E1 Legitimacy segments

Topic

There are three stages of legitimacy—the worldview track, which encompasses culture and ideology while leaving echoes in the realms of power and conflict: the traditional-sacred stage, the charismatic stage, and the rational-legal-secular stage. What distinguishes one stage from another is the source of authority invoked when a decision is challenged: tradition and the sacred in the traditional-sacred stage; a leader's charisma in the charismatic stage; and rational-legal-secular rules in the rational-legal-secular stage.

The invoked source of authority is the variable that determines which stage of legitimacy a society occupies: when the response to a challenged decision is "that is how it has always been done," the invoked source of authority is tradition and the sacred; when the response is "because the leader says so," the invoked source of authority is a leader's charisma; and when the response is "because the procedure dictates it," the invoked source of authority consists of rational-legal-secular rules.

A society leaves one stage of legitimacy and enters another only when the invoked source of authority changes in a sustained and widespread manner—and when that new source does not revert within a generation. It is precisely this shift that has been identified as the trigger for a worldview transition; furthermore, the invoked source of authority regarding challenged decisions is the very element tracked by the diagnosis of legitimacy stages and worldview-shift signals to determine which stage a society is in and when it begins to move toward the next one.

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