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Political legitimacy
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Political legitimacy
In political science, legitimacy is a concept concerning the right of an authority, usually a governing law or a regime, to rule the actions of a society. In political systems where this is not the case, unpopular regimes survive because they are considered legitimate by a small, influential elite. In Chinese political philosophy, since the historical period of the Zhou dynasty (1046–256 BC), the political legitimacy of a ruler and government was derived from the Mandate of Heaven, and unjust rulers who lost said mandate therefore lost the right to rule the people.
In moral philosophy, the term legitimacy is often positively interpreted as the normative status conferred by a governed people upon their governors' institutions, offices, and actions, based upon the belief that their government's actions are appropriate uses of power by a legally constituted government.
The Enlightenment-era British social John Locke (1632–1704) said that political legitimacy derives from popular explicit and implicit consent of the governed: "The argument of the [Second] Treatise is that the government is not legitimate unless it is carried on with the consent of the governed." The German political philosopher Dolf Sternberger said that "[l]egitimacy is the foundation of such governmental power as is exercised, both with a consciousness on the government's part that it has a right to govern, and with some recognition by the governed of that right". The American political sociologist Seymour Martin Lipset said that legitimacy also "involves the capacity of a political system to engender and maintain the belief that existing political institutions are the most appropriate and proper ones for the society". The American political scientist Robert A. Dahl explained legitimacy as a reservoir: so long as the water is at a given level, political stability is maintained, if it falls below the required level, political legitimacy is endangered.
Legitimacy is "a value whereby something or someone is recognized and accepted as right and proper". In political science, legitimacy has traditionally been understood as the popular acceptance and recognition by the public of the authority of a political actor, whereby authority of such a regime has political power through consent and mutual understandings, not coercion. The three types of political legitimacy described by German sociologist Max Weber, in "Politics as Vocation", are traditional, charismatic, and rational-legal:
More recent scholarship distinguishes between multiple other types of legitimacy in an effort to draw distinctions between various approaches to the construct. These include empirical legitimacy versus normative legitimacy, instrumental versus substantive legitimacy, popular legitimacy, regulative legitimacy, and procedural legitimacy. Types of legitimacy draw distinctions that account for different sources of legitimacy, different frameworks for evaluating legitimacy, or different objects of legitimacy.
Legitimacy in conflict zones, where multiple authorities compete over authority and legitimacy, can rest on other sources. The theory of interactive dignity by Weigand shows that interactions are key for the construction of substantive legitimacy in such contexts. The aspect of an authority that most concerns people in the absence of other accountability mechanisms are its actions, particularly with regard to how authorities interact with them on a day-to-day basis. The value-based expectation people have with regard to such interactions is one of human dignity. People expect procedures to be fair and practices to be respectful, reflecting a serving rather than an extractive attitude. As long as authorities do not satisfy people's more immediate expectation of interactive dignity, people support and consider alternative authorities to be more legitimate.
In a theocracy, government legitimacy derives from the spiritual authority of a god or a goddess.
The political legitimacy of a civil government derives from agreement among the autonomous constituent institutions—legislative, judicial, executive—combined for the national common good. In the United States, this issue has surfaced around how voting is impacted by gerrymandering, the United States Electoral College's ability to produce winners by minority rule and discouragement of voter turnout outside of swing states, and the repeal of part of the Voting Rights Act in 2013.
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Political legitimacy
In political science, legitimacy is a concept concerning the right of an authority, usually a governing law or a regime, to rule the actions of a society. In political systems where this is not the case, unpopular regimes survive because they are considered legitimate by a small, influential elite. In Chinese political philosophy, since the historical period of the Zhou dynasty (1046–256 BC), the political legitimacy of a ruler and government was derived from the Mandate of Heaven, and unjust rulers who lost said mandate therefore lost the right to rule the people.
In moral philosophy, the term legitimacy is often positively interpreted as the normative status conferred by a governed people upon their governors' institutions, offices, and actions, based upon the belief that their government's actions are appropriate uses of power by a legally constituted government.
The Enlightenment-era British social John Locke (1632–1704) said that political legitimacy derives from popular explicit and implicit consent of the governed: "The argument of the [Second] Treatise is that the government is not legitimate unless it is carried on with the consent of the governed." The German political philosopher Dolf Sternberger said that "[l]egitimacy is the foundation of such governmental power as is exercised, both with a consciousness on the government's part that it has a right to govern, and with some recognition by the governed of that right". The American political sociologist Seymour Martin Lipset said that legitimacy also "involves the capacity of a political system to engender and maintain the belief that existing political institutions are the most appropriate and proper ones for the society". The American political scientist Robert A. Dahl explained legitimacy as a reservoir: so long as the water is at a given level, political stability is maintained, if it falls below the required level, political legitimacy is endangered.
Legitimacy is "a value whereby something or someone is recognized and accepted as right and proper". In political science, legitimacy has traditionally been understood as the popular acceptance and recognition by the public of the authority of a political actor, whereby authority of such a regime has political power through consent and mutual understandings, not coercion. The three types of political legitimacy described by German sociologist Max Weber, in "Politics as Vocation", are traditional, charismatic, and rational-legal:
More recent scholarship distinguishes between multiple other types of legitimacy in an effort to draw distinctions between various approaches to the construct. These include empirical legitimacy versus normative legitimacy, instrumental versus substantive legitimacy, popular legitimacy, regulative legitimacy, and procedural legitimacy. Types of legitimacy draw distinctions that account for different sources of legitimacy, different frameworks for evaluating legitimacy, or different objects of legitimacy.
Legitimacy in conflict zones, where multiple authorities compete over authority and legitimacy, can rest on other sources. The theory of interactive dignity by Weigand shows that interactions are key for the construction of substantive legitimacy in such contexts. The aspect of an authority that most concerns people in the absence of other accountability mechanisms are its actions, particularly with regard to how authorities interact with them on a day-to-day basis. The value-based expectation people have with regard to such interactions is one of human dignity. People expect procedures to be fair and practices to be respectful, reflecting a serving rather than an extractive attitude. As long as authorities do not satisfy people's more immediate expectation of interactive dignity, people support and consider alternative authorities to be more legitimate.
In a theocracy, government legitimacy derives from the spiritual authority of a god or a goddess.
The political legitimacy of a civil government derives from agreement among the autonomous constituent institutions—legislative, judicial, executive—combined for the national common good. In the United States, this issue has surfaced around how voting is impacted by gerrymandering, the United States Electoral College's ability to produce winners by minority rule and discouragement of voter turnout outside of swing states, and the repeal of part of the Voting Rights Act in 2013.
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