Max Weber's Classification of Authority

Two things to fix before the three chapters that follow

Weber is classifying legitimacy, not government. He is not saying there are three kinds of state. He is saying there are three grounds on which a claim to be obeyed is accepted. A single state contains all three at once.

These are ideal types. An ideal type, in Weber's method, is a deliberately purified mental construct: it exaggerates the essential features of a phenomenon so that real cases can be compared against it. No actual regime is a pure type, and pointing out that a real government is a mixture is not an objection to Weber but an application of him. "Ideal" here does not mean desirable. It means conceptual.

The classification at a glance

A worked example

A village faces a dispute about the use of a common pond.

The traditional claim. The head of the oldest family says that the pond has always been used in a certain order and that his family has always settled such matters. He is obeyed by those who accept that this is how it has always been. His authority stops where custom stops: if he ordered the pond filled in, the same villagers would refuse, and the refusal would not feel like disobedience.

The charismatic claim. A young man who led the drought relief two years ago and who is believed to have unusual judgment proposes a completely new arrangement. Those who follow him do so because of him, not because of any office. If the arrangement fails, his authority does not diminish; it disappears.

The legal rational claim. The Gram Panchayat passes a resolution under the powers conferred on it by statute, and the Secretary issues a notice. It binds everybody in the village, including those who dislike it and those who never heard of the head of the oldest family. It binds because a rule says the Panchayat may decide such matters, and it lasts after every present member has gone.

Three claims to command, in one village, on one afternoon. That is why Weber's classification is still taught.

What this classification is NOT

It is not a historical sequence. Weber is not saying that societies pass from traditional to charismatic to legal rational. All three appear in ancient societies and all three appear now.

It is not a ranking. Legal rational authority is not "better"; Weber was, if anything, gloomy about it, because he thought bureaucratic rationality would trap people in what he called an iron cage.

It is not a classification of governments. It classifies grounds of legitimacy, and any government rests on more than one.

It is not a classification of power. Weber is explicit that this is Herrschaft, authority, the chance of finding obedience to a command, which is the narrower concept. Power in his wider sense need not be legitimate at all.

Quick revision

1. Three pure types of legitimate domination: traditional, charismatic, legal rational.
2. Traditional: the sanctity of immemorial custom; the person of the master is obeyed, out of piety, within the circle of the customary.
3. Charismatic: devotion to the sanctity, heroism or exemplary quality of a person; the leader as such is obeyed, out of personal trust, so long as the belief lasts.
4. Legal rational: belief in the legality of enacted rules; the impersonal order and the office are obeyed, by virtue of formal legality, within the scope conferred.
5. They are ideal types: purified constructs for comparison, not descriptions of real regimes, and "ideal" does not mean desirable.
6. Every real state contains all three at once.

Test yourself

1. State Weber's three types of legitimate authority. Traditional authority, resting on the everyday belief in the sanctity of traditions valid from time immemorial and in the legitimacy of those whom those traditions call to authority. Charismatic authority, resting on extraordinary devotion to the sanctity, heroism or exemplary character of a person and of the order that person reveals or creates. And legal or rational authority, resting on belief in the legality of enacted rules and in the right to command of those raised to office under them.

2. In each type, what exactly is being obeyed? Under legal authority, the legally established impersonal order and the superior determined by it, by virtue of the formal legality of the direction and only within its scope. Under traditional authority, the person of the master who is called by tradition and is himself bound by it, out of reverence, and only within the circle of what is customary. Under charismatic authority, the charismatically qualified leader as such, out of personal trust in revelation, heroism or exemplary quality, and only so long as the belief in that charisma holds.

3. What is an ideal type, and why does it matter here? A deliberately purified mental construct that exaggerates the essential features of a phenomenon so that real cases can be measured against it. It matters because Weber's three types are ideal types, so no actual regime is any of them in pure form, and observing that a real government mixes all three is not a criticism of the classification but the intended use of it. "Ideal" here means conceptual, not desirable.

4. Is Weber's classification a historical sequence? Give reasons. No. All three types are found in ancient and in modern societies, and a modern legal rational state contains traditional elements, such as ceremonial monarchy or customary practices, and charismatic ones, such as a leader followed for personal qualities rather than for the office held. Weber is classifying the grounds on which claims to obedience are accepted, and those grounds coexist rather than succeed one another.

5. Distinguish what Weber classifies here from power in his wider sense. Here he classifies Herrschaft, authority or domination, which he defines as the chance of finding obedience to a command of a given content among specifiable persons, and the classification is of the grounds on which such obedience is thought legitimate. Power, Macht, is the wider concept: every chance of carrying through one's own will within a social relationship even against resistance, whatever it rests on. Power need not be legitimate at all, and this classification has nothing to say about it.