A requirement of subject-matter concentration—generally to the extent of two full-year courses or their equivalent in the student's annual budget of four or five—during the last two years of the undergraduate curriculum is common to the great majority of colleges and universities granting liberal arts degrees. It complements a requirement of diversification that is also commonly prescribed as a restriction on the freedom students otherwise would have to concentrate still further in their choices among course offerings. Together, the two embody a philosophy of balance in the distribution of studies; but they do not define the scope or content of any particular area of concentration.

The requirement of a “major” applies equally to a wide variety of fields of study, in the humanities and the natural as well as the social sciences. The aims and problems of the major in political science, therefore, are in large measure those of the major as such. They merge, indeed, into the broader question of the general goals of college education in the upper-class years, since the major figures so importantly in the work of juniors and seniors. They focus on two points chiefly: (1) the course content, or area, of the major in political science, and (2) the ways and means of instruction within the major, to the end of deepening its educational value. Put more briefly, the problems are what to learn and how to learn in the area of principal interest.

On September 23,19…, in Roscommon county in the Southern Peninsula of Michigan, the county clerk called the local officials together at the court house. Of the county administrators, the sheriff, treasurer, prosecuting attorney, circuit court judge, register of deeds, health and welfare administrators, and highway engineer were present. Many of the township supervisors had managed somehow to reach the court house in spite of the streams of refugees pouring northward from the destroyed industrial cities of southern Michigan. Already the county was bursting with new and unforeseen problems of public administration. The traffic jam on U. S. highway 27 from Lansing northward was something beyond the memory of the oldest living inhabitant. Near Houghton Lake, this traffic was jammed by another stream which had followed U. S. 23 northward from Saginaw and Bay City, turning inland at Standish by way of state highways 76 and 55 to connect with U.S. 27. The flight of stampeding and determined refugees was flowing like a river through the county seat of Roscommon and ever northward toward Cheboygan and Mackinaw City at the tip of the Lower Peninsula of Michigan.

“This meeting was called,” said the clerk, “to discuss how we can handle this emergency. One of the state police officers who has been on reconnaissance with a deputy sheriff will tell us what we are up against in this area. For 36 hours our telephone and telegraphic communications with Washington and Lansing have been out. We are on our own and must make the best of a terrible emergency.”

A democratic and peace-loving Germany must have sound political, economic, social, and ethical foundations. On the political side, this means, among other things, the restoration of local self-government, destroyed by Nazi rule and now in process of being rebuilt. Fortunately, Germany has a long tradition of local self-government on which to build. The tradition reaches back to the Middle Ages, but was lost in the centralizing absolutism of modern times. With the reforms of Stein in 1808, a new chapter in the history of local self-government began which lasted on down through the Bismarckian Empire and the Weimar Republic.

One of the attributes of local self-government is freedom of association. In other words, local authorities may voluntarily unite in associations for the promotion of their mutual interests and the defense of their rights against encroachments by the state. For example, the United States has its state leagues of municipalities, federated into the American Municipal Association, France has its Union des Villes et Communes de France, and Britain has its Association of Municipal Corporations. The same was true of pre-Hitler Germany, with its various unions of cities (Städte), rural counties (Landkreise), rural communes or municipalities (Landgemeinden), and provinces.

The first German union of local authorities was the Hanover Städteverein founded in 1866 while Hanover was still an independent kingdom. Thirty years later (1896), the cities of all Prussia formed the Preussischer Städtetag. In that same year, the Bavarian cities were also organized. These various state unions were finally united (1905) into an all-German association known as the Deutscher Städtetag. In addition to the state unions, larger cities were direct members of the organization—usually cities with more than 25,000 inhabitants and constituting Stadtkreise (city-counties or county-boroughs, to use the English terminology). In 1931, 279 cities held direct membership in the Deutscher Städtetag.

Along with its obligations to train men and women to serve as useful citizens, to carry on the cultural heritage of the past, and to take their places as productive members of private professions and occupations, the American university recognizes a responsibility to train students for service in federal, state, and local governments. The dimensions of this responsibility are best illustrated by the finding in 1939 that of the men graduates of the University of Minnesota between 1928 and 1936, 41.3 per cent either were or had been in government employment; for the women graduates, the proportion was 66 per cent.

A relatively small proportion of students find their way into the judiciary through the avenue of law-school training and practice of the law. Another small proportion become legislators through a variety of avenues, but with the law schools again predominant in the training. The bulk of university graduates who are public servants will be found in administrative agencies. Consequently, undergraduate training for the public service places its principal emphasis on the training of students to contribute effectively as officers and employees of administrative agencies. The university, therefore, is obligated to acquaint students with the opportunities for administrative service and to guide them into courses that will prepare them for such service.

Legal Basis. On February 4, 1946, President Truman, by Executive Order 9691, further decentralized personnel administration to the departments and agencies. The order states: “In order to assure the maximum utilization, in the recruitment and placement of persons for the Federal service, of the field service resources of the departments and agencies, the Civil Service Commission, after consulting the departments and agencies concerned, may establish United States civil service boards of examiners in the field service, composed of officers and employees of the departments and agencies concerned.” Boards of examiners are not new. The Civil Service Act of 1883 directs the Commission, “where examinations are to take place,” to “designate and select a suitable number of persons, not less than three, in the official service of the United States, … after consulting the head of the department or office in which such persons serve, to be members of boards of examiners. …” The Commission “may at any time substitute any other person in said service … in the place of anyone so selected.” Civil Service Rule IV, promulgated by an earlier President in accordance with the basic act states: “The Commission shall designate from among persons in the Federal service … such boards of examiners as it shall deem necessary. Their members shall perform such duties as the Commission may direct, in connection with the execution of the Civil Service Act and these Rules, and in the performance thereof they shall be under the direct and sole control of the Commission. Such duties shall be considered part of the duties of the office in which they are serving, and time shall be allowed therefor during office hours.”

The swing to the left, discernible at present in many countries, has given a new urgency to the old problem of hyphenating the politics of democracy to the economics of socialism. What was in the past mainly a matter of theoretical discussion and parliamentary rhetoric has shifted to the stage of legislative enactment and executive application. It is worth while, therefore, to pay attention to some of the world's smaller states whose experiments over a number of decades are pointers along the path now trodden by larger nations like Britain. One of these smaller communities which has persistently moved in a socialist direction by piecemeal and peaceable methods is New Zealand.

The history of New Zealand as a state organized along Western European lines can count but a little over a hundred years. Just because of its youth, however, this nineteenth-century colony and twentieth-century Dominion has provided from its birth a fertile field for governmental activity. The discovery of New Zealand by Tasman and Cook, and to a large extent the early colonization and settlement by white immigrants, were due to public enterprise. The extension of state functions was facilitated from the beginning by the vesting of large tracts of land in the Crown, and was necessitated by the inadequacy of available private capital.

By its complete defeat, the surrender of its armed force, and the abolishment of its national government, Germany has ceased to exist as a sovereign state and subject of international law. By the Declaration of Berlin, June 5, 1945, the four Powers occupying the country—the United States of America, the United Kingdom, the Soviet Union, and the French Republic—assumed “supreme authority with respect to Germany including all powers possessed by the German Government, the High Command, and any state, municipal, or local government or authority.” This meant that the four occupant Powers have assumed sovereignty over the former German territory and its population, though the term “sovereignty” was not used in the text of the Declaration. The four occupant Powers exercise their joint sovereignty through the Control Council, established at Berlin as the legitimate successor of the last national government of Germany. All this is in complete conformity with general international law, which authorizes a victorious state, after so-called debellatio of its opponent, to establish its own sovereignty over the territory and population of the subjugated state. Debellatio implies automatic termination of the state of war. Hence, a peace treaty with Germany is legally not possible. For a peace treaty presupposes the continued existence of the opponent belligerents as subjects of international law and a legal state of war in their mutual relations.

The opposite doctrine, advocated by some authorities and governments, that Germany, in spite of the fact that there exists no independent national government, not even a “government in exile,” still exists as a sovereign state, that the four occupant Powers are not the sovereigns in relation to the German territory and its population, that they only exercise Germany's sovereignty just as a warden exercises the rights of his ward, is manifestly based on a legal fiction. According to international law, a community is a state if, and as long as, a certain population is living on a definite territory under an independent government. If one of these three essential elements of a state in the sense of international law is missing, the state as a subject of international law disappears, or, in other words, the community ceases to exist as a sovereign state. No state can exercise the sovereignty of another state. State sovereignty does not permit representation or substitution.

Like his colleagues generally in the social sciences, the political scientist has prided himself upon the subject-matter content of his teaching. His responsibility has been to enlarge the understanding of the dynamic process by which men govern and are governed. Teaching and research have been coördinate elements of that responsibility. Constantly seeking to find better techniques for observation and measurement of political phenomena, ever trying to define more exactly the field of interest and knowledge, the political scientist has always focused attention upon the subject-matter of his specialization. He has had little time to devote to the problems of teaching methodology.

The very fact that higher education has been selective is another possible explanation for our seeming indifference to improvements in teacher-student communication. From necessity, teachers' colleges and the educational profession have given considerable attention to teaching techniques. Primary and secondary schools are intended for mass education. If they fulfill their purpose, they reach virtually all of the population from six to sixteen years of age. The college teacher has had no such mass obligation. Traditionally, only some ten per cent of our high school population continue with higher education, and they are usually divided among the various fields of learning represented in colleges and universities. Selectivity and a limited audience have encouraged the college instructor to concentrate upon subject-matter and to ignore methodology.

Political scientists certainly have no reason to offer any apologies for their primary interest.

Recent concern with the liberal arts curriculum as evinced by the report of the Harvard committee on General Education in a Free Society, Colgate's adoption of a core curriculum, and a thorough reëxamination of their entire educational program by scores of other institutions sharpens the recurrent problem of attempting better integration within the constituent parts of the curriculum. Whenever political scientists, talking shop, lapse into general principles, there is inevitable discussion concerning the nature and focus of political science itself. Much hard thinking has been done on the subject. There is, however, as in every profession where individual specialties are earnestly pursued, a tendency toward intellectual myopia, a tendency to miss, by default rather than consciously, a synoptic view of the subject. This has resulted in a lack of integration, of comprehensive design, of sense of balanced purpose, in many political science curricula.

The miscellany of unrelated, overlapping courses which one sometimes encounters in college or university catalogues, to say nothing of the neglect of important aspects of government, indicates that the political science curriculum has received inadequate analysis. Political scientists who teach are educators as well, and thereby have a dual professional responsibility to present their field of inquiry as an integrated, comprehensive whole, elucidated by specific course offerings. Only thus can political science realize its richest contribution to liberal education as well as to an understanding of the political process within and beyond academic halls.

The International Labor Organization (hereafter referred to as“I.L.O.”) took the first steps toward establishing relations with a new organization which would replace the League of Nations in the spring of 1944. The 26th Session of the International Labor Conference, which met in Philadelphia in April–May, 1944—the first regular session held since 1939—adopted a resolution requesting the Governing Body of the International Labor Office “to take appropriate steps to assure close collaboration and full exchange of information between the I.L.O. and any other public organizations which now exist or may be established for the promotion of social and economic well-being.”

Acting on this recommendation, the Governing Body of the I.L.O., at its session of May, 1944, a few days after the close of the Philadelphia Conference, appointed a delegation composed of nine members of the Governing Body, its chairman, and the director of the International Labor Office, and authorized it to negotiate with any international authority in regard to the Organization's relationship to other international bodies. In January, 1945—still prior to the San Francisco Conference—the Governing Body reaffirmed the I.L.O.'s desire to be associated with the contemplated general international organization, “while retaining for the International Labor Organization the authority essential for the discharge of its responsibilities under its constitution and the Declaration of Philadelphia.”

At the invitation of the United States Government, the I.L.O. was represented at San Francisco by a consultative delegation. The position of the I.L.O. within the new framework was discussed at some length at the Conference.

These are days when the individual who would devote himself to the study and teaching of political science stands upon the threshold of new and exciting adventures and a lot of very hard work. His mind and his enthusiasms must be keyed to the great possibilities for constructive advancement to be found in a period of social transition. There are those among us who insist with great cogency that we should turn back to the achievements of the “wisdom of the ages” and find there the insight and answers to our current perplexities. Incisive as were the achievements of the great minds of the past, as right as were their prescriptions for their own times and difficulties, few among us would defend the proposition that all wisdom and all understanding reside solely with those who have given us our foundations. Much remains to be uncovered amidst the back-wash of a world-wide revolution. The teacher of political science must balance the wisdom of the past against present possibilities for the greater understanding and clearer insight into political institutions to be found in the quickening imagination of the contemporary scene. We must cut new paths. We must produce our Einstein. Perhaps we have, and are now ready for our own Manhattan Project. But to do this we must face squarely and honestly at least six major problems in this postwar period: (1) graduate preparation; (2) community leadership; (3) teaching load; (4) research; (5) salaries; and (6) academic freedom.

Diverse are the interests of those who are now preparing to enter the profession at the college or university level.

The field known as “political science” is in many ways a peculiarly American discipline. Although it plays a minor rôle in some European universities, and none in the rest, this particular field of the social sciences is of great importance in the United States. Besides a mounting interest in the study of government on the undergraduate level in this country, there has been a steady growth of professional training for the public service in special schools of public administration and in international affairs and diplomacy, both closely related to and usually staffed in part at least by political scientists.

To the non-American inquiring as to the reason for this special development, no exhaustive answer can be given at the present time. But mention may be made of a number of factors which have contributed to this phenomenal and persistent growth. In the first place, political science, backed by the ancient tradition of Aristotle's Politics, has a central appeal to young men and women seeking an integrated and over-all approach to the “great society” of a free and intensely democratic people. The pride Americans used to take in their political “institutions,” which was noted by many a foreign traveller, has in this age of democratic disillusionment found an uneasy refuge in academic study of the history of political thought and institutions. The well-known practical, or rather activist, tendency of American scholars has turned many an economist, such as John R. Commons, to legislative halls and thus has pushed the problems of government into the center of attention. Historians with similar propensities, like Charles A. Beard, came to enrich the work of political science.