Almond defines Political System as “the system of interactions to be found in all independent societies which performs the function of integration and adaptation both internally and vis-a-vis other societies by means of employment of more or less legitimate compulsion.”
Almond combines in his definition with Weber’s definition of state, Easton’s conception of authoritative allocations, and Parsons’s view of the function of the political sub-system in society. The use of the term ‘compulsion’ helps him in distinguishing the political system from other social systems.
According to Almond, “A political system is characterised by three elements – comprehensiveness, interdependence and boundaries.” A system is comprehensive because it includes all the interactions; its inter-dependence means that the various sub-sets of the system are so closely connected with each other that a change in one sub-set produces a change in all other sub-sets, and the existence of boundaries means points where one system ends and the other begins.”
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On the basis of these characteristics, we can make out a comprehensive list of these characteristics:
(1) A set of elements or objects comprising a whole,
(2) Interactions and a regular pattern of interactions,
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(3) Inter-dependence,
(4) Comprehensiveness,
(5) Existence of boundaries,
(6) Structures,
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(7) Functions performed by the Structures.
Almond is more interested in the study of processes than institutions. He tries a proper understanding of the structures within the political system through their functions. According to him, every political system has a set of structures which perform certain functions.
To quote Dr. S.P. Verma, “In fact, it is on the basis of the efficiency with which a political system performs the functions assigned to it as a political system that its stature in the scale of political development is determined.
Functions being given, the question that a political scientist may ask is: Through which mechanism are these functions being performed? In other words, one searches for structures by asking questions about functions.”