Altruistic Behavior In Politics

2142 Words9 Pages
Arda Korkmaz 20700167 102 – 73 Research Paper, Final Draft 11.05.09 Saadet Birlik Karaca Altruistic Behavior in Politics It has always been an important issue whether people are altruistic or not. In order to clarify this controversial issue, the meaning of altruism should be defined first. What is altruism? Basically, it can be defined as the concern for others as much as one does for himself/herself. From the beginning of the world, it was seen that human kind is a social being, which means that people have to live together in order to survive. Using their intelligence, people have realized the importance of this situation and they tried to find the best way to live together. That is when some terms such as selfishness and altruism emerged. Some people believed that they have to be selfish in order to achieve their goals in this race called “Life”. According to different perspectives, altruism was the one of the most important keys in our lives for the communities which had to live together. The contrary ideas in 21st century make this argument even more heated. However, as far as the current situation of the world is concerned, it can be seen that human being has behaved selfishly throughout the years. Current circumstances have stressed the importance of altruism once more. Especially, when it comes to politics, altruism becomes even more important issue. As far as the economic, social and environmental crises that are happening now are concerned, it is not hard to see that there has been a mistake. In order to correct this mistake, some authors believe that some activists should take that risk and participate in politics. James H. Fowler and Cindy D. Kam, for instance, illustrate that whether altruism and social identification affect political participation in their
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