State, Legitimation and "Civil Society"

In: Telos, Heft 86, S. 143-152

Abstract

The text of a lecture delivered on 27 June 1990 at Humboldt U, East Berlin, Germany, examines the concepts of "civil society" & "state" in light of contemporary developments in Eastern Europe. Drawing on insights from Max Weber, it is shown that the primary formal characteristic of the state is its possession of an administrative & legal order subject to change by legislation. The way in which the state derives authority & legitimation from its bureaucratic/administrative apparatus is discussed to show that the communist one-party system failed largely because it lacked the legitimation & authority characteristic of fully developed modern states.