Formal democracies lack an adequate model of how power flows between institutions.
Evidence
What surely is most needed in order to make men clear-sighted in confronting the official abuse of power, is that they should preserve the sense that the certification of something as legally valid is not conclusive of the question of obedience, and that, however great the aura of majesty or authority which the official system may have, its demands must in the end be submitted to a moral scrutiny. — HLA Hart, The Concept of Law (Clarendon Law…, 502 (
#expands, via linked claim)
Categorization
- XREF: connects to: Narrow concepts of legal validity fail to prevent official abuse of power — HLA Hart, The Concept of Law (Clarendon Law…, 502; Institutional power persists even in egalitarian settings that believe they disavowed it
Related
Broader Connections
- Institutional power persists even in egalitarian settings that believe they disavowed it
#corroborates(0.55) - Narrow concepts of legal validity fail to prevent official abuse of power
#expands(0.50) — HLA Hart, The Concept of Law (Clarendon Law…, 502