Social Organization, Legitimacy, and the Modern State
The Social State of Law
Included in their fundamental rights are individual freedoms and social equality, giving the state an increasingly active role for two reasons:
- Because of the demands of social justice, to make opportunities real and equal.
- For their own economic problems, because the economy needs state coordination to ensure efficiency and avoid crisis.
When a state has taken the shape of a social welfare state, it tries to ensure the satisfaction of certain basic needs. This new conception of the state attempts to protect the human rights of the second generation. The basic rights of the first generation are items 1 to 20 of the declaration of 1948 and include civil and political rights. The second-generation rights are social rights enshrined in Articles 21 to 27, dealing with the right to work, housing, and education. The third-generation rights are those that are not covered by any statement and deal with justice among nations, peace, and ecological issues.
The Social and Democratic State of Law
The Spanish Constitution of 1978, Article 1, states that Spain is a social and democratic state of law that holds as superior values of its legal freedom, justice, equality, and political pluralism. This is intended to combine three objectives:
- A social state that recognizes equality and deals with the economic, social, and cultural rights of the population.
- A democratic state where sovereignty is expressed through popular elections.
- The rule of law where the state and people submit to the constitution, respecting the fundamental legal safeguards, and where the balance of the three branches is achieved.
Some authors say it is not possible to maintain the three dimensions because only advancing in one would leave the other two behind. Others say that it is possible because the three aim to delve into three aspects: the law, democracy, and social protection.
Origin and Legitimacy Combinations
- Origin and Positive Legitimacy: An institution with a source we consider good and also consider legitimate, e.g., family, art, trade.
- Origin and Negative Legitimacy: An institution born in abuse that is not legitimate, e.g., Mafia, slavery.
- Legitimate Negative and Positive Origin: When it has a historical origin full of violent abuse, and yet there is reason to believe it is a legitimate institution.
- Origin Positive, Negative Legitimacy: When an institution has an ethically impeccable origin, however, this source is not guaranteed to be legitimate.
Different Forms of Social Organization
Every society implies a form of organization, a set of rules of conduct that dictate how relations between its members should be.
- Tribal: Small communities, family ties, with a subsistence economy.
- Slaver: A community larger than the tribal economy in which production depends on slaves.
- Feudal: Revolves around the feudal warlord and rural political economy, based on bonds of vassalage.
- Modern: Emerging after the Renaissance with the great development of trade and industry, the state is the core of political organization.
The Modern State and its Characteristics
The modern state wants to monopolize coercive power in its territory. We can define the state, according to Max Weber, as an association of institutional type in a given territory trying to monopolize legitimate violence as an instrument of control.
Features: It is an impersonal and sovereign political institution with jurisdiction over its territory, with the capacity to enact laws to regulate public taxes and rights. It has a unitary structure of power that remains through the change of rulers and provides power through officials.
Rules, Regulations, and Their Classes
Various types of standards guide human behavior in society:
- Universal Moral Standards: Indicate a person is obliged in conscience. When our behavior does not adhere to these rules, we consider it immoral.
- Legal Standards: Established by the authorities in every political community, they are addressed to its inhabitants. The area of law is not fulfilled when it says that our conduct has been illegal.
- Social Customs: Without rank or mandatory standard, when not met, society may qualify us as rude.