(This is an archived extract from the book Patterns of Power: Edition 2)
Using Max Weber's classification of “pure types of authority”, one-party States might be described as having legitimacy by virtue of "legality" if the people support the system of rules which is used as the basis for appointing the government and officials.[1] There are two different reasons why people might accept such a system:
· Systems based on shared values – such as Communism or Confucianism – in theory confer equal recognition on the whole population and provide a reason to support the State. In the early 21st century it has been suggested that China's government, having moved beyond pure Communism, could cite Confucian teachings on virtuous public service to claim legitimacy.[2]
· Theocracies take the position that there can be no other law but God's and that political power must be exercised in the name of God. In the example of Iran, Ayatollah Khomeini wrote:
“If a faqih, an expert in Islamic jurisprudence, took control of the administrative and political institutions, he could ensure that the Shariah was implemented correctly”. [3]
In a theocracy the clergy is interpreting the religious texts, with all their contradictions and ambiguities, in order to determine the will of God in matters of government. Given that political decisions include economics and participation in world affairs, in which the religious texts don’t give direct guidance, the clergy concerned are acting as politicians as well as providing moral advice. The population in a theocracy is, in effect, submitting to the rule of a group of people who were not elected by the population as a whole but by a religious organisation.
In any one-party State, the leader is appointed by committees within the ruling party, so succession can be peaceful. Leaders can be seen as working for the common good (and they would swiftly lose their legitimacy if they were seen to be corrupt or governing badly).
© PatternsofPower.org, 2014
[1] “Legality” is one of Max Weber’s “three inner justifications, hence basic legitimations of domination” which were summarised in paras. 7-10 of his lecture Politics as a Vocation; it was available in May 2014 at http://anthropos-lab.net/wp/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/Weber-Politics-as-a-Vocation.pdf:
“there is domination by virtue of 'legality,' by virtue of the belief in the validity of legal statute and functional 'competence' based on rationally created rules. In this case, obedience is expected in discharging statutory obligations. This is domination as exercised by the modern 'servant of the state' and by all those bearers of power who in this respect resemble him.”
[2] On 17 May 2007 the Economist published an article entitled Confucius makes a comeback, describing it as:
“another sign of the struggle within China for an alternative ideological underpinning to Communist Party rule in a country where enthusiasm for communism waned long ago”.
The article was available in May 2014 at http://www.economist.com/node/9202957.
[3] Karen Armstrong quoted Ayatollah Khomeini’s 1971 rationale for theocracy in The Battle for God, p. 256.