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Difficulty: HardSufficient Assumption

Historian: No social movement can achieve lasting institutional change unless it secures the active support of political elites. Securing the active support of political elites, however, invariably requires a movement to demonstrate a willingness to engage in incremental policy compromises. The newly formed Vanguard Coalition is explicitly committed to the complete dismantling of the current political establishment. Therefore, the Vanguard Coalition will fail to achieve lasting institutional change.

The historian's conclusion follows logically if which one of the following is assumed?

  1. A
    Any social movement that demonstrates a willingness to engage in incremental policy compromises will successfully secure the active support of political elites.
  2. B
    Social movements that successfully achieve lasting institutional change are rarely explicitly committed to the complete dismantling of the current political establishment.
  3. C
    Any movement that is unwilling to engage in incremental policy compromises is explicitly committed to the complete dismantling of the current political establishment.
  4. No movement that is explicitly committed to the complete dismantling of the current political establishment is willing to engage in incremental policy compromises.Answer
  5. E
    A social movement that is not explicitly committed to the complete dismantling of the current political establishment will invariably be willing to engage in incremental policy compromises.

Answer

The statement that no movement explicitly committed to the complete dismantling of the current political establishment is willing to engage in incremental policy compromises.
The argument relies on formal conditional logic. Lasting Change -> Elite Support -> Willingness to Compromise. To prove the Vanguard Coalition will not achieve lasting change, we must trigger the contrapositive: Not Willing to Compromise -> No Elite Support -> No Lasting Change. Since the only premise given about the Vanguard Coalition is that they are committed to dismantling the establishment, we must assume that this commitment guarantees an unwillingness to compromise. The correct answer provides exactly this required link.

Step-by-Step Solution

1
Identify the conclusion and the premises.
Conclusion: The Vanguard Coalition will not achieve lasting institutional change. Premises: Achieving lasting change requires elite support, and elite support requires a willingness to compromise. Fact: The Vanguard Coalition is committed to dismantling the establishment.
Deconstructing the argument structure is the first step in finding the logical gap.
2
Chain the conditional premises together to find the required condition for the conclusion.
Lasting Change -> Elite Support -> Willingness to Compromise. The contrapositive is: NOT Willing to Compromise -> NO Elite Support -> NO Lasting Change. To prove the conclusion for the Vanguard Coalition, we must prove they are NOT willing to compromise.
Understanding the deductive chain reveals exactly what necessary condition the Vanguard Coalition must fail.
3
Identify the missing link between the facts about the Vanguard Coalition and the required condition.
We know the Vanguard Coalition is committed to dismantling the establishment. We need to prove they are NOT willing to compromise. Therefore, the missing assumption must connect these two: If a movement is committed to dismantling the establishment, it is NOT willing to compromise.
A sufficient assumption must completely bridge the gap between the given premises and the conclusion to provide 100% deductive certainty.

Key Concept

Sufficient Assumption / Formal Logic Bridging
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Topics

Sufficient Assumption

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