Showing papers on "Legitimacy published in 1988"

Legitimacy in the International System

Abstract: The surprising thing about international law is that nations ever obey its strictures or carry out its mandates. This observation is made not to register optimism that the half-empty glass is also half full, but to draw attention to a pregnant phenomenon: that most states observe systemic rules much of the time in their relations with other states. That they should do so is much more interesting than, say, the fact that most citizens usually obey their nation's laws, because the international system is organized in a voluntarist fashion, supported by so little coercive authority. This unenforced rule system can obligate states to profess, if not always to manifest, a significant level of day-to-day compliance even, at times, when that is not in their short-term self-interest. The element or paradox attracts our attention and challenges us to investigate it, perhaps in the hope of discovering a theory that can illuminate more generally the occurrence of voluntary normative compliance and even yield a prescription for enhancing aspects of world order. Before going further, however, it is necessary to enter a caveat. This essay attempts a study of why states obey laws in the absence of coercion. That is not the same quest as motivates the more familiar studies that investigate the sources of normative obligation. The latter properly focus on the origins of rules—in treaties, custom, decisions of tribunals, opinio juris, state conduct, resolutions of international organizations, and so forth—to determine which sources, qua sources, are to be taken seriously, and how seriously to take them. Our object, on the other hand, is to determine why and under what circumstances a specific rule is obeyed. To be sure, the source of every rule—its pedigree, in the terminology of this essay—is one determinant of how strong its pull to compliance is likely to be. Pedigree, however, is far from being the only indicator of how seriously the rule will be taken, particularly if the rule conflicts with a state's perceived self-interest. Thus, other indicators are also a focus of this essay insofar as they determine the capacity of rules to affect state conduct.

The political language of Islam

Abstract: What does "jihad" really mean? What is the Muslim conception of law? What is Islam's stance toward unbelievers? Probing literary and historical sources, Bernard Lewis traces the development of Islamic political language from the time of the Prophet to the present. His analysis of documents written in Arabic, Persian, and Turkish illuminates differences between Muslim political thinking and Western political theory, and clarifies the perception, discussion, and practices of politics in the Islamic world. "Lewis's own style, combining erudition with a simple elegance and subtle humor, continues to inspire. In an era of specialization and narrowing academic vision, he stands alone as one who deserves, without qualification, the title of historian of Islam." Martin Kramer, "Middle East Review" "A superb effort at synthesis that presents all the relevant facts of Middle Eastern history in an eminently lucid form. . . . It is a book that should prove both rewarding and congenial to the Muslim reader." S. Parvez Manzor, "Muslim World Book Review" "By bringing his thoughts together in this clear, concise and readable account, [Lewis] has placed in his debt scholars and all who seek to understand the Muslim world." Ann K. S. Lambton, "Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies" "[Lewis] constructs a fascinating account of the ways in which Muslims have conceived of the relations between ruler and ruled, rights and duties, legitimacy and illegitimacy, obedience and rebellion, justice and oppression. And he shows how changes in political attitudes and concepts can be traced through changes in the political vocabulary." Shaul Bakhash, "New York Review of Books""

Creative Democracy: Systematic Conflict Resolution and Policymaking in a World of High Science and Technology

Abstract: Foreword, by Willy Brandt Introduction: The Global Challenge Technology and Society Science and Politics: Studies in Competing Logics Democratic Discourse, Expertise, and Alternative Futures Systematic Democratic Discourse: Issues, Legitimacy, and Power

The dynamics of institutional change : local government reorganization in western democracies

Abstract: Western democracies have retained political legitimacy since 1945 by a continuous process of adaptation to changing socio-political circumstances. Most states have changed their institutional arrangements, and reorganized their systems of local government to some degree. This book explains local government change within the wider context of institutional change. It links theories of legitimacy and institutional change to the extensive empirical and historical literature on local government reorganization. It also differentiates between institutional change and reform. Structural or historical variables are shown to play a major role in explaining why and how both reform and change take place. In particular, the rise and decline of the welfare state - and the political and policy changes associated with this - is one of the most important points of departure in the analysis. The ideas shared by the policy community explain the roles played by actors involved in shaping local government change and reform. This provides the link between the macro (structural) dimension and empirical observation.

Patterned Chaos in Global Life: Structure and Process in the Two Worlds of World Politics 1:

Abstract: The changing world scene is marked by innumerable developments for which extant paradigms have, at best, strained and insufficient explanations. Here the analysis undertakes a fresh approach to the emergent patterns of global life by tracing a bifurcation in which the state-centric world coexists and interacts with a diffuse multi-centric world consisting of diverse "sovereignty-free" actors who endlessly confront an "autonomy" dilemma that differs significantly from the "security" dilemma of states. An outline of the basic structures and processes of this two-world universe of world politics suggests that its equilibrium may derive from cyclical patterns in which orientations at the micro-level toward authority and legitimacy vary systematically to redress the balance of systems and subsystems at the macro level.

The Struggle for Hegemony

Abstract: In "The New Labor History and the Powers of Historical Pessimism," Leon Fink makes an important contribution to scholarship about American political culture by addressing recent debates over the Gramscian categories of domination, resistance, and hegemony. He presents hegemony as something to be struggled for, rather than as something imposed on inert masses. Fink demonstrates that dominant ideology is contested terrain, involving concessions to aggrieved populations as well as control over them. Finally, Fink insists that power is wielded within the context of historical blocs temporary and unstable alliances built on combinations of ideology and self-interest that can be both created and destroyed through political struggle. It is perhaps a measure of the inescapable irony of our time that Antonio Gramsci's ideas have gained popularity among scholars largely as a means of explaining the futility of efforts to change past and present capitalist societies. Above all else, Gramsci was a revolutionary strategist, an individual who instructed others to temper their "pessimism of the intellect" with an "optimism of the will." He knew about defeat and domination from personal experience and systematic study, yet Gramsci still championed a political and ideological struggle for hegemony. He called for "a war of position," in which aggrieved populations seek to undermine the legitimacy of dominant ideology, rather than just a "war of maneuver" aimed at seizing state power. To counter the hegemony of ruling historical blocs, Gramsci sought to fashion oppositional coalitions capable of struggling for a world without expolitation and hierarchy. He described traditional intellectuals as "experts in legitimation," but called for the development of "organic intellectuals" able to give voice to the repressed needs and aspirations of oppressed groups., Yet the Gramsci who appears in much contemporary scholarship is less a strategist

The Church and Political Opposition: Comparative Perspectives on Mobilization Against Authoritarian Regimes

Abstract: The Catholic Church has recently taken a greater role in encouraging and aiding political opposition to authoritarian regimes. The ability of the church to do this derives in part from its dominant cultural presence in these societies. It also derives from the unique character of authoritarian states. The need for legitimacy is common to these regimes. The quest often takes the form of appealing to religious legitimation. In return, the church is accorded privileges enjoyed by no other institution outside the state. This raises a paradoxical situation for the church: the less legitimate a regime, the more it needs the church. However, it is not in the church's interest to identify too closely with an unpopular and often repressive regime. There is also a second side to the paradox: the less legitimate the regime, the more the church may be disposed to oppose it for moral and evangelical reasons. If the church uses its freedoms in support of opposition movements, it may cultivate popular support, but it risks repression of its normal religious activities and loss of its freedoms, thereby jeopardizing its spiritual mission. This paper examines how this paradox is manifested in Latin America, Spain and Poland. Based on our observations, we offer several propositions concerning the circumstances, nature and intensity of church participation in anti-regime activity. Church resources, its organization and the level of social and political development of the country in question are the variables which are most strongly suggested as determining factors of the church's response.

Lineages of the State in Afghanistan

Abstract: In March and April 1988 diplomats in Geneva, Washington, and elsewhere were fretting over a few issues that the United States and Pakistan had raised at what was to be the conclusion of the six-year process of negotiations aimed at ending the war in Afghanistan. These included the timing of the termination or suspension of foreign aid of various sorts to the Afghan parties to the conflict, including the state. President Zia of Pakistan also insisted on the formation of a compromise transitional government in Afghanistan before signing the agreements, although he backed down under pressure from both the United States and his own civilian government. After the April 14 signing, the parties to the agreements (Pakistan, the regime in Kabul, the United States, and the USSR) mandated the U.N. mediator, Undersecretary-General Diego Cordovez, to promote efforts to form a new Afghan government, and from June 29 to July 10, Cordovez traveled to Iran, Pakistan, and Afghanistan to present his proposal for a Government of Peace and Reconstruction. In short, the diplomats were confronting the two linked crises that had led to the conflict, crises of the legitimacy of the state in Afghanistan and of its relation to the international system. To call the Afghan state a "state," however, may mislead the uninformed Westerner (or Russian). "State" conjures up the image of an organization whose laws and regulations structure the interaction and guide the common affairs of its citizens who, however else they may be divided, are united in their membership in and attachment to the historical and territorial community that the state represents. This relationship of the state and society is typical of the forms of nation-state that developed in Europe and became generalized through war and imperialism into the in-

Dans la mouvance du prince : la symbolique du pouvoir itinérant au Maghreb

Abstract: In the Prince's Sphere: the Symbolics of Itinerant Power in the Maghreb ; ; The Maghreb's Beys and Sultans share a long tradition of voyaging, institutionalized in expeditions known as mehallas and harkas. These latter, which are almost always fiscal ventures, take on an obviously repressive character and constitute a means of controlling regions over which the central administration has little control. Their cost, however, is so high that the net balance after such a mobilization is sometimes ; nil. One must also interpret the "mehallas" as attempts to make people believe in the legitimacy of power, and as enactments of the kingdom's harmony, answering to the subjects' own expectations. The procession's staging borrows models of Muslim power which are not specific to the Maghreb: mimesis of the Prophet, the fiction of the Holy War, and so on. On the other hand, the structural tension between a mobile exercice of power and its sedentary practice—in an extremely shifting and unstable political context in which each group's alliance with the sovereign must be constantly renegotiated— may well be a feature particular to the Maghreb.

Corporatist implementation and legitimacy: The case of privatisation in Swedish public housing

Abstract: ‘Corporatist implementation’ plays an important role throughout the Swedish rental sector. It is based on close ideological affiliations and adherence to common policy objectives among the Social Democratic government and the organised interests in the public rental sector. In this article, I describe how it works in rent policy as well in the programme for widened tenant influence over housing management and renewal In the mid‐1980s, however, the public landlord association invited a private company to manage and renew problem estates in public housing. The methods used by that company are examined and found to be in conflict with the objectives hitherto shared by Social Democratic governments and the ‘recognised’ interests in the public rental sector. I then go on to discuss the implications for the legitimacy of the existing ‘corporatist implementation’ structure, suggesting that a ‘de‐legitimisation’ of that structure would prove too costly and difficult for government Once such a structure i...

State Formation and Political Legitimacy

Abstract: The evolution of the state from earlier forms of political organization is associated with revolutionary changes in the structure of inequality. These magnify distinctions in rank and power that outweigh anything previously known in so-called primitive societies. This volume explains how and why people came to accept and even identify themselves with this new form of authority. The introduction provides a new theory of legitimacy by synthesizing and uniting earlier theories from psychological, cultural-materialist, rational choice, and Marxist approaches. The case studies which follow present a wide range of materials on cultures in both Western and non-Western settings, and across a number of different historical periods. Included are examples from Africa, Asia, Europe, and the New World. Older states such as Ur, Inca, and medieval France are examined along with more contemporary states including Indonesia, Tanzania, and the revolutionary beginnings of the United States. Using a variety of approaches the contributors show in each instance how the state obtained and used its power, then attempted to have its power accepted as the natural order under the protection of supra-naturally ordained authority. No matter how tyrannical or benign, the cases show that state power must be justified by faith and experience that demonstrates its value to the participants. Through such analysis, the book demonstrates that states must be capable of enforcing their rule, but that they cannot deceive populations into accepting state domination. Indeed, the book suggests that social evolution moves toward less coercive rule and increased democratization. "Ronald Cohen" is a political anthropologist who has taught at the Universities of Toronto, McGill, Northwestern, and Ahmadu Bello, and is on the faculty of the University of Florida. He has carried out field research in Africa, the Arctic and Washington. His major works include "The Kanuri of Borno, Dominance and Defiance, Origins of the State, " and a book in preparation on food policy and agricultural transformation in Africa. "Judith D. Toland" is a lecturer at University College, Northwestern University, and the College of Arts and Sciences, Loyola University of Chicago. She is the director of her own corporate and non-profit consulting firm. She has done fieldwork in Ayacucho, Peru and has written widely on the Inca State.

The Element of Irrationality: Max Weber's Diagnosis of Modern Culture

Abstract: Max Weber's diagnosis of modern culture as presented for example in Science as Vocation includes the idea of differentiation between the spheres of science, art, and law and ethics. But Weber also claims that all genuine values have gone from public life. The parallel processes of rationalization and intellectualization have resulted in a loss of individual freedom and meaning. This diagnosis does not simply follow from his over-narrow concept of rationality as claimed by Habermas. To Weber rationalization is not identical with the increase of instrumental rationality. Rather, it is the formal and abstract, or quantifying nature of the modern type of rationality which is totally alien to all value considerations. In Weber's opinion there is thus an unavoidable element of irrationality inherent in the very process of rationalization. Weber obviously also wanted to emphasize the paradoxical nature of legal authority and formal bureaucracy. The legitimacy of the modern type of domination does not rest on any shared norms or values, but is by nature exclusively procedural and formal. An analysis of Weber's views about modernity thus reveals a highly conscious critique of the Project of Enlightenment.

The theory of the state versus the state of theory

Abstract: Metatheory makes sociopolitical analyses of "stability" and "crisis" more empirically and theoretically comprehensive. Multidimensional yet parsimonious presuppositions and models reside at the core of metatheory. Power and viability are political sociology's pivotal presuppositional topics. A multidimensional view of power permits a more valid study of such issues as the interaction of capitalism and the state and the autonomy and transformative potential of the latter. Multidimensional analyses of viability encourage a tiered image of politics in which activity and passivity can coexist and the rejection of the binary interpretation of "stability" and "crisis." A model of the polity with a minimum of four tiers is presented. The state tier is modeled as a complex organization. An organizational, but "nonmanagerialist," perspective opposes a monogoaled view of state effectiveness. Moreover, viability is understood as entailing not merely state effectiveness but the efficiency of participation and the legitimacy of institutions as well.

Self-Direction and Political Legitimacy: Rousseau and Herder

Abstract: Part 1 From extended selfhood to political rightness - Rousseau: self-direction and political will self-mastery and paternalism extended selfhood - "patriotism and citizenship" public reasons and political legitimacy self-choosing and right-acting self-direction or self-destruction - an appraisal. Part 2 From historical self-understanding to civic humanity - Herder: rationality and self-direction coping with autonomy natural growth and human purpose historical understanding - "dispositions and reasons" historical consciousness and political culture - levels of legitimacy analogy and political vision - an appraisal. Part 3 From individual self-direction to national self-determination - Rousseau and Herder: nature, culture and political legitimacy.

Negotiated Settlement to Armed Conflict: Lessons from the Colombian Peace Process

Abstract: Colombian Politics, by 1982, were characterized by stagnation, increased levels of violence, and diminished regime legitimacy. In the face of an active, though limited, guerrilla insurgency as well as nascent labor unrest and popular protest, the successive governments of the National Front had come to depend on the coercive powers of the state to preserve public order and political stability. Colombia's peace process, initiated during the government of Conservative President Belisario Betancur (1982- 1986), was a recognition of the limits, indeed the failure, of the military solution to the maintenance of public order.

Legitimacy of Internships for Academic Credit Remains Controversial.

Abstract: The academic legitimacy of internships in mass communication curricula is an issue that won't go away easily. There is no doubt that both students and communications enterprises benefit from internships.' But the assessment of the benefits devolving upon students is left to a faculty that is usually unfamiliar with the pedagogy of experiential learning. The result is that credit is uneasily extended for activities that seem unrelated to the objectives expected of traditional classroombased learning. Giving ill-considered academic status to internship courses increases the vulnerability of the communications discipline to outside criticism. Bruce Garrison, writing in Journalism Educator in 1981, commented that according to faculty critics \"the overall academic program becomes diluted\" when internships are given full status as academic courses, thus \"endangering the quality of the curriculum.\"2 John De Mott, writing about summer internships at a time before internships had migrated massively into the main academic year, argued that \"s ince... the average school or department of journalism is seldom in a position to oversee [internship] activity satisfactorily, there is a natural reluctance to grant academic credit.\"' Faculties are rightfblly concerned about transferring the control and responsibility for evaluating student performance to an off-campus professional who is not academically certified. De Mott, citing Hugh Cowdin's report on Academic Cedit for Internshrps (Roundtable #80, American Society of Journalism School Administrators, 1978) illustrates how the appropriate

Morocco: Monarchy, legitimacy and succession

Abstract: (1988). Morocco: Monarchy, legitimacy and succession. Third World Quarterly: Vol. 10, No. 1, pp. 201-228.

Presidential Address 1987: Democratization and the Problem of Legitimacy in Middle East Politics

Abstract: When I told some of my colleagues and students that I wanted to address the question of democratization in Middle East politics at the annual meeting, I was not surprised at their reactions, which were mainly incredulous. If ever a topic were passe, surely it was this one. Not only was the experience of parliamentary democracy brief and unhappy, it also had ended by the middle 1950s. Furthermore, the liberal modernization paradigm that had underpinned earlier forecasts of democracy was itself largely discarded. In addition, my friends argued, how could I try to make a case for democratization when my own writing on Arab politics portrayed fragmented, disoriented societies and unstructured, insecure political environments in which the race between societal demands and state capabilities—no matter which side was “ahead”—could hardly be conducive to democracy. Skeptical colleagues from Egypt and other Arab countries also raised the troublesome question of academic and ideological ethnocentrism: should one even ask about prospects for democratization?

Uganda, 1979–85: Leadership in Transition

Abstract: After a period of preoccupation with the study of the military in post-colonial states, some scholars have begun to turn their attention to the analysis of politics in post-military states in the Third World.1 This shift, however, has had a considerable impact on perceptions of the traditional rigid dichotomy between military and civilian regimes. In particular, there is increasing scepticism about the ability of the latter to restore political order, to establish the supremacy of civil institutions over the armed forces, and to acquire popular legitimacy. There seems little doubt that the pre-eminence of the soldiers, and their ability to dictate the degree of participation in politics, has continued to persist in a number of African countries, thereby producing systems of government that are a mixture rather than a clear manifestation of either a military or a civilian regime.

Economic Reform and Political Change in Eastern Europe: A Comparison of the Czechoslovak and Hungarian Experiences

Abstract: Economic reform - the introduction of elements of the market into a planned economy - has been the central political problem for socialist states for at least three decades. This thesis seeks to elucidate the nature of the problem through a reconsideration of the general theoretical issues, and through a comparative analysis of the practice of economic reform in two countries - Czechoslovakia and Hungary. In Part One, the arguments in favour of the use of the market in socialism are recapitulated, and the implications of various socialist economic models for political freedom, democracy, and the realisation of some concept of the 'social interest 1 are discussed. The case studies presented in Part Two address the practical political problem of introducing market-type reform into communist systems. In Czechoslovakia, the issue of economic reform contributed to a profound political crisis culminating in 1968. But it is argued, economic reform was not the only, or even the most important source of the crisis. In the different political conditions in Hungary, economic reform was embraced by the regime as a means of securing political stability and popular legitimacy. Political crisis was avoided, but at the costof compromise in the economic reform. The conclusion is that while full-scale democratisation of the political system may not be an inevitable concomitant of economic reform, profound changes in the style and instruments of communist rule are required.

De la quête de légitimation à la question de la légitimité : les thérapeutiques « traditionnelles » au Sénégal.

Abstract: E. Fassin & D. Fassin — From the Quest for Legitimation to the Question of Legitimacy : 'Traditional' Therapies in Senegal. ; The quest for new forms of recognition for traditional therapists raises the question of the relations between the different kinds of medical practices and, more precisely, that of medical legitimacy. Through three case studies carried out in Senegal, the authors attempt to show how principles of legitimation are defined today with, as essential characteristics: recognition of the least legitimate of the healers, strengthening of the legitimator's authority, and recourse to legitimating bodies outside of the medical field. This analysis shows the inanity of the classical modem/traditional opposition and leads to an examination of the meaning of a legitimacy crisis which seems to affect both doctors and healers. ;

The Ubiquity of Prophylactic Rules

Abstract: The Supreme Court's opinion in Miranda v. Arizona' does not even look like an ordinary opinion. As many critics have commented, it reads more like a legislative committee report with an accompanying statute.2 As if that were not enough, the Court has, since Miranda, repeatedly said that the Miranda rules are not required by the self-incrimination clause of the fifth amendment but are judge-made rules designed to implement that provision.3 Against this background, it is not surprising to find Miranda under attack not just as wrong but as "illegitimate." Professor Grano, for example, argues that "prophylactic rules" like Miranda's always raise questions of legitimacy; and that even if prophylactic rules are sometimes legitimate, Miranda's prophylactic rule is not.4 I want first to suggest that Professor Grano is mistaken in his argument that what the Court did in Miranda is different from, and less legitimate than, what it does when it prescribes the kind of prophylactic rules that he finds legitimate. Then I will make a broader argument-that "prophylactic" rules are not exceptional measures of questionable legitimacy but are a central and necessary feature of constitutional law. Indeed, constitutional law consists, to a significant degree, in the elaboration of doctrines that are universally accepted as legitimate, but that have the same "prophylactic" character as the Miranda rule."

Understanding the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes from the Perspective of the French Court

Abstract: Few political decisions have roused historians to such a swift condemnation, indeed such a unanimous censure as the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes, signed at Fontainebleau on 17 October 1685 At the time, however, the Revocation was greeted in France with widespread and unsolicited enthusiasm Its partial failure—creating as it did more problems than it solved—caused disappointment and slowly led the public to question its legitimacy Ensuing generations perceived the Edict of Fontainebleau and the anti-Protestant policies which it consecrated as an enormous error and a serious political misjudgment Such an attitude is too well-known to merit consideration here