Government

A government is the system or group of people governing an organized community, generally a state.World’s states coloured by form of government.

Full presidential republics²     Semi-presidential republics²     Republics with an executive president elected by or nominated by the legislature that may or may not be subject to parliamentary confidence.     Parliamentary republics²     Parliamentary constitutional monarchies     Constitutional monarchies which have a separate head of government but where royalty still holds significant executive and/or legislative power     Absolute monarchies     One-party states     Countries where constitutional provisions for government have been suspended (e.g. military dictatorships)     Countries which do not fit any of the above systems (e.g. provisional governments).

¹ This map was compiled according to the Wikipedia list of countries by system of government. See there for sources.
² Several states constitutionally deemed to be multiparty republics are broadly described by outsiders as authoritarian states. This map presents only the de jure form of government, and not the de facto degree of democracy.

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. Each government has a kind of constitution, a statement of its governing principles and philosophy.

While all types of organizations have governance, the term government is often used more specifically, to refer to the approximately 200 independent national governments and subsidiary organizations.

Historically prevalent forms of government include monarchy, aristocracy, timocracy, oligarchy, democracy, theocracy and tyranny. The main aspect of any philosophy of government is how political power is obtained, with the two main forms being electoral contest and hereditary succession.