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Power

In: Social Issues

Submitted By aamir123
Words 256
Pages 2
Legitimacy and Authority in International Politics
Ian Hurd
What motivates states to follow international norms, rules, and commitments? All social systems must confrontwhat we might call the problem of social control—that is, how to get actors to comply with society’s rules—but the problem is particularly acute for international relations, because the international social system does not possess an overarching center of political power to enforce rules. Yet, taken in bal- ance with other values, a measure of order is a valued good. Some take this absence of centralizedpower tomean thattheinternationalsystemis likea Hobbesianstateof nature,where onlymaterialpowermatters;otherssee it as evidencethatinternational rules haveforce onlywhen theyare in theself-interestof each state.I show thatthese two conclusionsare prematurebecauseof theirshallowreadingof internationalsoci- ety and misinterpretationof the ways in which authorityworks in domesticsociety.
Consider three generic reasons why an actor might obey a rule: (1) because the actor fears the punishmentof rule enforcers, (2) because the actor sees the rule as in its own self-interest,and (3) becausetheactorfeels therule is legitimateand oughtto be obeyed. The trait distinguishingthe superior from the subordinate is different in each case. In the￿rst, it is asymmetry of physicalcapacity;in thesecond,a particular distributionof incentives;and in the third, a normative structure of status and legiti- macy.In otherwords, the currency ofpower is not thesame for allrelations.Political theorists traditionallyisolate three ideal-typemechanisms of social control that cor- respond to the three currencies of power, which I call coercion, self-interest, and legitimacy. 1 Thesedevicesrecurincombinationacrossall socialsystems where rules exist to in￿uence behavior,ranging from the governingof children in the classroom,

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