Legitimacy requires a visible link between votes and policy, not just good results

Evidence

In order to legitimize the government, the political system must do more than merely produce satisfactory results. For unless the democratic vote is connected in recognizable ways with what voters actually ‘receive’, political rule becomes an autonomous paternalistic regime. In other words, once the function of the political public sphere decays, the state loses its democratic substance, even if the ‘rule of law’ remains unaffected and the government more or less satisfies its voters. This latent danger can only be averted in the large-scale polities of the modern era insofar as the media infrastructure of the public sphere enables halfway deliberative opinion and will formation by the population itself. The independent media must generate sufficient power of articulation to maintain the connection of political power back to the communicative power generated by the citizens, the only ‘power’ that ‘proceeds’ from the people. — Jürgen Habermas, A New Structural Transformation of the…, 98

Categorization

• XREF: This is the connective membrane between this 2022 essay and the 1962 ‘Structural Transformation’ thesis on the public sphere’s function. — connects to: Legitimacy arises from inclusion plus deliberation filtered through reasons — Jürgen Habermas, A New Structural Transformation of the…, 16; Democratic elections legitimize only as outcomes of prior public deliberation, not preference aggregation — Jürgen Habermas, A New Structural Transformation of the…, 94; Political legitimacy is an ongoing project of constructing and repairing trust (+8 more)
• ADDENDUM: Directly relevant to the public-sphere-as-infrastructure theme; media infrastructure as the load-bearing channel of legitimacy echoes ‘Grafting and Growth’ on infrastructure.

Related

• Political parties are necessary but not sufficient for durable legitimacy. (similarity 0.83)
• Legitimacy arises from inclusion plus deliberation filtered through reasons (similarity 0.82)
• Deliberative politics is constitutive of democracy, not a regulative ideal (similarity 0.81)
• Power-legitimation must come from within democracy itself once unifying worldviews fade (similarity 0.81)
• Democratic elections legitimize only as outcomes of prior public deliberation, not preference aggregation (similarity 0.81)
• Deliberative legitimacy requires considerations neutral across interest groups (similarity 0.81)
• Political power matters mainly for what it produces in policy outcomes (similarity 0.80)
• Voting does not constitute a mandate of trust in representatives (similarity 0.78)
• Legitimacy, built through contestatory democracy, generates civic virtue. (similarity 0.78)

Broader Connections

• Voting does not constitute a mandate of trust in representatives #corroborates (0.80) — Niklas Luhmann, Trust and Power, 222
• Political legitimacy is an ongoing project of constructing and repairing trust #expands (0.75)
• Legitimacy can be derived from constitutional practices rather than from justifications. #complicates (0.75) — Philip Chase Bobbitt, Reflections Inspired by My Critics, 15
• Administrative autonomy and rule-following boost state legitimacy and stability #complicates (0.75) — Abdi Ismail Samatar, Africa’s First Democrats, 111
• Political parties are necessary but not sufficient for durable legitimacy. #expands (0.70) — Diego Gambetta, Trust - Making and Breaking Cooperative…, 1256