some say plato founded political science. His republic among other things,described an ideal polis,but his reasoning was largely speculative,and his ideal system ended up looking a bit like moden fascism or communism. Plato's student,aristotle,on the other hand,was the first empirical political scientist and sent out his students to gather data from the dozens of Greek city-states. With these data,he constructed his great work politics. both plato and Aritotle saw Athen in decline ; they attempted to understand why and to suggest how it could be avoided. they thus began a tradition that is still at the heart of political scien: a search for the sources of the good stable political system. aristotle was not shy about indentifying what worked best as in this passage from politics