Authors: Bobbio, Matteucci, Pasquino
Summary: This 2,600-word entry focuses on the political meaning of the term. It treats the degree of consensus, protest against legitimacy, and the manipulation of consensus. Legitimacy is defined as consensus by a large section of the population that a given regime has the right to govern. As such, legitimacy is an attribute of the State that allows it to rule without recourse to violence. The process of legitimacy does not apply to the State in general, but to its different aspects: the political community (that is, the social-territorial group uniting all the people who take part in the division of political labor); the regime (that is, the institutions regulating the struggle to control the power of the State); and the government (that is, the complex of roles through which the discharge of political power is carried out).
The central part of the entry considers political protest against legitimacy. Protest takes place when the State is perceived, in its structure and aims, to be in contradiction with the prevailing system of beliefs. This negative judgment may become an act (revolt or revolution) that aims at transforming the basic aspects of political life. But it cannot be said that both the democratic State and tyrannical one are legitimate only because there is the prevailing approval of the system. In many cases, consensus can be forced or manipulated by political power. Thus, the end of the entry gives a more precise definition of the term: a state can be considered more or less legitimate according to whether it enjoys consensus that is freely expressed by a community of autonomous and conscious persons.