PYQ Vault · Paper 1 · Power, Authority & Legitimacy
Do you think that legitimacy acquired by consent or manufactured by indoctrination is an essential element in maintenance of political rule? Justify your answer with relevant examples.
How the answer moves
The flow snapshot — the routes in, the body, the counter-view and the routes out.
Flow snapshot — how the answer moves
Intro routes
R1 Legitimacy = rightfulness → turns naked power into authority → force alone never lasts (Rousseau: obedience must rest on duty, not fear) → stake line: by consent or by manufacture, legitimacy is essential to rule R2 Question pairs two routes — consent vs indoctrination → both aim at one thing, voluntary obedience ~. thesis: legitimacy, however secured, is the essential condition of stable rule
Body flow
Consent-based legitimacy: authority seen as beneficial, obedience voluntary, coercion backgrounded → constitutional democracy, elections, rights, welfare → but legitimacy is often manufactured → Gramsci's hegemony: domination + intellectual & moral leadership — civil society (family, school, church, media) makes ruling worldview common sense → Althusser's ISA mould obedient subjects → Marcuse's consumer culture.. false needs, false consciousness → divine right as older manufactured belief → both routes sustain rule → Arendt: without legitimacy authority falls back on coercion, which cannot last — absence → resistance, protest, governability crisis
Counter-view
Manufactured legitimacy is fragile → Habermas: capitalist economy vs democratic demands → legitimation crisis.. engineered consent cannot mask contradictions for long -. Soviet collapse = manufactured consent cracking
Conclusion routes
R1 Legitimacy essential to maintaining rule → but only genuine, openly reasoned consent makes it durable → indoctrination buys time, not permanence R2 Legitimacy, by consent or by manufacture, is indispensable → naked force without it is short-lived _. lasting rule rests on freely given consent, not engineered belief
Model answer
Handwritten, in the form it would be written in the examination hall.
