State Autonomy Theory

Behind every developed country, there are political figures, behind every political figure, there is an individual, an individual who has lived a unique social background, consequently leading to the development of assumptions based off of their personal life experiences. This is quite important because these experiences have affected us, the citizens, in the manner that it has eventually led to how society looks like today. As the diverse mass of individuals we are, it is always up to debate, especially within political figures, how power should be distributed and how different groups are to interact with and control other groups. This, has eventually led to the development of different power theories which include pluralism, state autonomy, …show more content…
G. (2005) “state autonomy theorists assert predominant power is located in [the] government, not in the general citizenry or a dominant social class… [this theory employs] the phrase ‘the state’ rather than “government” to emphasize the government’s independence from the rest of society… due to several factors; (1) its monopoly on the legitimate use of force within the country; (2) its unique role in defending the country from foreign rivals and (3) its regulatory and taxing powers.” With this in mind, the state essentially acts on its own interest when it involves stability and expansion. But, according to Christiansen, et al., (1994) “[there are] three [levels/] degrees of state autonomy: strong, medium and weak… [typically]strong state, societal-state preferences diverge; in the medium state, societal-state preferences initially diverge but become aligned after the state induces a change in societal preferences… in a weak autonomous state the policy preferences of society and the state are …show more content…
M. (2013), “While there are many theories of elite rule, they are [all] in agreement that elite rule is not necessarily oligarchical… but rather a regime sufficiently democratic to prevent elite domination and maintain popular legitimacy…elite democracy is a theory of representative government that seeks to reconcile centralized institutions with democratic principles.” Barker, D. M. (2013) goes on to say that a few key themes in an elite democracy which include, “a view of institutional systems as self regulating. That is… rather than an active citizenry, institutional systems are primarily responsible for providing for their own legitimacy and accountability…[and] free elections serve as meaningful democratic mechanism through which the citizenry can exercise influence over