2021 CSAT — Q34

Locate. This asks for the central idea: find the pattern that covers the whole passage. The passage gives three parallel cases: aristocracy “ruins itself by limiting too narrowly the circle… of power”; oligarchy “ruins itself by the incautious scramble for immediate wealth”; “even democracy ruins itself by excess of democracy.” Same verb each time — ruins itself by overdoing its own defining trait.

Test (thesis-vs-detail + scope-fit). The crux is the shared pattern: every form of government decays through the excess of its basic principle. (b) states exactly that. Test the rivals against the whole passage: (a) “societies experiment with governments” is a vague aside that ignores the self-ruin theme; (c) speaks only of democracy and over-claims a “perfect” outcome; (d) imports “necessary evil” and “tyranny inherent,” beyond the text.

Eliminate by anatomy. (a) offers a detail, not the main idea, and strays out of scope — a generality that misses the self-destruction-by-excess engine. (c) is too strong for what the passage says and covers only one passage in view — “ensures a perfect, functional and sustainable democracy” inflates the passage’s point (lack of education dooms democracy) into a guarantee, and covers only one of the three forms. (d) is too strong for what the passage says — “necessary evil… tyranny inherent in any form” is a verdict the passage does not pronounce. The transferable rule: when a passage runs parallel cases to a single pattern, the crux names the pattern. Key: (b).

“Aristocratic government ruins itself by limiting too narrowly the circle within which power is confined; oligarchic government ruins itself by the incautious scramble for immediate wealth. But even democracy ruins itself by excess of democracy.” — each form is destroyed by the runaway of its own defining principle (aristocracy → narrowness, oligarchy → wealth-scramble, democracy → excess democracy) → (b). (a) is a peripheral generality; (c) over-claims (“ensures a perfect… democracy”) and covers only democracy; (d) over-reads into “necessary evil / tyranny inherent.”

Plato’s passage shows three regimes each destroyed by the runaway of its own principle: aristocracy by narrowing power, oligarchy by chasing wealth, democracy by excess democracy (uneducated voters can’t choose the best rulers).

• (b) names that shared pattern — government deteriorates by excess of its basic principle. Correct.
• (a) is a peripheral generality about experimentation, not the self-ruin theme.
• (c) over-claims a “perfect” democracy and addresses only one form.
• (d) reads in “necessary evil” and inherent tyranny the passage never states.

Answer: (b).

The passage’s structure is three parallel mini-arguments that share one verb — “ruins itself.” That parallelism is the tell: the crux is the common mechanism, not any single regime. (c) is the seductive trap because the passage dwells longest on democracy and its uneducated voters — but a crux that captures only the last of three parallel cases fails scope-fit, and (c) further over-claims “perfect… democracy” which the passage’s gloom never promises. When you see “X ruins itself by…, Y ruins itself by…, even Z ruins itself by…,” the answer is the line that names the shared self-ruin. (b).