Sunday, February 8, 2009

Are domestic policy and politics anarchy?

Domestic politics and policy are not in a state of anarchy except in a few regions of a few countries.  It is a tenet of the study of international relations that the international community is in a state of anarchy, but that is not true of the domestic sphere.


Anarchy can be defined as a situation in which there is no recognized authority that has the right to rule.  This is true of international relations.  On the international level, there really is no government that has the right to coerce states.  The United Nations can be seen as an international authority of sorts, but it does not have the power to coerce states into doing anything unless they consent to give it that power through treaties.


By contrast, there is duly constituted authority in domestic politics.  Every country has a government that is, at least nominally, given a monopoly on the use of violence in the country.  The government has the right to coerce people into acting in certain ways.  There are places where the government is too weak to exercise this authority (for example, in much of Afghanistan), but these examples are the exception rather than the norm. 


In general, it is not correct to say that there is anarchy in domestic politics and policy.

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