2. Do you think the United States has a true democracy?
2
3. Who Rules in the United States?
• In the United States, power is shared
between three branches of government
as well as between the federal
government and the many state
governments.
• Other important actors in our political
system are political parties and interest
groups.
4. Who Rules in the United States?
• A political party is an organization that
wants to gain power in a government,
typically by backing a candidate who
shares the same beliefs.
5. Does your personal philosophy
match your party affiliation?
Political Party Quiz/
8. Who Rules in the United States?
• An interest group is an organization that
seeks to gain power in government and
influence policy without its representative
(a lobbyist) seeking election.
15. Types of Legitimate Authority
• A “state,” according to Weber, is a human
community that claims the legitimate use of
physical force in a given territory.
16. Types of Legitimate Authority
• Charismatic authority is based on the
personal appeal of an individual leader.
• Traditional authority is based on appeals to
the past or a long established way of doing
things.
• Legal-rational authority is based on legal,
impersonal rules that have been routinized
and rationalized.
17. Types of Legitimate Authority
Bureaucracy is a legal-rational organization or
mode of administration that governs with
reference to rules and roles and emphasizes
meritocracy.
18. Types of Legitimate Authority
• Authority is the justifiable right to exercise power.
19. Obedience to Authority
• The Milgram Experiment
– tested people to see how far they would
go in obeying an authority figure
– results showed that obedience to
authority is a very powerful form of
social control that can make “ordinary”
people do unspeakable things because
an authority figure told them to do so
21. Authority, Legitimacy, and the State
• Max Weber stated that:
– Power is the ability to carry out one’s will
despite resistance.
– Domination is the probability that a
command will be obeyed by a group of
people.
22. Authority, Legitimacy, and the State
• Coercion is the use of force to get others
to do what you want. Once a person or
institution decides to use physical
coercion, it loses all its legitimate
authority.
23. Authority, Legitimacy, and the State
• Sociologist T. H. Marshall
identified three types of
citizenship rights (rights that one
has as a citizen of a nation):
– civil rights
– political rights
– social rights
24. Authority, Legitimacy, and the State
• Civil rights guarantee personal freedom
without state interference.
• Political rights are rights to participate in
politics, hold office, or vote.
• Social rights guarantee protection by the
state.
Editor's Notes
For a heated discussion about the freedoms and rights of Americans, as well as the flawed system for campaigning and electing officials.
The three branches of government are the executive branch (headed by the president), the legislative branch (including the House of Representatives and the Senate, which together make up Congress), and the judicial branch (including the Supreme Court and lower federal courts). The three branches should use a system of “checks and balances” to keep each other in line. We’ll talk about political parties and interest groups in just a moment.
Many people think that there are two parties in the United States, Democrats and Republicans. Some people might also think of the Green Party, the newly formed Tea Party, or people registered as “Independents.” However, most people would be surprised to know that there are dozens of political parties in the United States. Most of these parties aren’t big enough to support strong candidates for public offices, but from time to time, one of these parties gains momentum and power and can be a force for social change.
Many groups want to have some political control, even though they don’t want to be politicians. For instance, let’s say there is a law that states that each farmer can only have one cow. The farmers don’t like this law and they want to change it, but they don’t want to run for office. So instead, they come together and form an interest group, called Farmers Want More Cows. They hire a lobbyist (a person to represent their interests) to go to Congress and talk to the politicians and try to convince them to change the laws. This sounds like a logical process, but sometimes people get upset because if a group has a lot of money to hire a lobbyist, their concerns might become more important than the concerns of the majority of the constituents (the voters in the area).
Figure 15.1 The Myth of the Vanishing Voter
Figure 15.2 Voter Registration Rates by Social Group, 2006
Figure 15.2 Voter Registration Rates by Social Group, 2006
Figure 15.2 Voter Registration Rates by Social Group, 2006
Figure 15.2 Voter Registration Rates by Social Group, 2006
Figure 15.2 Voter Registration Rates by Social Group, 2006
One of the things that binds the United States together is federal regulations and laws. The government has enacted regulations that allow for the use of military and police forces.
There are different types of legitimate authority. In other words, people can earn authority in different ways. For discussion, ask your students to think of examples. Charismatic authority comes from a person’s charisma, or outstanding personality. Examples could be Jesus Christ or Gandhi. Traditional authority comes from traditions in a society, for instance, having a tribal leader could be a social tradition. Legal-rational authority is based on legal, or regulated power. In the United States, an example would be the president or the police force.
In other words, bureaucracy is based on the idea that people are treated fairly and equally and that everyone has an equal opportunity to succeed or fail, based on the amount of effort they exert.
Having authority in a society helps to enforce the norms of that society. Authority is the justifiable right to exercise power. In other words, authority is power that is vested or backed by a society.
Through his experiment, Milgram realized that people feel strongly compelled to obey a person whom they believe is an authority figure. The “authority figure” doesn’t have to be a police officer or a politician. Milgram found that even a white lab coat conveyed some authority, and people would obey experimenters just because they “look” like they had the authority to conduct the experiment. What Milgram found was that “ordinary people” would administer electric shocks (or at least they thought they were administering shocks) to other people just because they were told to do so, even when told the shocks were strong enough to kill the other person!
Through his experiment, Milgram realized that people feel strongly compelled to obey a person whom they believe is an authority figure. The “authority figure” doesn’t have to be a police officer or a politician. Milgram found that even a white lab coat conveyed some authority, and people would obey experimenters just because they “look” like they had the authority to conduct the experiment. What Milgram found was that “ordinary people” would administer electric shocks (or at least they thought they were administering shocks) to other people just because they were told to do so, even when told the shocks were strong enough to kill the other person!
Weber differentiated between domination by economic power and domination by authority , which is the willing obedience of the ruled to the commands of legitimate authority. Weber defined the state, the ultimate example of domination by authority, as “a human community that (successfully) claims the monopoly of the legitimate use of physical force within a given territory.” (See the key term definition on page 554.)
Coercion is the use of force, as opposed to authority, to get others to do what you want. For example, if you are a police officer and you tell someone to get out of the car, you have controlled that person with your authority. If instead you tell your friend to get out of the car or you will post all of their deep, dark secrets on the Internet, you were still able to control that person, but you did so with coercion rather than authority.
We’ll define each of these types in just a moment.
Civil and political rights are considered to be constitutional rights, yet these rights were not granted to all citizens until recently in American history. For example, African Americans weren’t granted full civil rights until the Civil Rights Act passed in 1964 (and even then full rights were not immediately granted), and women were not granted the right to vote until 1920. Many people argue that here in the United States, some people still are denied civil, political, or social rights.
