This volume is an introduction to current developmentes in the field of comparative government and politics. In the recent years political scientists, in addition to undertaking descriptive analysis of institutions, have sought to interpret politics in terms of key analytic concepts. It is our hope that this volume will encourage students to generalize about political systems, the way in which account for similarities and differences. But the study of politics is also an unrelenting quest (in Aristotle's terms) for the highest good.