In its broadest sense, that of civility or Politikos designates what relates to the organization or self-management of a city (in Greek: polis, in Latin: civitas) or of a State and to the exercise of power in an organized society.

It is a type of organization of a country in which power is exercised by representatives of the population, generally elected, and where the head of state is not hereditary and is not the only one to hold power. In this sense “republic” is opposed to “monarchy”, but is not always synonymous with democracy.

Citizenship (from the Latin civitas, meaning: right of city, right of an inhabitant of a country) is the fact for an individual, or for a group of individuals, of being officially recognized as a member of a city (in Greek: polis, in Latin: civitas), or more generally of a state.

The citizen has, in a given political community, all his civil and political rights and duties.

Political alienation is a feeling of estrangement, even rejection, experienced by a citizen vis-à-vis the political system in force. In representative democracies, this condition often leads to abstention in elections.

Political alienation should not be confused with voter apathy, which describes a person's indifference to voting and/or the voting process. They feel underrepresented by those running for office; their best interests or concerns not being taken into account.

The root of this word is Arabic and it means "the chief". Generally used to qualify a warlord or the leader of a given community.

Confessionalism is a system of government which by right distributes political power in a proportional way among different religious communities. The positions of government, as well as the seats of the legislative institutions, are distributed in a manner proportional to the demographic weight of each denomination in the total population.