Definitions

Here are a a few of the definitions that Deirdre and Liz asked about. I was going to draw on dictionaries of political science and philosophy but decided instead to begin at the beginning:the Oxford dictionary hence:
The State:2. a nation or territory considered as an organized political community under one government: the state of Israel.• an organized political community or area forming part of a federal republic: the German state of Bavaria. • ( the States ) informal term for United States.
Note the two definitions, Germany is a state, but so is maine,the latter being part of the United States....something like Province in our country...oops I mean state
Here is one for this week:

2. conservatism
Originally in Burke an ideology of caution in departing from the historical roots of a society, or changing its inherited traditions and institutions. In this ‘organic’ form it includes allegiance to tradition, community, hierarchies of rank, ...
(From The Oxford Dictionary of Philosophy in Religion & Philosophy)

and here is another
Nationalism
Is a concept that arose in the 19th c. among peoples who became aware of their national identity without having a national state; in these cases nationalism had first to be affirmed linguistically and culturally, then be given political embodiment. In France, the state came first, and over the centuries created the nation, so that the roots of national self-consciousness can be traced long before the concept or word existed. French nationalism was clearly one of the driving forces of the Revolutionary and Napoleonic periods, but the word nationalisme appeared in a dictionary only in 1874.