一开始...
First, let's think about a few questions while we begin to learn about the origins and development of humans and government: 政府为什么会形成?? 它们有什么用呢? 它们有必要吗?? 什么是最好的政府形式?
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Generally speaking the first form of what we would identify today as government formed about 5,在美索不达米亚(今天的伊拉克)由苏美尔人. 当人类开始学习如何耕种和生活在一个地方, they eventually learned to survive at a much more successful rate thus the population grew. 随着人口的增长, it became apparent to the citizens of highly populated urban cities that some form of organization was needed to ensure that those cities would survive. 只要你有一大群人在一起, 组织成为群体进化的下一步.
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What resulted in the formation of government = the development of agriculture. When humans learned to grow crops they no longer had to travel great distances to find food, this allowed them to stay in one place and grow small communities into cities. In order to have plentiful crops, one must have fresh water, fertile soil, and temperate climate. 美索不达米亚就是这样一个地方(虽然今天没有那么多，哈哈). The first civilizations in Mesopotamia were Sumer, Babylon, and Assyria. As one civilization developed and peaked, another began to threaten the power of the former power. This led to the need of forming some type of national army for civilizations for protection, 这是建立复杂政府的又一步. 另一个发展是成文法的产生, credited mostly with the Babylonian leader Hammurabi who felt that written laws would the people of Babylon understand the rules and punishments of breaking the rules.
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The earliest forms of government were usually made up of a single ruler (many times based on the idea that the ruler had powers from or was part of the god or gods they people worshipped). 这些统治者通常拥有绝对的权力. Their goals were usually to take city-states (small civilizations were usually centered around a single city and did not belong to a bigger group or government than the city itself) by force or by diplomacy (diplomacy is convincing other parties to join or do as you wish through talking and making agreements) to join their own emerging empire. An empire is a group of city-states or countries that merge under one leader.
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大约公元前630年(大约2600年前), the Greeks began to merge many of their city-states into a loose alliance to form a larger government or empire. 800年后，罗马人, under one ruler expanded their power by forcefully conquering neighboring countries and territories until they became the largest empire in the world up to that time. 多年来，罗马由一个独裁者或一个领导人统治. 一些独裁者试图做好事，并在很大程度上被人民所接受, 其他独裁者, called, tyrants, 统治非常严厉和残酷. 当独裁者长期对人民施以残酷的对待, 人们变得焦躁不安，有时还会造反. One of the things that can make people of civilizations become unhappy and seek to remove their leaders was when tyrants made the people pay high taxes they could not afford. Taxes are money or goods paid to the government by the citizens in order to pay for the things the dictator sees fit to spend the tax money on. A good dictator uses the money to build roads, bridges, and public buildings. A bad dictator (or tyrant) uses the money for himself to build lavish and large temples or fight wars to gain more money and power.
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After several hundred years of bad leadership in which much of the citizens of Rome suffered, the people led a revolt and ousted the dictator of Rome in order to form a Republic, or a government that operates based off of representatives of the people. Rome then went through a series of wars and eventually the Republic was again replaced with a dictator which the Romans called an emperor. 到这个时候，帝国的人口已经达到了6000万.
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当这一切发生的时候, 其他地区，如印度, China, Africa, and even in the Americas with Native Americans developed civilizations of various forms. 公元400年代罗马帝国灭亡后(大约1600年前), almost all of Europe returned to small civilizations that were centered on city-states. For the next 700 years these city-states began to join other city-states either by force or by choice and countries were formed that we know of today and each one was led by a king or emperor. 在欧洲发展起来的统治制度是君主制. A monarchy is usually led by a king and/or queen in which power becomes determined through bloodlines. 国王的长子不仅是王子, but the next in line for the royal thrown when the king passed away or decided to step down.
现代欧洲
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During the 1500s, the population of Europe grew and trade, also known as commerce, grew. European nations began to expand their trade routes and discover new lands. 这导致了商品生产的增加. Merchants, 被称为企业家的企业主, 银行家在商业上的影响力和权力越来越大. European economies became based on capitalism or an economic system based on private ownership of business. This led to higher economic status that was under the king but above the peasant or poor class.
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This growth of government and power in Europe led to European nations wanting to expand their horizons and explore new trade routes across the ocean. Soooooo, in 1492, that is what Christopher Columbus was doing when he discovered the West Indies, aka, 在加勒比海发现了中央岛, South, 和北美. 随着西班牙探险家的到来, England wanted in on the race for new lands and ended up settling North America at Jamestown and Plymouth, thus we find ourselves as Europeans and later African-indentured servants and slaves, in America, and that's how colonial Americans looked at British history to form their new government (next Unit).
