The monopoly on violence (German: Gewaltmonopol des Staates) is the definition of the state expounded by Max Weber in Politics as a Vocation, which has been predominant in philosophy of law and political philosophy in the twentieth century.
It defined a single entity, the state, exercising authority or violence over a given territory, as territory was also deemed by Weber to be a characteristic of state. Importantly, such a monopoly must occur via a process of legitimation, wherein a claim is laid to legitimise the state's use of violence.
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Max Weber's theory
Max Weber said in Politics as a Vocation that a necessary condition for an entity to be a state is that it retains such a monopoly. His definition was that something is "a 'state' if and insofar as its administrative staff successfully upholds a claim on the monopoly of the legitimate use of violence in the enforcement of its order."[1]
According to Weber, the state was to be the source of legitimacy for any use of violence: if the police and the military were its main instruments, this did not mean only public force could be used. Private forces (as in private security) could be used, but their legitimacy derived from the state.
There are several caveats which apply to this basic principle:
- Weber intended his statement as an observation, stating that it has not always been the case that the connection between the state and the use of violence has been so close. He uses the example of feudalism (where private warfare was permitted under certain conditions) and of the Catholic (and Anglican) Church courts, which had sole jurisdiction over some types of offenses, especially heresy (from the religion in question) and sexual offenses (thus the nickname "bawdy courts").
- The actual application of violence is delegated or permitted by the state. Weber's theory is not taken to mean that only the government uses violence, but that the individuals and organizations which can legitimise violence or adjudicate on its legitimacy are precisely those authorized to do so by the state. So, for example, the law might permit individuals to use violence in defense of self or property - in this case, the ability to use force has been granted by the state, and only by the state.
- The word "legitimate" is subject to controversy. To some, it has normative meaning, i.e. that the state should monopolize violence. To others, it has positive connotations, i.e. people accept the "legitimacy" of the state monopoly. However, Weber's conceptualization opposed both: he claimed neither that the people "accepted" the legitimacy, nor that the state should monopolize the legitimate use of violence, but simply defined the state as such. Suspending any moral judgment when doing sociological observations, an imperative of neutral axiology exposed in Science as a Vocation, leads to the conclusion that Weber did not consider this monopoly good or bad, but only considered it a realist description of the state and of its formation (which was not uncommon in German circles at the time — a close definition was provided by Rudolf von Jhering in Zweck im Recht, as did Rudolph Somh in 1911 or Georg Jellinek[2]).
See also
- Anarchism
- Failed state
- Warlord
- Sovereign state
- Libertarianism
- State inside a state
- Franz Oppenheimer's "conquest theory" of the state and Albert Jay Nock on the state as that which "claims and exercises the monopoly of crime"
- Means of protection
- Violent non-state actor
References
External links
- Politics as a Vocation (translation)
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