Author: Jack Knight Publisher: NYU Press ISBN: 1479888699 Category : Political Science Languages : en Pages : 411
Book Description
Essays on the political, legal, and philosophical dimensions of political legitimacy Scholars, journalists, and politicians today worry that the world’s democracies are facing a crisis of legitimacy. Although there are key challenges facing democracy—including concerns about electoral interference, adherence to the rule of law, and the freedom of the press—it is not clear that these difficulties threaten political legitimacy. Such ambiguity derives in part from the contested nature of the concept of legitimacy, and from disagreements over how to measure it. This volume reflects the cutting edge of responses to these perennial questions, drawing, in the distinctive NOMOS fashion, from political science, philosophy, and law. Contributors address fundamental philosophical questions such as the nature of public reasons of authority, as well as urgent concerns about contemporary democracy, including whether “animus” matters for the legitimacy of President Trump’s travel ban, barring entry for nationals from six Muslim-majority nations, and the effect of fundamental transitions within the moral economy, such as the decline of labor unions. Featuring twelve essays from leading scholars, Political Legitimacy is an important and timely addition to the NOMOS series.
Author: Joseph Chan Publisher: Cambridge University Press ISBN: 1108107826 Category : Law Languages : en Pages : 446
Book Description
What makes a government legitimate? Why do people voluntarily comply with laws, even when no one is watching? The idea of political legitimacy captures the fact that people obey when they think governments' actions accord with valid principles. For some, what matters most is the government's performance on security and the economy. For others, only a government that follows democratic principles can be legitimate. Political legitimacy is therefore a two-sided reality that scholars studying the acceptance of governments need to take into account. The diversity and backgrounds of East Asian nations provides a particular challenge when trying to determine the level of political legitimacy of individual governments. This book brings together both political philosophers and political scientists to examine the distinctive forms of political legitimacy that exist in contemporary East Asia. It is essential reading for all academic researchers of East Asian government, politics and comparative politics.
Author: Arthur Isak Applbaum Publisher: Harvard University Press ISBN: 0674241932 Category : Philosophy Languages : en Pages : 305
Book Description
At an unsettled time for liberal democracy, with global eruptions of authoritarian and arbitrary rule, here is one of the first full-fledged philosophical accounts of what makes governments legitimate. What makes a government legitimate? The dominant view is that public officials have the right to rule us, even if they are unfair or unfit, as long as they gain power through procedures traceable to the consent of the governed. In this rigorous and timely study, Arthur Isak Applbaum argues that adherence to procedure is not enough: even a properly chosen government does not rule legitimately if it fails to protect basic rights, to treat its citizens as political equals, or to act coherently. How are we to reconcile every person’s entitlement to freedom with the necessity of coercive law? Applbaum’s answer is that a government legitimately governs its citizens only if the government is a free group agent constituted by free citizens. To be a such a group agent, a government must uphold three principles. The liberty principle, requiring that the basic rights of citizens be secured, is necessary to protect against inhumanity, a tyranny in practice. The equality principle, requiring that citizens have equal say in selecting who governs, is necessary to protect against despotism, a tyranny in title. The agency principle, requiring that a government’s actions reflect its decisions and its decisions reflect its reasons, is necessary to protect against wantonism, a tyranny of unreason. Today, Applbaum writes, the greatest threat to the established democracies is neither inhumanity nor despotism but wantonism, the domination of citizens by incoherent, inconstant, and incontinent rulers. A government that cannot govern itself cannot legitimately govern others.
Author: Patrick Riley Publisher: iUniverse ISBN: 9781583484241 Category : Philosophy Languages : en Pages : 276
Book Description
At the heart of representative government is the question: "What makes government and its agents legitimate authorities?" The notion of consent, of a social contract between the citizen and his government, is central to this problem. That contract allows the government to rule over the citizen and to exact obedience from him in return for certain protections and goods he needs.
Author: Mlada Bukovansky Publisher: Princeton University Press ISBN: 0691146705 Category : History Languages : en Pages : 266
Book Description
This book examines the causes and consequences of a major transformation in both domestic and international politics: the shift from dynastically legitimated monarchical sovereignty to popularly legitimated national sovereignty. It analyzes the impact of Enlightenment discourse on politics in eighteenth-century Europe and the United States, showing how that discourse facilitated new authority struggles in Old Regime Europe, shaped the American and French Revolutions, and influenced the relationships between the revolutionary regimes and the international system. The interaction between traditional and democratic ideas of legitimacy transformed the international system by the early nineteenth century, when people began to take for granted the desirability of equality, individual rights, and restraint of power. Using an interpretive, historically sensitive approach to international relations, the author considers the complex interplay between elite discourses about political legitimacy and strategic power struggles within and among states. She shows how culture, power, and interests interacted to produce a crucial yet poorly understood case of international change. The book not only shows the limits of liberal and realist theories of international relations, but also demonstrates how aspects of these theories can be integrated with insights derived from a constructivist perspective that takes culture and legitimacy seriously. The author finds that cultural contests over the terms of political legitimacy constitute one of the central mechanisms by which the character of sovereignty is transformed in the international system--a conclusion as true today as it was in the eighteenth century.
Author: Dorothea E. Schulz Publisher: Boydell & Brewer ISBN: 184701268X Category : Political Science Languages : en Pages : 255
Book Description
An innovative examination of our understanding of political legitimacy in Mali, and its wider implications for democratization and political modernity in the Global South.
Author: David Estlund Publisher: Princeton University Press ISBN: 1400831547 Category : Political Science Languages : en Pages : 324
Book Description
Democracy is not naturally plausible. Why turn such important matters over to masses of people who have no expertise? Many theories of democracy answer by appealing to the intrinsic value of democratic procedure, leaving aside whether it makes good decisions. In Democratic Authority, David Estlund offers a groundbreaking alternative based on the idea that democratic authority and legitimacy must depend partly on democracy's tendency to make good decisions. Just as with verdicts in jury trials, Estlund argues, the authority and legitimacy of a political decision does not depend on the particular decision being good or correct. But the "epistemic value" of the procedure--the degree to which it can generally be accepted as tending toward a good decision--is nevertheless crucial. Yet if good decisions were all that mattered, one might wonder why those who know best shouldn't simply rule. Estlund's theory--which he calls "epistemic proceduralism"--avoids epistocracy, or the rule of those who know. He argues that while some few people probably do know best, this can be used in political justification only if their expertise is acceptable from all reasonable points of view. If we seek the best epistemic arrangement in this respect, it will be recognizably democratic--with laws and policies actually authorized by the people subject to them.
Author: Rodney Barker Publisher: ISBN: Category : Political Science Languages : en Pages : 232
Book Description
Governments and their supporters attempt to justify their power by arguing for their moral, rightful, or predestined claim to authority. Political Legitimacy and the State examines the accounts that have been given of legitimacy, proposing that legitimation should be studied as a form of political activity in its own right. Drawing on recent historical examples, Barker argues for a more diversified understanding of the function and character of political legitimacy, suggesting that rulers are often far more concerned about legitimating their power than are those whom they govern.
Author: Benno Netelenbos Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan ISBN: 9781137551115 Category : Social Science Languages : en Pages : 0
Book Description
Legitimacy is an essential concept in politics. But what is it? This book seeks to answer this question through adopting Weber’s sociological approach to legitimacy. Weber argues that we should not only understand legitimacy from the perspective of the political order, but that we should also look at its subjective meaning. If this approach seems to have fallen into discredit since Weber formulated it almost a century ago, Netelenbos argues that we need to bring back the subjective into political sociology and theory. Political Legitimacy beyond Weber argues that contemporary politics in late-modern society cannot merely be understood in terms of legitimate domination or formal bureaucratic organisation. Politics is also about strategic conflict, coordination and argumentation. Based upon these different conceptualisations of politics and by critically evaluating some of the most leading sociologies, Netelenbos presents four analytical perspectives of political legitimacy. Providing crucial insights into the multiple dimensions of political legitimacy, this will be an essential tool for both empirical and normative research.
Author: Jack Knight
Author: Joseph Chan
Author: Arthur Isak Applbaum
Author: Michael G. Schatzberg
Author: Patrick Riley
Author: Mlada Bukovansky
Author: Dorothea E. Schulz
Author: David Estlund
Author: Rodney Barker
Author: Benno Netelenbos