, the essential feature of a modern democracy is usually considered as the separation of powers, which means that the judiciary, executive, and legislature will have the ability to check each other’s functions and provide a balancing mechanism against functional overreaching and breaching of the rules. A system of checks and balances ensures that the government’s decisions as well as the laws promulgated by the legislative organs and judicial reviews are seen legitimate. Significant safeguards in modern democracies are therefore the separation of powers and the principle of the rule of law through which we imply that institutions of the government will abide by the legal boundaries. Thus, it prescribes that “citizens are better off when the political system establishes rules for all to follow, rather than subjecting citizens either to arbitrary rule or to anarchy”.

In abstract terms, ideology refers to the production of meanings, symbols, and ideas to be drawn on whilst interpreting various dimensions of the social reality. Ideology can also be defined as the imaginary relation that we have with the actual life conditions. In this critical definition, political philosophers refer to the use of bodies of ideas for legitimating political power or the political preferences of particular groups. From a general point of view, ideology is used both to refer to the material production of ideas, and the ideas that not only signify the social conditions and experiences but also promote the interests of social groups. Disregarding ideology as false belief or false consciousness will be a grave mistake since for politics as well as a political scientist, not just the rightness of a particular idea, but the way this idea is used for political purposes carries great significance. 

The origins of the terms of right and left lie  in certain historical events such as the French Revolution and their meanings have transformed to a certain extent in relation to the social political contexts in which they are drawn upon to make distinctions between the political actors. In the 19th Century France, the terms of left and right were used to delineate the supporters of the Republic vis-á-vis the supporters of the monarchy.

The term of policy in political thought mainly refers to the outcome of the struggle over resource distribution and the way governments address the social-political problems to achieve their goals. It cannot be limited to immediate responses to crises or temporary solutions to expand electoral base. 

Protectionist policies aim to preserve the economy from harsh competition or particular sectors from foreign competitors in order to speed up the development and increase the pace of the economic growth.