Legitimation Research Papers - Academia.edu (original) (raw)

Монографія. — Дніпропетровськ : Інновація, 2012. — 132 с. — ISBN 978-966-8676-58-1.
У монографії з’ясовуються політико-владні практики правлячих суб’єктів в Україні, аналізуються їх позиції та внесок щодо політичної модернізації, визначаються способи та стратегії забезпечення легітимності влади. Обґрунтовано доводиться, що основні проблеми легітимації та модернізації політичної влади в сучасній Україні полягають, з одного боку, у надзвичайній слабкості суспільної солідарності та відсутності привабливої пропозиції моделі спільного майбутнього, а з іншого – у недооцінці теоретичного та практичного досвіду Заходу в досягненні збалансованої політичної системи, що є динамічним механізмом досягнення консенсусу.
Монографія розрахована на науковців, викладачів, аспірантів, студентів, державних службовців, політиків – усіх, хто цікавиться проблемами легітимації та модернізації політико-владних відносин у сучасній Україні.

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- Ukraine, Legitimation

Drawing from scholarship on authoritarian adaptation and insight from legitimacy theory, we seek to examine to what degree the renewal of authoritarianism under ‘Abd al-Fattah al-Sisi in post-revolutionary Egypt can be understood as the establishment of a new political order with its own patterns of legitimation. The main focus of the discussion is al-Sisi's adaptation of legitimization strategies designed to justify his rule and ensure stability under severe repression and economic reforms. We discuss al-Sisi
claims of personal legitimacy as a substitute for institutional legitimacy, his missionary role as a substitute for ideology, and his reshaped eudaemonic legitimacy. All these legitimation strategies are formulated while rejecting the 2011 revolutionary legitimation and its promises for democracy. Such analysis, which goes beyond coercion or institutional explanations for authoritarian adaptation, scrutinizes the conceptual
reconstruction of authoritarianism as a tool to ensure the consent of the citizens and their legitimacy to the renewal of authoritarianism.

- by Limor Lavie
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- Egypt, Authoritarianism, Legitimation, Arab Spring (Arab Revolts)

Conclusion générale d’un ouvrage collectif, ce chapitre fait la synthèse des enjeux et des problèmes soulevés par la notion de charisme en sciences sociales. Il revient à la fois sur les difficultés de la conceptualisation du charisme chez Weber lui-même et sur les usages extensifs qui ont pu être faits par la suite de cette notion, au point de la banaliser. Le charisme apparaît en définitive comme un concept provisoire dont l’ « utilité scientifique marginale » est aujourd’hui négative ; qui illustre les risques plus généraux pesant sur la méthode idéaltypique ; et qu’il faut donc oser abandonner au profit de concepts plus relationnels, comme « capital symbolique » et « saillance situationnelle ».

- by Francisco Roa Bastos
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- Sociology, Political Sociology, Legitimacy and Authority, Social Sciences

This paper explores the process of legitimation involved in the struggle for secession in Telangana, India. It argues that this was focussed on the securing of justice in a) gaining access to resources (the legitimation of risk) and b) the exercise of political power (the legitimation of democracy). The plight of Telangana demonstrates the historical and contextual nature of legitimacy. The paper asserts that the ongoing struggle to legitimate risk and democracy will be constitutive of the norms and values of the new state, influencing the way in which exposure to risk is differentiated, and democratic legitimacy defined. It suggests that, although contextualized, local struggles to legitimate risk and democracy represent a microcosm of a wider global legitimation process which is constitutive of world society and the search for justice in a world at risk.

- by Elaine L Desmond
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- Sociology, Political Sociology, Geography, Anthropology

This paper tries to examine the relationship between Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) and some Corporate Financial Performance (CFP). CSR is measured by an index of corporate social responsibility disclosure while ROA, ROS and ROE are used to measure CFP. The CSR disclosure index gives information about the engagement of firm in corporate, CSR, and staff strategy, social, community, and political investment, environment, consumer, and supplier awareness, voluntary reports and certifications. We test our hypothesis on a sample of Italian listed firms, specifically, our sample is composed by companies listed on the STAR market and a sample of control, composed by the 20 listed companies with the higher capitalization. Therefore, our sample is compodes by 84 corporations. We have hand-collected the data from the annual report and any other available document present in the institutional website of each corporation, for the 2012-2013 financial year. We use the Tobit Regression Model, whose analyses were performed using the statistical software SPSS© and Gretl©. The result of this study indicates that we cannot state that there is a positive relationship between CSR and CFP.

- by Miriam Petracca
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- Legitimacy, New Institutionalism, Legitimation, Financial Performance

In this paper, I intend to focus on the prolific use of the rosette at Persepolis, and analyse such usage in association with the relief scenes which the motif overwhelmingly borders. In particular, I will examine the relief scenes featuring lion/bull combat, tribute or processional scenes, and also scenes of enthronement, analysing the rosette motif within such depictions, and raising questions as to whether the motif in these particular scenes held the same semiotic value as it did in similar scenes in the wider Near East. Through such analysis I will, thus, raise the question of the ‘message’ being communicated to those who viewed these reliefs. Overall, I will argue that the rosette motif acted as a means of enhancing the legitimacy of Darius’ reign and, through such argument, I aim to offer a new interpretation for the prolific use of the rosette motif on the relief scenes at Persepolis.

- by Cheryl Hart
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- Semiotics, Nonverbal Communication, Persepolis, Legitimation
- by Jared Hansen
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- Management, Marketing, Business Administration, Sociology

This article provides a framework for understanding social and cultural inequalities in education in the context of cultural processes and epistemic injustice. Insight into the cultural processes and the concept of epistemic injustice direct us to the conceptualization of agency of the actors within the educational domain and the institutionalized relations of domination and recognition. The article employs two cultural processes: identification (stigmatization and racialization) and rationalization (standardization and evaluation) and two epistemic injustice models: testimonial and hermeneutical injustice to understand the production of inequalities and relations of domination in a school setting (Lamont, Beljean and Clair, 2014; Fricker, 2017). This goal is animated by this research question: "How to understand the production of inequalities in a school setting through cultural processes and epistemic injustice?" Taking into account cultural processes and epistemic injustice, this article argues that the literature on education should include diverse epistemic approaches to problematize the ways of the transmission of structural inequalities in society to education and how these inequality forms are complementary to current practices. This article indicates that cultural processes and epistemic injustice forms should be taken into consideration in understanding the production and maintenance of inequalities in education.

- by Duygun Göktürk
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- Stigmatization, Evaluation, Categorization, Racialization

Desde que comenzó el boom de las series de televisión, los esfuerzos intelectuales de algunos críticos y especialistas se han centrado en legitimar unos contenidos visuales que emitidos en por un medio tan denostado culturalmente como es la televisión. Como ha explicado el filósofo José Luis Pardo, este proceso siempre ocurre cuando productos de la cultura popular superan el espacio que socialmente han tenido asignado. Las series de televisión han sido objeto de dos procesos sancionadores que buscaban ennoblecerlas. Por un lado, se les otorgó legitimidad estética aplicando cánones de la alta cultura. Así las series empezaron a compararse con la literatura, la novela por entregas o el arte. Por el otro, legitimidad moral considerando muchas obras como de protesta social, denuncia o testimonio. Javier Marías, Marta Sanz o Vicente Luis Mora han criticado este alto estatus cultural que han adquirido como consecuencia de su popularidad. Este último, por ejemplo, ha puesto en duda que las series televisión pudiesen ser consideradas como arte porque no favorecen una experiencia estética profunda sino una especie de sucedáneo, un ersatz que requiere poco esfuerzo intelectual. Aunque era necesario pinchar la burbuja cultural de las series, la crítica a su posible condición artística ha pecado de esencialista en su intento de separar o diferenciar lo que es el arte de lo que pertenece al ámbito de la cultura y el entretenimiento.

- by Plataforma Revistas Comunicación and +1
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- Art, Television Studies, Visual Culture, Mass Art

Проблема истории властных отношений и институтов является сегодня одной из наиболее актуальных для целого ряда научных дисциплин: антропологии, истории, политологии, культурологии, философии. Особое значение данная проблематика имеет для все более активно развивающихся ныне междисциплинарных исследований в области общественных наук. Целью авторов коллективной монографии является изучение на материалах большого количества конкретных обществ древности, средних веков и раннего нового времени, комплекса явлений, обусловленных тем фундаментальным, но зачастую не понимаемым и игнорируемым фактом, что политическая культура, политическая организация являются частью, проявлением и отражением типа культуры, присущего данной цивилизации в целом. Этот цивилизационный тип культуры, разнящийся в разных цивилизациях, и определяет многообразие, вариативность темпов, форм, направлений, пределов социокультурной эволюции, в том числе форм и объема сакрализации власти и ее носителей. Книга рассчитана на ученых (антропологов, историков, политологов, философов, культурологов,), преподавателей и учащихся вузов, а также на широкий круг любителей истории и культуры.

- by Dmitri Bondarenko and +1
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- Religion, Buddhism, Ancient History, Anthropology

Based on policy change literature and in an improved version of D. Beetham's (1991) model for legitimacy (Alagappa, 1994), I propose here an approach for the study of policy stability & change (called legitimation & policy dynamics). Oriented to explain policy change in political systems defined by its institutional fragility and persistent legitimacy deficits, LPD is an actor-centered perspective, in which legitimation of power through policy is assumed as an unavoidable task, and conforms as a causal-driver useful in explaining policy stability and change. LPD assumes that policy change can take two forms: as a reactive way or as a proactive logic. In both of these forms the actors of the dominant coalition will seek to maintain an active presence (and increase own’s influence and control capabilities if possible) over policy and its change processes. Institutionally conditioned, these actors may assume four differentiated operational positions (shock response, strategic improvement-based, thermostatic and change-contention) and in doing so they also configure narratives and send clear messages that influence all actor expectations during change process. The “legitimacy pattern” associated with a given policy design favors periods of stability based on perpetuation, the logic of adaptation and incremental changes or planned and long-time based processes of policy change. Focusing events, external shocks, innovation and diffusion processes, or endogenous dynamics are all forces that influence the policy subsystem and may lead to distortions (based on unconformity with rules, discrepancy with shared beliefs, withdrawal of consent or an inadequate policy performance) in the legitimacy pattern. Those distortions may force changes in the dominant coalition and in public policy, but it is only with a transformation of the legitimacy pattern when a major policy change occurs. Preliminary hypotheses are here proposed.

- by Cesar Nicandro Cruz-Rubio
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- Policy Process, Policy Change, Legitimation

Using a mixed-methods approach, I aspire to trace the legitimation process of reggaeton. In this research, I examine market information regimes to understand the trajectory of reggaeton from 2005 to 2019. Billboard music charts, and press coverage suggest reggaeton did not follow an exponential upward trend. Data sources indicate high numbers between 2005 and 2008, before dropping, and remaining low until 2014. Following this descent, reggaeton’s presence in the USA mainstream music market has not stopped ascending until the end of 2019, indicating an unprecedentedly high level of legitimacy and popularity. In the qualitative analysis I investigate discourses of the reggaeton scene in relation to the Latin Grammy Awards. As suggested in the literature, reward systems are important indicators of legitimation. However, reggaeton has been nearly absent in the major categories of the Latin Grammys, since their inception in 2000. I examine the longstanding relationship between the Latin Academy and reggaeton, by focusing on the claims made by the reggaeton industry for the 20th Annual Latin Grammy Awards, on November 2019. Results suggest that 1) class-based discrimination is a main factor in the Latin Academy’s lack of recognition of reggaeton as an art form, 2) two levels of racism are at play in the social perception of reggaeton, namely within the Latinx community, and from the outside, 3) the reggaeton industry is challenging the relevance, influence and authority of the Latin Grammys, and questions are raised towards its structure and ability to vote.

- by Mateo Echeverria
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- Discourse Analysis, Sociology, Cultural Studies, Music
- by Jasper Doomen
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- Law, Criminal Law, Jurisprudence, Constitutional Law
- by Alberto Cadili
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- Religion, History, Diplomatic History, Legitimacy and Authority
- by Christian Garland
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- Critical Theory, Sociology, Collective Behavior, Political Sociology

Why and how do nations turn to religion to justify claims for statehood? This article addresses this question in both theory and practice, showing that religion plays multiple legitimating roles that shift dynamically according to the success they yield for national movements. I posit four legitimating models: (1) nationalism instead of religion (“secular nationalism”), (2) nationalism as a religion (“civil religion”), (3) religion as a resource for nationalism (“auxiliary religion”), and (4) religion as a source of nationalism (“chosen people”). Empirically, I analyze the roles of religion in Zionist efforts to legitimate a Jewish state in Palestine. I argue that Zionism has responded to persistent delegitimation by expanding the role of religion in its political legitimation. The right of self-determination, which stands at the core of the “secular Zionism” legitimation, has given way to leveraging Judaism, which in turn has been eclipsed by constructing a Zionist civil religion and a “chosen people” justification.

- by Uriel Abulof
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- Religion, Legitimacy and Authority, Religion and Politics, Nationalism

This article provides a systematic analysis of the Disney Renaissance films’ narrative tropes as a way to discern the particular social world they collectively depict and promote. Taking these popular cinematic productions as expressions of their authors’ and artistic creators’ world views, it argues that they all effectively legitimize a particular American ethos conventionally and frequently equated with the ‘happy ever after’ life ideal of the United States’ white, Christian middle and upper classes of the post-World War II era. Ultimately, based on the textual analysis of these films, the article urges us to consider the cultural and social implications of these narratives, particularly in light of their global distribution and the narrow world view they promote and legitimize.

- by Massimo A Rondolino and +1
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- Popular Culture, Walt Disney Company, Legitimation

- by Miriam Petracca and +2
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- Corporate Social Responsibility, New Institutionalism, Legitimation, Corporate Financial Performance

Автор исходит из постулата, что принцип организации общества — преимущественно родственный или территориальный — как критерий различения государственных и негосударственных социумов весьма значим, но изучив современное состояние проблемы, пришел к заключению, что проблема родства и территории — это вопрос меры, соотношения между ними, а не наличия или отсутствия, хотя общей социоисторической тенденцией действительно является постепенное вытеснение родственных институтов территориальными на надлокальных уровнях социокультурной и политической сложности. В то же время нет никаких оснований искать в истории того или иного общества момент некого скачка — от полного доминирования родства к абсолютному господству территориальных связей. Напротив, история представляет собой континуум социально-политических форм, в типологической последовательности которых, можно обнаружить общую динамику от большей к меньшей значимости родственных связей по сравнению с территориальными. Немаловажным уточнением является то, что, с одной стороны, в основе государства не могут не лежать преимущественно территориальные связи, но, с другой стороны, это вовсе не значит, что никогда не существовало основанных на них же сложных негосударственных обществ.

- by Dmitri Bondarenko
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- Social Theory, Anthropology, Community History, Legitimacy and Authority

Azerbaijan presents itself as a country fitting in with Western values while simultaneously adhering to Islam and associated traditional values, while also sharing some identity features with Russia and Turkey. This article provides a brief, yet critical, analysis of the dynamics of Azerbaijan’s foreign policy and the country’s national identity to make the case for the mutually derivative—and hence contingent—nature of the two.

We integrate a rhetorical perspective with neoinstitutional theory to develop a rhetorical model of institutional decision making. We use this model to describe how the communicative
practices of decision makers both enable and constrain how actors manage the risk and uncertainty of their judgments and decisions within an institutional context. We first develop a dual conception of reason as both communication (public argument) and cognition (private argument). With this dual conception of reason, we conceptualize actors as active and passive speakers and listeners who interpret, produce, and present public and private arguments to persuade themselves and others to adopt, maintain, or reject practices. Speakers and listeners have cognitive limits and thus create presumptions or shared decision-making rules to help them efficiently produce and process the arguments needed to debate, evaluate, and adjudicate recurring institutional decisions. We suggest that arguments shape actors’ reasoning and judgment because they reflect appeals to pathos (emotion), logos (logic), and ethos (values) that support or
criticize decisions to act. These appeals also shape the nature and construction of presumptions that bind rationality. We describe how these binds on rationality affect the formation of judgments and decisions, as well as the performance evaluation of institutional practices.

- by sandy green
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- Communication, Rhetoric, Institutional Theory, Argumentation
- by Andrey Korotayev and +1
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- Political Sociology, Social Theory, Anthropology, Political Economy

В центре данной работы стоят взаимоотношения власти и народа в их институциональном оформлении, а именно проблематика соотношения власти правителя, действующей общественной нормы и ее носителей. На широком конкретно-историческом материале, включающем традиционные и модернизирующиеся общества, прослеживаются такие аспекты данной проблематики, как характер представлений о непогрешимости или, напротив, несовершенстве правителя и политической системы, возможности правителя по отношению к действующим социальным нормам, возможности критики в адрес правителя и принудительных общественных санкций в его адрес, понятия о легитимности правителя и ее источниках, концепция высших целей существования института верховной власти и др. Используемый конкретно-исторический материал обобщается на основе формализованного выделения ключевых параметров, характеризующих данные феномены с установлением корреляций между ними, что позволяет осуществить типологизацию социумов с точки зрения исследуемой тематики.

- by Dmitri Bondarenko
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- Religion, Anthropology, Historical Anthropology, Ideology (Anthropology)

In the Early Modern period, the Religious dynamics in the Sahara and its shores, from the Maghreb to the Lake Chad, remain largely unexplored. The scarcity of source as well as the fragmentation of this region into various area studies are obstacles to the historical investigations. Yet, information found in local and external textual sources from Borno, in present-day North-East Nigeria, show that Sufi Brotherhoods had such an influence that political actors were led to change their legitimacy discourses in the Early Modern period even before the rise of the Qâdiriyya in the 18th century. This article seeks to show that, in the wake of the politico-religious changes that affected the Mediterranean in the 16th century (namely, the Ottoman advance in North Africa and the rise of political Sufi Brotherhoods), Islamic reconfigurations deeply affected the relations between political powers and societies in Sahara and Sahel.

- by Rémi Dewière
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- Early Modern History, Islamic Studies, Sufism, Sub-Saharan Africa

In this article, I deconstruct the concept of legitimacy (notably in the form elaborated by Max Weber) by emphasising its conceptual complicity with the notion of sovereignty. Through an analysis of Derrida's critique of Austin's theory of performativity, I elaborate another, non-ontological 'concept' of legitimacy, located before and beyond sociological methodology, International Relations theory, and performative ontologies of power. This legitimation-to-come signifies the structural fallibility and pervertibility of the performative, and instantiates the archi-originary force of an unconditional resistance, conditioning both the position and the deconstruction of ontologies of sovereign ipseity (ipsocracy). Pursuing the efforts of Cynthia Weber and Rob Walker, I attempt to sketch the implications of this post-performative legitimacy with respect to the protocols of legitimation of International Relations theory and sociological methodologies, through an analysis of their persistent ontological presuppositions.

- by Thomas Clément MERCIER
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- Critical Theory, Religion, Sociology, Cultural Studies
- by Katja Hericks
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- Gender Studies, Gender Equality, Legitimation, Decoupling

The purpose of the article is to analyze the specific features of an autocratic regime in the modern digital environment, to determine the prospects and risks of its legitimation. The main methods were the comparative political science method and the Case Study. The Swedish model Regimes of the World was chosen as the working one. For a comparative analysis of different types of political regimes (closed, electoral autocracy, electoral and liberal democracy) forty 40 countries were selected. The analysis showed that the introduction of various technologies for digital control over citizens during the COVID-19 pandemic no longer makes it possible to clearly distinguish between autocratic and democratic political regimes. Different modes use in a pandemic a whole range of techniques that control the movement and activity of citizens: control through drones, face recognition, video surveillance, restricting access to information, surveillance through government services, control of Internet communications, control via mobile phones, disconnecting the Internet, etc. The emerging ratchet effect, when political regimes are in no hurry to remove restrictions on control over citizens, makes one think about a serious revision of the theory of democracy and the theory of autocracy.

- by Sergey Fedorchenko
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- Political Regimes, Democracy, Democracy and Good Governance, Legitimation

Este trabalho tem como objeto os denominados influenciadores digitais, que produzem conteúdo e se relacionam com seus públicos por meio de diversas plataformas de mídia social (Youtube, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat). O objetivo é analisar como ocorre a legitimação desses influenciadores nesse ecossistema de mídias sociais digitais, em que as diferentes mídias estão interligadas. Mais especificamente, observa-se como o comunicador Marcos Piangers legitimase nesse ecossistema, por meio da análise de seu canal no Youtube. Os resultados demonstram que a construção dessa legitimação se dá por meio de dois pontos 1) autorreferenciação de si, com estratégias no terreno da linguagem e 2) por meio de capital social, com os valores da popularidade, visibilidade e reputação construídos no decorrer da sua carreira profissional na mídia de massa, e que são potencializados na internet.

We develop a model of rhetorical legitimation that specifies the communicative and
cognitive structure underlying the maintenance and change of institutions. To do so
we draw on Toulmin (1958) and his idea that social actors can use two structurally
distinct forms of rhetoric: intrafield rhetoric and interfield rhetoric. We use this distinction
to develop and advance novel arguments about the role of rhetoric in legitimation
processes. Specifically, we theorize how the use of intrafield and interfield
rhetoric shapes and reflects social actors’ assumptions of legitimacy at two different
levels. We then theorize how the use of intrafield rhetoric relates more to institutional
maintenance, whereas the use of interfield rhetoric relates more to institutional
change.

- by sandy green
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- Rhetoric, Cognition, Institutional Theory, Argumentation

With transition to the state kinship ceases the role of the central organizing principle of society. However, the very social nature of kinship provides the opportunities for manipulating it as ideology in societies of all types. It was typical for early states to represent the state and the sovereign by analogy with the family and its head. Not infrequently the same connotations are exploited for the sake of power’s legitimation in modern states either. However, the ideology of kinship’s exploitation in states should not be confused with the cases of completely another sort. In some societies of the overall complexity level not lower than that of early states (in “alternatives to the state”), one can observe the whole socio-political construction’s encompassment not from above (as it must be in states) but from below – from the local community level, while the community itself is underpinned by kin ties. Here kinship is not only ideology but also the real socio-political background. So, there is no direct conformity between the socio-political (transition to the state) and ideological (departure from the ideology of kinship) processes and this seemingly clear fact should be acknowledged and given due attention by researchers.

- by Dmitri Bondarenko
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- Social Theory, Anthropology, Historical Anthropology, Ideology (Anthropology)

Cette etude s’interroge sur les conditions de possibilites et les modalites d’entrance des auteurs africains dans le champ de la bande dessinee europeenne de langue francaise. La these procede a une approche sociologique en effectuant, en premier lieu, une analyse institutionnelle des conditions de production, de circulation et de reception, ainsi que de la sociabilite dans les contextes locaux, notamment dans les pays de l’Afrique subsaharienne francophone. L’examen des modalites de publication dans l’edition ou dans la presse, des associations d’auteurs, des festivals et d’autres initiatives de promotion, des possibilites offertes par le monde associatif et celui des institutions montre que les auteurs locaux ont a realiser leur vocation artistique et leurs projets professionnels dans des milieux mal organises et peu propices. Cet etat de choses, certes, oblige les agents a mettre en œuvre leur plus ou moins grande habilete a s’y adapter et a le faire jouer a l’avantage de leur pa...

- by Sandra Federici
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- Humanities, Art, Autonomy, Institutions

Standing at the edge of life's abyss, we seek meaningful order. We commonly find this 'symbolic immortality' in religion, civilization, state and nation. What happens, however, when the nation itself appears mortal? The Mortality and Morality of Nations seeks to answer this question, theoretically and empirically. It argues that mortality makes morality, and right makes might; the nation's sense of a looming abyss informs its quest for a higher moral ground, which, if reached, can bolster its vitality. The book investigates nationalism's promise of moral immortality and its limitations via three case studies: French Canadians, Israeli Jews, and Afrikaners. All three have been insecure about the validity of their identity or the viability of their polity, or both. They have sought partial redress in existential self-legitimation: by the nation, of the nation and for the nation's very existence.

- by Uriel Abulof
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- Discourse Analysis, Legitimacy and Authority, Middle East Studies, Québec History

Since Weber formalized the notion of "legitimate domination" in Economy & Society, the concept of legitimacy has been an omnipresent staple of sociology and political science, while its theoretical foundations and ontological status have remained uninterrogated. This article offers a deconstruction, in Derridean terms, of Weber's hermeneutics of domination (Herrschaft) and legitimacy, and argues that this hermeneutics is co-dependent with an essentialization of sovereignty, conceived as it is as the all-powerful presence of a circular performative.
Admittedly, by highlighting the performative dimension of legitimacy claims, Weber has provided powerful methodological tools towards a critique of legitimation as a process of establishing domination. This particular aspect, partly influenced by Marx and Engels' theory of ideology, concerns in priority the legitimacy of State sovereignty, now envisaged as a social construct by definition unnatural. However, as Derrida critically demonstrated in his late writings, traditional theories of performativity can only confirm and repeat (performatively) legitimizing conventions and legitimized power structures. Analogically, and despite its subversive potentialities, Weber's representation of State sovereignty in its legitimate form remains that of a centralised, indivisible and discretionary principle of decision, a monopolistic and powerful arkhē exerting violence within the limits of a clearly delineated territory. As such, the sociological formalization of legitimacy and the conceptuality attached to it cannot be said to constitute a purely descriptive, axiologically neutral theoretical model: the logic of legitimacy already offers a specific orientation and interpretation with epistemic and practical consequences, that is to say that it itself carries a certain legitimacy and performativity (with legitimizing-performative effects). This dimension has been particularly manifest in the methodology and protocols of International Relations as a discipline (notably, but not only, through its "Realist" strand): emphasis on power relations and balance of power, structuring categories of inside/outside, focus on decision-making, etc. Considering the efforts to escape "methodological nationalism" (Beck) and the "territorial trap" (Agnew), and in spite of undeniable progress achieved over the last few decades, it is not certain that International Relations and political science have been able to go beyond a certain metaphysics of presence and a logic of sovereignty, which contaminate all hermeneutics of power and sociologies of domination, even the most "critical" ones.
Nevertheless, Weber's theory of legitimacy also lays the foundations for a potent deconstruction of sovereignty. In inscribing an obligation towards the other at the heart of Kant's law of autonomy, Weber seems to suggest that the logic of legitimacy signifies a form of pre-subjective sociality, and therefore a pre-sovereign violence, figure of différance. As a rule, legitimacy blurs the boundary between autonomy and heteronomy of the subject, thus challenging the idea of sovereign ipseity by invoking an undecidable politicality: at its core, legitimacy must be without origin or arkhē, always-already divided. I argue that this originary sociality, pre-performative in nature, constitutes the specific violence of legitimacy, an arche-originary violence which precedes and conditions all other forms of sovereignty, power or domination. We are thus able to elaborate a new 'concept' of legitimacy: the unconditional call of a legitimacy-to-come, an unrecognizable 'force of legitimacy', the force of law of an arche-originary bound (or gage) exceeding the limits of traditional sovereignty and legitimacy.

- by Thomas Clément MERCIER
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- Critical Theory, Sociology, Political Sociology, Social Theory
- by Francisco Roa Bastos and +1
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- Legitimacy and Authority, Political Legitimacy, Power and Legitimacy, Max Weber (Philosophy)

To gain an in-depth understanding of legitimacy as a general social process, we review contemporary approaches to legitimacy within two areas of sociology: social psychology and organizations. A comparison of these distinct approaches allows us to explain the process, both in implicit and explicit ways at different levels of analysis, through which a social object is construed as legitimate. This comparison also suggests four stages in the process by which new social objects, both individual (worthy/unworthy individuals) and collective (organizational forms), gain legitimation: innovation, local validation, diffusion, and general validation. We then show how legitimation of the status quo---that is, the acceptance of widespread consensual schemas/beliefs in the larger society---often fosters the stability of nonoptimal actions and practices that are created as a result of these new individual and collective social objects. Finally, we discuss how consensual beliefs such as status beliefs and cultural capital fuel the reproduction of inefficiency and inequality in groups and organizations.

- by Timothy J Dowd
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- Social Psychology, Legitimacy and Authority, Legitimacy, Legitimation
- by Rubén Ruiz-Ramas
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- Russian Studies, Post-Soviet Regimes, Russian Politics, Post-Soviet Studies

The ‘European way of life’ (EWOL) has emerged as a new narrative in
the communication of the European Union (EU) after the 2019
European elections. The article analyses the social relevance and
meanings of this legitimizing narrative against the background of
similar past communicative attempts; and compares its framing by
EU institutions with its understanding by citizens. We rely on the
results of a survey exploring the cultural and normative
foundations of the European multi-level governance in eight
countries, (France, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Poland, Romania,
Spain, UK). Our findings are twofold. First, the EWOL narrative does
not differ much of previous narratives; and the popular perceptions
of EWOL are in line with its institutional definition. Second, EWOL
has a low public salience and remains an elusive topic. As a
conclusion, it is unlikely to significantly alter EU legitimization.

- by François Foret
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- Identity (Culture), Culture, Political communication, Populism

This M.A. thesis deals with the subject of international legitimacy which is a topic that has returned to the stage of global politics due to the events of the “Arab Spring”. In this context, the Arab League has been frequently regarded as having assumed a prominent legitimation role, however, there is currently no existing theoretical framework in International Relations that allows for the verification of this hypothesis.
In order to contribute to this discussion, this theoretically-inclined research attempts to find an alternative to the ontological, epistemological and methodological confusion that reigns over the dynamics of legitimacy in IR. For this purpose, we address three “Arab Spring” case studies (Egypt, Bahrain and Libya) in order to analyze how the rhetorical strategies of the Arab League influenced the legitimacy of the actors involved and thus the outcomes of these conflicts. We do this by employing a framework which combines process tracing and methods for discourse analysis, including an innovative “International Legitimacy Index” (ILI) as a measuring tool. Throughout the empirical study we demonstrate how the access to the framing brokers of the ACE legitimation factors (Appropriateness, Consensus and Empathy) reveals itself to be the key to success in legitimation battles. The expected findings could lead to novel implications about the role of regional organizations as legitimation sources as well as well as explain factors that govern conflict resolution in current Middle Eastern and global politics.

This article examines the interaction of legitimation, cooptation, and repression in China’s authoritarian consolidation. It shows that the totalitarian regime under Mao Zedong was characterized by a low degree of performance and cooptation and that it had to rely on extreme repression and ideological indoctrination to stay in power. After the death of Mao Zedong, the character of the regime changed markedly. The new elites made sparing use of repression and indoctrination but did not compensate the abdication of coercive and ideological control with increases in the performance or cooptation of powerful social groups. This induced a power vacuum, in which popular discontent against increasing corruption, rising inequality, and high inflation fermented. The student demonstrations of 1989, which quickly spread to include other population groups, were an expression of this discontent. Learning from this crisis, the communist party leadership subsequently initiated reforms to increase regime performance and co-opted an increasing number of social groups. The use of repression remained a last resort option. The central findings of this contribution are that these measures significantly improved the stability of China’s one-party autocracy.

- by Christian Goebel
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- Authoritarianism, People's Republic of China, Legitimation