Power, Authority and Legitimacy Flashcards Preview

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Flashcards in Power, Authority and Legitimacy Deck (24)
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1
Q

What is power?

A
  • The central concept in political science
  • The ability to get other individuals to do as one wants them to
    • Physical
    • Intellectual (problem solving)
    • Social
2
Q

What are the three types of power?

A
  • Influence
  • Coercion
  • Authority
3
Q

What is influence?

A
  • The ability to persuade others, by convincing them to do what you
    want them to
  • It’s voluntary, that is those who are being influenced freely chose
    to agree
  • Belief in the right thing to do / reap personal benefit
4
Q

What are the types of influence?

A
  • Intellect
    • Arguments this is best
  • Passion
    • Playing to emotions
  • Self-interest
    • “What’s in it for us”?
  • Group solidarity
    • Community they belong
5
Q

Does influence still matter?

A
  • Elections
  • Interest groups
    • Try to persuade
6
Q

What is coercion?

A
  • The deliberate subjection of one to another through fear (or threats)
    of harm
  • Compliance is not voluntary
7
Q

What types of coercion are there?

A
  • Violence
  • Fines
  • Labor Strikes
8
Q

What is Authority?

A
  • Where people obey commands not because of reason or fear but because
    the respect the command
  • Parents & children
9
Q

What types of authority are there?

A
  • Natural Authority (traditional)
  • Public Authority
  • Legal Authority
  • Charismatic Authority
10
Q

What is natural authority?

A
  • aka traditional
  • Exists when judgement is deferred
  • Based on inherited position
    • Based on tradition
11
Q

What is public authority?

A
  • Is created by human agreement

- “He’s an authority on constitutional law”

12
Q

What is legal authority?

A
  • One of the general rules binding all participants
  • Rule of law
  • Crown → Constitution → Government
13
Q

What is charismatic authority?

A
  • Based on the projection and perception of extraordinary qualities
  • Impassioning with rhetoric - Obama
14
Q

What is legitimacy?

A
  • The belief in “rightness” of rule

- The feeling of respect for authority in those who obey

15
Q

How is obligation involved with authority and legitimacy?

A
  • Authority → Obligation → Legitimacy

- Right of command → Sense of duty → Belief in rightness of government

16
Q

What is the rule of law?

A

The principle that every member of a society, even a ruler, must follow the law

17
Q

What is the history of the rule of law?

A

Magna Carta (1215) → Glorious Revolution of 1688 → Declaration of Independence (1776) → British North America Act 1867 (Constitution Act 1867) → Dicey (1885) → Roncarelli v. Duplessis (1959)

18
Q

What was the Magna Carta?

A
  • June 1215 - Runnymeade

- King John was forced by English Nobles to rule per legume terrae (according to the laws of the land)

19
Q

What was the Glorious Revolution?

A
  • “English Bill of Rights” (1689)
  • Established a Constitutional Monarchy where the Royal power to
    suspend and dispense with law was abolished, and the crown was
    forbidden to levy taxation or maintain a standing army in peacetime
    without parliamentary consent
  • Monarchy → Parliament
  • John Locke
20
Q

Who was John Locke?

A
  • Good theorists, late to the party
  • Father of the rule of law
  • “As power ought not to be arbitrary and at pleasure, so it ought to
    be exercised by established and promulgated (formally announced)
    Laws: that both the people may know their Duty, and be safe and
    secure within the limits of the Law, and the Rulers too kept within
    their due bounds, and not to be tempted, by the Power they have in
    their hands, to imply it to such purposes, and by such measures, as
    they would not have know, and own no willingly”
  • Not making it up as we go anymore
  • The people need to understand the limitations (no speed limits)
21
Q

What was the declaration of independence?

A
  • all men are created equal,
  • Governments are instituted among Men
  • the consent of the governed
22
Q

Who was Dicey?

A
  • Introduction to the study of the law of the constitution (1885)
  • Arguably the architect of Westminster common law
    1. Supremacy or predominance of “regular law”
      - This speaks against the use of arbitrary power on the part of the
      government (i.e. their laws must be made according to established
      procedure and guidelines, and/or have ground for their creation
    1. Equality before the law - meaning that everyone, regardless of
      whether he or she is a ruler, government official or regular citizen,
      is subject to the same law that is enforced by normal courts
      - Abnormal courts - secret (kangaroo court)
      - Normal court - judge/trial by peers
23
Q

What was Roncarelli v. Duplessis?

A
  • 1959
  • Roncarelli
    • Montreal restaurateur - liquor license suspended “forever” for providing financial support to Jehovah’s Witnesses (including bail)
  • Duplessis
    • Premier of Quebec (36 - 39 & 44 - 59)
    • Quebec - Catholic
  • Decision
    • Justice Rand
    • “To deny or revoke a permit because a citizen exercises an unchallengeable right totally irrelevant to the sale of liquor in a restaurant is… beyond the scope of the discretion conferred… what could be more malicious than to punish this licencee for having done what he had an absolute right to do in a matter utterly irrelevant to the Liquor Act?”
  • Could Duplessis pass a law that took Roncarelli’s liquor license forever?
    • Of course
24
Q

Are laws equal?

A
  • “do not and cannot affect everyone equally
  • clear distinction between being equal before the law as is demanded by the concept of the ‘rule of law’, and having a law affect everyone equally” Jeremy Waldron
  • Everyone is treated equal in the face of the law