what they believe makes their life worth living,

让他们相信生命值得继续
or to put it again slightly differently,

或是再作修润
what a people stand for.

即代表人民的主张
Although we are most familiar with the character of a modern democratic

虽然我们最熟悉现代民主的特性
regime such as ours, the study of political philosophy is

就像美国政治哲学的研究
in many ways a kind of immersion into what we might call today

在很多方面渗透于我们今天所说的
comparative politics; that is to say it opens up to us the

比较政治中意即为我们开启
variety of regimes, each with its own distinctive set of

多种政治种类每种都有其独特的主张
claims or principles, each vying and potentially in

和理念彼此在竞争并和其他政体
conflict with all the others, okay?

形成潜在冲突不是吗
Underlying this cacophony of regimes is the question always,

隐藏在这些政体杂音下的一个问题永远是
which of these regimes is best?

这其中哪种政体是最好的