Similarities and Differences Between Britains and Jamaica's Political System

Rummel describes political systems as “the formal and informal structures which manifest the state’s sovereignty over a territory and people”. Now, sovereignty in politics is said to be concerned with the ‘right’ of a given country to have national control over a country’s territory. Norman Grindley and Anthony Woodburn, in an article published in the gleaner on February 14, 2002 describes a political system as “one which seeks to identify and satisfy the demands of its citizens as best as possible.” They also mentioned that the mandate of a political system is to maximize the utilization of all resources in order to arrive at society’s desired goals. Combining both definitions, we can say that a political system is the formal and informal structures which gives a state the right to have general control over a country’s territorial space and its citizens, by aiming to satisfy the demands of those citizens by making the best use of all available resources. The Westminster system originates from the Palace of Westminster, the home of the British House of Parliament. It is an adversarial two party system that utilizes a single member plurality system. The plurality system is where voters simply place a mark next to their preferred candidate. The candidate receiving the highest number of votes wins. This allocation rule is referred to as "first past the post." Grindley and Woodburn noted that each nation has adapted, adopted or created a system of government that is considered consistent and compatible with its citizen’s socio-political-economic, cultural and environmental needs. They also hypothesized that each political system varies according to its philosophy and culture. I share their perspective. Thus, we can infer that Britain and Jamaica has political cultures which defers. In their article, Grindley and Woodburn identifies Jamaica’s political system as “the export model of the British Westminster-Whitehall model.” They pointed out that Jamaica adopted this