A government is the system or group of people governing an organized community, generally a state.
In the case of its broad associative definition, government normally consists of legislature, executive, and judiciary. Government is a means by which organizational policies are enforced, as well as a mechanism for determining policy. In many countries, the government has a kind of constitution, a statement of its governing principles and philosophy.
A military junta (/ˈhʊntə, ˈdʒʌntə/ ) is a system of government led by a committee of military leaders. The term junta means "meeting" or "committee" and originated in the national and local junta organized by the Spanish resistance to Napoleon's invasion of Spain in 1808. The term is now used to refer to an authoritarian form of government characterized by a politically dominant group of military officers.
The Constitution of Canada (French: Constitution du Canada) is the supreme law in Canada. It outlines Canada's system of government and the civil and human rights of those who are citizens of Canada and non-citizens in Canada. Its contents are an amalgamation of various codified acts, treaties between the Crown and Indigenous Peoples (both historical and modern), uncodified traditions and conventions. Canada is one of the oldest constitutional monarchies in the world.
The Constitution of Canada comprises core written documents and provisions that are constitutionally entrenched, take precedence over all other laws and place substantive limits on government action; these include the Constitution Act, 1867 (formerly the British North America Act, 1867) and the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. The Constitution Act, 1867 provides for a constitution "similar in principle" to the largely unwritten constitution of the United Kingdom, recognizes Canada as a constitutional monarchy and federal state, and outlines the legal foundations of Canadian federalism.
Responsible government is a conception of a system of government that embodies the principle of parliamentary accountability, the foundation of the Westminster system of parliamentary democracy. Governments (the equivalent of the executive branch) in Westminster democracies are responsible to parliament rather than to the monarch, or, in a colonial context, to the imperial government, and in a republican context, to the president, either in full or in part. If the parliament is bicameral, then the government is usually responsible first to the parliament's lower house, which is more representative than the upper house, as it usually has more members and they are always directly elected.
Responsible government and the principle of parliamentary accountability manifests itself in several ways. Firstly, ministers must account to parliament for their decisions and for the performance of their departments. This requirement to make announcements and to answer questions in parliament means that ministers must have the privileges of the floor, which are only granted to those who are members of parliament. Secondly, and most importantly, although ministers are officially appointed by the authority of the head of state and can theoretically be dismissed at the pleasure of the sovereign, they concurrently retain their office subject to their holding the confidence of the lower house of parliament. When the lower house has passed a motion of no confidence in the government, the government must ordinarily immediately resign or submit itself to the electorate in a new general election.
The Liberal Wars (Portuguese: Guerras Liberais), also known as the Portuguese Civil War (Guerra Civil Portuguesa) and the War of the Two Brothers (Guerra dos Dois Irmãos) was a civil war in Portugal that lasted from May 1828 to May 1834, fought between liberal progressive constitutionalists (led by former King Pedro IV) and conservative traditionalists (led by King Miguel I) over the country's system of government and royal succession. Embroiled parties included the Kingdom of Portugal, Portuguese rebels, the United Kingdom, France, the Catholic Church, Spain and Russia.
Democracy promotion, also referred to as democracy building, can be domestic policy to increase the quality of already existing democracy or a strand of foreign policy adopted by governments and international organizations that seek to support the spread of democracy as a system of government. In practice, it entails consolidating and building democratic institutions.
International democracy promotion typically takes three forms: assistance, monitoring, and conditionality. In financial terms, democracy promotion grew from 2% of aid in 1990 to nearly 20% in 2005. More controversially and rare, it can also take the form of military intervention.