The Importance Of Legitimacy In Criminal Justice

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“Legitimacy [of power] is based on three things. First of all, the people. . . have to feel like that have a voice. . . Second, the law has to be predicable. . . And third, the authority has to be fair” (Gladwell 207-208). It is stated in the book, Globalization: Power, Authority, and Legitimacy in Late Modernity that, “Power is the ability of A to get B to do something B would otherwise not do,” so if there is no legitimacy in the government it dose not have power over its people (Rappa 133). In the book David and Goliath, by Malcolm Gladwell, the author talked about how if just one of the three parts of legitimacy is lacking in a government the citizens will disobey (Gladwell 208). He used the state of Belfast to prove his point (222). Belfast’s government focussed on punishment and less on fairness (202). They believed if there was enough punishment the crime would stop, so if there was crime there needed to be more punishment (202). Instead of going down the crime rates skyrocketed (222-223). Lauren M. Ouziel, a writer for The Yale Law Journal writes on the importance of legitimacy in governance, “Procedural legitimacy has tremendous promise for governance in general and criminal justice in particular because it enables governance based on the public’s trust” (Ouziel). Trust is what the government …show more content…

When Aicher refused to join the Nazi Youth, he was arrested for his disobedience, this made him unable to pass his exams (10). Otl Aicher ended up studying with ought the help of college. Another example is when Bruno Wustenberg, the Sofingen parish priest was going to be arrested for speaking poorly of the government (10). Aicher and a friend named Anton protected Wustenberg the day he was supposed to be arrested (10). Otl Aicher’s mistreatment, by the Nazis non-legitimate power, helped Aicher become a better man and grow in

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