Hello, my name's Mrs. Tomassi, and I'm gonna be working with you on your Citizenship lesson today.

So, if you're all good to go, you've got everything you need, then we will make a start.

The title of today's lesson is How Do Different Systems of Government Compare? And this forms part of the unit on How Do Others Govern? So by the end of the lesson today, hopefully you'll be able to explain the system of government in the UK and how this differs to governments across the world.

We have three keywords today, and you'll see them in bold throughout the session.

If you ever need to, you can refer back to them here, but I will go through them quickly.

So we've got democracy, that's a system of government in which citizens vote in regular, fair elections for representatives who then make laws and decisions on their behalf.

You've got Democracy Index, which is an index measuring the quality of democracy across the world.

And then you've got government, which is the group of people with the authority to govern a country.

In the UK, the government is chosen and led by the Prime Minister, also known as the PM> As I said, if you ever need to, they're here to refer back to.

So we'll make a start on our first learning cycle, which is what systems of government exist? So to start, democracy looks different across the world.

There are different countries and they follow different types of democracies.

Here is the Democracy Index, so you can see it there on the map, and that measures the state of democracy in each country.

This one is the Democracy Index for 2024.

Having a look, what do you think the different colours might mean? So you've got from the red to the blue, any ideas? If you have seen this before, then you'll know that the bluer it is, the fuller of democracy and the more red it is tends to be a non-democratic government.

We'll look at them in more details now.

So, the four different types.

You have a full democracy, a flawed democracy, a hybrid regime, and an authoritarian regime.

And we will go through each of them in detail.

So if there's any you aren't sure on, don't worry, we're gonna go through them.

So to start with, a check for understanding with it now.

So the Democracy Index showed four different types of democracy, which is missing from the list below? You've got full, flawed democracy, authoritarian regime.

Hopefully you managed to realise that the hybrid regime is missing.

Now we're gonna go through them properly.

So, to be classed as a full democracy, countries must have an overall score of 8 or above.

It's out of 10.

So if they score 8 or above, they're classed as a full democracy.

And what that means is that you'll find that there's fundamental political freedoms and rights.

They don't just exist, but they're fully respected and they're reinforced in the culture in the country.

So to give a bit of an example of what that means, that would things like you have the right to a freedom of speech, there are regular free and fair elections, and the media tends to be free as well.

You can see there on the map.

So if you're having a look at any countries that you might know, if you see them in that kind of mid shade of blue to the darker blue, they're the full democracies.

We're gonna look at an example now.

Can you recognise that country at all? And if your geography skills are any good, then you'd know that that is Norway.

And in 2024, their score was 9.

81.

So remember the Democracy Index goes up to 10, so they are scoring very, very highly, and it's an example of a full democracy.

If you know anything about it, you might know why.

If you don't, you'll have a look now.

So Norway is seen as a full democracy because of its multi-party system.

Do you remember what that means? So we have lots of political parties and they have free and fair elections that run every five years.

There's a separation of powers through the monarchy, parliament, and government, and their courts are independent as well.

And there is political participation for citizens.

They can express their opinions, they can scrutinise the government, and they can campaign for change without the fear of being punished.

So if they're like, "Actually, do you know what? This isn't right.

I wanna do something about it." They have the right to do that.

Next we're gonna move on to flawed democracy.

So these are the lighter shades of blue going into the really pale colour, so the 6-7.

99s, and they are flawed democracies.

What this means is that they probably have still got free and fair elections and they're respected.

But you remember before it was like embedded in the culture? Here it's like it exists, but maybe there's some weaknesses.

So this could be like problems in the government, it could be maybe that the country don't really believe or trust what's going on so much, maybe they're not too interested in participating to make change.

That would be a flawed democracy.

So to give you a bit of an example here, do you recognise this country? This is an example of a flawed democracy, and that is the USA.

So the USA in 2024, their score 7.

85.

So they are at the higher end of a flawed democracy, but there are still flaws there.

The reason why is because they do have free and fair elections, so like the presidential elections there take place every four years, but there are challenges that exist through voting access.

So some states might not be able to get to vote, not that they can't vote, they can vote, but the access might be too difficult so then therefore those people don't vote.

There also might be some issues with trust in the system.

In terms of human rights, they have fundamental human rights, but sometimes there's not full protection for all citizens.

And there's been some cases highlighted in the media that show that.

And also there's been some bans on the media.

So the media is independent.

However, actually there's some news organisations that have been banned from press briefings and political figures have attempted to discredit them.

So what that's saying is that actually then they're not allowed to be free, which is what makes it a flawed democracy.

So a check for understanding now.

A country has a score of 9.

00 on the Democracy Index; which type of democracy would it be? Is it, A, full democracy, B, flawed democracy, C, hybrid regime, or D, an authoritarian regime? It would be a full democracy because it's scoring 8.

0 or above.

Now we're gonna move on to hybrid regime.

So hopefully you can start to see the pattern here in the scores.

So we're down to 4-5.

99.

Anything there, and they are them really palely, yellowy colours.

That means they're classed as hybrid because they might have irregular elections.

So that means that they can't always be free and fair because there's something in it that it's not happening like every four or five years, maybe there's something that's a bit different there.

The weaknesses are more prevalent, so you can see them more and then in a flawed democracy, and there tends to be more widespread corruption, maybe the judiciaries, so the legal side and the courts, maybe they're not independent and they're run by the same as the government and there might be a weak rule of law, so maybe some people are treated more fairly than others, and that's what would lead it to be a hybrid regime.

Again there, see if you can work out what that country is.

This is Turkey.

And Turkey in 2024, their score was 4.

26, so they are classed as a hybrid regime.

We'll have a look now why.

So the reason why is because they do have elections, but there has been concerns over fairness, media bias, or restrictions put on the opposition so that maybe it's not as fair as it could be.

In terms of separation of powers, so to give you an example here, the president appoints 12 out of 15 members of the Constitutional Court of Turkey.

So what that's saying is that actually because the president's appointed them, there's a bit of a conflict of interest there.

So actually it might not be as independent and as fair as it could be is if they were appointed by somebody else.

And then there's limited political freedom, so there's restrictions on the press and opposition voices, which can then cause the difficulties there.

So check for understanding, can you add in a missing word in each sentence? Norway is seen as a (pauses) democracy.

USA is seen as a (pauses) democracy.

And Turkey is seen as a (pauses) regime.

See if you can work them out.

Hopefully you managed to work out.

So Norway was the full, USA flawed, and Turkey was a hybrid regime.

So that leads us onto our final one, which is an authoritarian regime.

So these are the scores from 0-3.

99 and they are the dark reds to the yellows that you can see on the map there.

So if you do wanna have a look at any countries, you've got the information there.

But these are limited political freedom, a single group or maybe a single person might be in charge of the country.

If there are elections, they're probably not free or fair, absolute monarchies, so a person that's the king or queen that's fully in control or a dictatorship are commonplace.

And the media is often owned by the state, so it's owned by the government or the ruler.

And the judiciaries, so the court system are not independent.

To give you an example here, I don't know if you recognise this country here.

This is North Korea and in 2024 their score was 1.

08, so it is an example of an authoritarian regime.

We will see why now.

So it's seen as one because of the centralised control.

So the Supreme Leader has absolute power.

They dominate the government, the military, and the economy.

They're in charge of it all.

And there's a lack of human rights because citizens have restrictions on freedom of speech, movement, so they might have to get permission in order to travel and leave the country, and political expression.

The state control the media, so all the media is owned and regulated by the government, which again, if you remember, leads back to the Supreme Leader, and there is no political opposition allowed.

Check for understanding.

Which system of government has a score between 4-5.

99 according to the Democracy Index? Is it a full democracy, a flawed democracy, a hybrid regime, or an authoritarian regime? It is a hybrid regime.

We're gonna move on to the first half now, which is to pick two countries and explain what type of government they have and the key features of their government.

So you can pick two countries of your choice and then what type of government they have and the key features? Take some time, if you pause it, and then when you're ready and you've done this, you can come back and we can feedback and go through it.

How did you get on? Now, this example just gives you two countries, but obviously you might have picked different countries.

So it is just about checking that you've got the type of democracy right and some of the features in it.

So to give you an example, here we've got, "The USA and Turkey have different types of democracy.

The USA is classified as a flawed democracy, meaning that has free elections but also political challenges.

Presidential elections occur regularly every four years.

However, some concerns exist such as restrictions on certain media outlets.

For example, some journalists and news organisations face bans from press briefings or been labelled as fake news.

In contrast, Turkey is considered a hybrid regime where elections take place but with irregularities, including concerns over fairness, media bias, and restrictions on opposition parties.

Separation of powers is weak as the president can appoint 12 out of 15 members of the Constitutional Court, given the executive significant influence over the judiciary.

Political freedoms are also limited with restrictions on press freedom and opposition voices." Hopefully you found that all right and you managed to research two areas or maybe two countries that you were interested in.

Now what we're gonna look at is how does systems of government differ? So we're gonna go into a bit more detail now in this learning cycle.

So to start, going back over what the Democracy Index is and the categories, can you remember them? So we've got full democracy, flawed, hybrid regime, and authoritarian regime.

Now it's a sliding scale from 0-10 rather than strict divisions.

So this is kind of what we were talking about.

So actually what this means is that no country is the same.

So one country could score really highly on civil liberties and freedoms, but it might score low in a different area.

So every country is gonna have differences.

They get scored on the five different categories and then that creates an overall score.

So although there's not an exact one-size-fits-all box, this guide might give you an idea of what to expect in each area.

So in a full democracy, because it's scoring so highly, you would expect to see elections, free media, freedom of speech, human rights exercised, and an independent judiciary.

And then in a flawed democracy, it could be any of them that could be a question mark, but it'd probably only be about one.

So maybe the media's not so free, maybe it is a little bit.

Hybrid regime again would tend to have elections, but the other parts might be question marks or they might not have.

And then in an authoritarian regime, you would expect they probably won't have a lot of those things.

There are, of course, gonna be some exceptions to this and there's some countries that aren't always gonna fit this because each country is individual.

So it's important to have a look at the country specifically you are interested in.

So, there are factors that determine the Democracy Index.

And this is when I was saying about the five different ideas.

So that's electoral process, civil liberties, functioning of the government, political participation, and political culture.

Don't worry again if you're like, "Whoa, that is a load of words," that maybe you've not heard of before, we will go through them a bit now.

So, each of these five factors are given a score and then that score is calculated to give the overall classification.

So whether the country's a full democracy or a hybrid regime.

Electoral process, that refers to the free and fair elections.

In a full democracy, the elections have to be free, fair, and competitive.

There's gotta be loads of different choice of political parties and people are turning out to vote.

Flawed democracy, it's generally free, but maybe there might be a bit of an unfair advantage to some, maybe people don't trust the people, trust the government so much so they don't turn out to vote as much.

When you hit a hybrid regime, it tends to not be fully free or fair.

So maybe there's a bit of manipulation, a bit of pressure on the opposition, there's a chance it could be a rigged election.

And then when we get to an authoritarian regime, if the elections exist, so they might not have elections at all, they're strictly controlled and oppositions or voters choice might be banned completely or really restricted.

Check for understanding now.

Andeep has got a bit confused about how elections look in different systems of government.

Can you rewrite his description, changing just two words to make it correct? So, "In authoritarian regimes, elections are generally free, but political trust might be low so it would not be classed as a full democracy." So you only need to change two words.

If you want and take some time, you could pause it to see if you could work out the correct words.

Did you manage to work out that it's flawed democracies, not authoritarian regimes that are generally free? Next we're moving on to civil liberties.

So these check that people can exercise basic human rights.

So to give an example here, in a full democracy, it's gonna be enjoyed, you know that it's there, freedom of speech, right to protest.

Not only the human rights respected, they're protected.

A bit like earlier they're gonna be maybe embedded in the constitution and governing of the country.

In a flawed democracy, they're mostly protected and enjoyed.

There could be restrictions and maybe occasionally some information is censored.

It's not all the time, but there's little bits that might happen.

When you hit hybrid regime, the rights exist, but they're often limited.

So maybe if there is an election, the opposition is suppressed and they're not allowed to share their points of view.

And then when you hit an authoritarian regime, the rights are severely restricted, suppressed, and violations of human rights are common.

So the government is centering, they're controlling the information.

There is a lack of freedom there.

We then move on to the function of government, and what that's saying is looking how well they work.

So are they accountable? Are they honest? Are they following the law? In a full democracy, it's gonna be completely transparent.

You're gonna be able to see what's going on.

There's checks and balance, people that are questioning the government so that you're probably gonna have like a separation of powers.

That idea that you've got the judiciary and you've got the executive and the legislative branches.

In a flawed democracy, again, you probably would see this stuff, but maybe there's a little bit of issue with it's not fully transparent, you can't fully see what's going on or maybe the separation of powers is a bit weaker.

There could be a bit of corruption, but not a lot.

When you hit a hybrid regime, then it's likely that corruption does exist.

There is a lack of trust with the government.

And then finally an authoritarian regime.

It probably is one leader or a small group and they're not accountable to anyone.

They are able to do and they have the power to do as they like.

They don't need to be transparent.

Corruption and control is high, that they just have full power and control over what they're doing.

We're now gonna do a check for understanding again.

So we've got Sam's statement, can you work out whether this country is a full democracy or a flawed democracy? So she's saying here, "The functioning of the government in this country generally works well, but there are concerns with transparency and accountability due to concerns around political funding." Is that full or flawed democracy? That is a flawed democracy.

If there weren't any concerns, then it would be full.

So we've got a couple left now.

So we've got political participation, so this is about getting in voting rates, political parties influencing decisions.

Full democracy, citizens are actively involved in politics.

So a lot of people are turning out to vote, there's lots of opportunities to get involved in decisions, and political parties are diverse and competitive.

Maybe your countries again have direct democracy, so there's lots of opportunities there.

Flawed, it's encouraged to get involved, but maybe there's lower voter turnout, people aren't turning up or there's some barriers for people to be able to participate.

Maybe they can't get to the polling stations, et cetera.

Hybrid regime is where the participation can be limited or controlled.

Some citizens might be discouraged from participating, some opposition could be suppressed.

And then once you hit an authoritarian regime, it's again it's severely restricted and actually opposition might not even exist or it could be banned and it could be silenced.

So then that's the idea you have the one group or person in control.

How political culture differs is this is more about the beliefs and values of people.

So this comes under as well the trust in the government, how important they think democracy is as a country and the people in it.

So again, you start to see a pattern here.

So we're working our way down with each one.

So at the top with full democracy, there's a strong trust, there's a belief in democratic values.

Citizens gonna get involved, they feel their voices are being heard.

In a flawed democracy, we're starting to see some issues with maybe of trust or inequality.

They might feel that the government doesn't fully represent them, not everyone's voice is heard.

Once you hit hybrid regime, some people might be a bit sceptical of the system.

They might feel like actually there isn't transparency, it isn't fair.

Participation, they think actually it might just be pointless because it's not gonna change anything.

And once you hit an authoritarian regime, there might be a complete lack of trust in the government.

Citizens may fear speaking out or feel they have no say or cannot make any decisions.

Check for understanding now.

Which system of government would you find a political culture where citizens fear speaking out against the government? Is it, A, authoritarian regime, B, flawed democracy, C, full democracy, or D, hybrid regime? That would be an authoritarian regime.

Now we have Aisha here who says, "Can a country have features of different types of government systems? For example, could a country have a mix of democratic and authoritarian features?" And Izzy says, "Yes, there are lots of countries that overlap and have a mix of scores." This is really important 'cause this is what we were saying earlier, it's a sliding scale from 0-10.

They might score highly in one area and lower in another.

So we could have a look at some examples now.

You've got Mauritius.

Mauritius is an example of a full democracy and it has features of a flawed democracy because of political participation and there's low voter turnout in some elections.

Then you've got Serbia, which is an example of a flawed democracy with fair electoral processes, but it has an authoritarian-leaning political culture because a media bias and a weak rule of law.

You've then got Peru, which is an example of a hybrid regime that has features of a full democracy.

So their electoral processes are seen as a full democracy, but they have features of an authoritarian regime because of their political culture as there's a lack of trust in the government.

And then you've got Lebanon, which is an authoritarian regime, but it has features of a flawed democracy for their political participation.

So actually they've got high voter turnout and they've got citizens who are politically engaging, but the country itself is seen as an authoritarian regime.

So that shows you actually there are countries that don't always fit the gaps.

So that's why I said to you, if there is a specific country that you're interested in, have a look in detail about where it stands in each different category because each country does govern very differently.

So, true or false, a full democracy must have no authoritarian features in its government? That's false.

Why is that false? A full democracy scores over 8 across all five factors.

They could score higher in one feature and lower in another, such as Mauritius.

Now this moves us onto the final task for the session today.

So can you explain with an example why can countries classified under the same category in the Democracy Index may run differently and have different systems of government? If you need to, you might wanna go back over and have a look at some examples and some countries.

Once you think you've got an idea, obviously take some time, pause it, then summarise your idea, and then we can get back and we can share and have a look through some feedback.

How did you get on? And when it comes to your example, obviously they might be different because there are so many different countries you could choose from.

Hopefully though it's the overall idea is gonna be similar.

So your answer could look something like this.

So countries classified under the same category in the Democracy Index may not be governed in the same way because the index measures democracy based on multiple factors such as elections, civil liberties, government functioning, political participation, and political culture.

Even if two countries fall into the same category, their scores may vary for different factors.

For example, Serbia is classed as a flawed democracy as they hold free and fair elections, but has authoritarian features for political culture due to media bias and weak rule of law.

Did you manage to get similar like that? Hopefully you did because that now brings us to the summary of this lesson.

So the Democracy Index has four different classifications of government, which are full democracies, flawed democracies, hybrid regimes, and authoritarian regimes.

These are classified through scores in elections, civil liberties, government functioning, political culture, and political participation.

Some countries have both democratic and authoritarian features.

Examples of these include Peru and Lebanon.

It's really important to remember this, that actually, again, the Democracy Index is updated as well yearly and governments and systems change because if they do have elections, a new government could come in and then systems can change again.

So when you are looking at this, if there are places that you're interested in, always make sure you are having a look at the up-to-date information.

Thank you so much for working with me today, and hopefully you've got a bit of an idea of how the systems of government differ across the world.