Chapter 2: States

Max Weber

________ provided one of the most famous early attempts at defining what a state truly was when he claimed it had a "monopoly on the legitimate use of physical force, "often abbreviated as a "monopoly on violence ..

Supranational organizations

________ make policies that limit the sovereign policymaking power of their member states.

Sovereignty

________ requires power, which can be manifested as the threat of physical force, or through many lesser forms.

federal state

In a(n) ________, there is an official legal constitutional division of powers between the central government and the regional governments, in which certain powers belong to each.

Unitary states

________ centralize power at one level of government.

European Union

Elections are held in each member state to send representatives to the European parliament, which has power over certain policy areas that the member states have agreed to give the ________.

Traditional legitimacy

________ exists when the legitimate political rulers acquired their status and power through old traditions that are simply being maintained for consistency and predictability in the present.

Supranational organizations

________, which are governing bodies that allow many sovereign states to send representatives to make collective decisions for the group.

Federal states

________ divide power between the central level and regional levels of government.

Regime change can occur through reform

important but gradual changes to the political rules that do not fundamentally alter the political system

States

are what people often refer to as “countries” or “nations,” though those are not the appropriate academic terms. 

Max Weber

provided one of the most famous early attempts at defining what a state truly was when he claimed it had a “monopoly on the legitimate use of physical force,” often abbreviated as a “**monopoly on violence**.”

Sovereignty

requires power, which can be manifested as the threat of physical force, or through many lesser forms.

**Strong states**

meaning the state has the ability to enact a policy and see through its execution and enforcement.

**weak state**

by contrast, would not necessarily have the capacity to carry out even a program as popular as guaranteed health care for all.

**Failed states**

which are unable to provide even basic law and order to their people.

**Autonomy**

the ability to enact and carry out a policy without the support of the public.

**Legitimacy**

which means that the people accept the right of the state to rule over them.

**Traditional legitimacy**

exists when the legitimate political rulers acquired their status and power through old traditions that are simply being maintained for consistency and predictability in the present.

**Charismatic legitimacy**

also sometimes referred to as a **personality cult**, exists when a single individual so captures the loyalty and attention of the people that the individual leader alone now serves as the basis of the legitimacy of the state.

**Rational-legal legitimacy**

exists in a state where formal understood legal practices and rules of the political game determine who wields political power and when.

**State institutions**

which is a very broad term for all of the various actors that carry out the policymaking and policy implementation functions of the state.

**Linkage institutions**

which connect the people of the country to the formal policy making process; these include political parties, interest groups, the media, and many others.

**Nations**

are groups of people that are bonded together by a shared sense of a sovereign political destiny, most commonly the desire to gain or maintain sovereign self-government.

**stateless nations**

because they are poorly integrated into the political system of the state they reside in, and their desire to separate and form their own nation-state is currently unrealized. 

Regimes

determine how individuals and groups acquire and exercise political power.

**constitution**

which acts as the supreme and fundamental basis for determining how the political process occurs.

**reform**

important but gradual changes to the political rules that do not fundamentally alter the political system.

**Revolution**

which is a sudden and radical change in the structures and systems that completely transforms the political regime.

**coup d’état**

in which the military of the state acts internally to displace those currently in power and seize power for itself.

**Government**

refers to those individuals currently exercising political power from official positions of authority. 

**Unitary states**

concentrate all, or almost all, power at the central, national level. 

**Devolution**

in which the central government willingly cedes certain key powers to regional governments in order to achieve a policy objective.

***Federal states***

divide power between the central level and regional levels of government.

**Supranational organizations**

which are governing bodies that allow many sovereign states to send representatives to make collective decisions for the group.

**European Union**

is one such supranational organization.