Abstract:

Weber’s analysis of domination or political legitimacy is a constitutive part of his political sociology. However, the origins of domination or legitimacy are subject to much debate. Rather than taking an approach of analyzing legitimacy through organizational coercion, this paper refocuses on the concept of interest to explain the intrinsic connection between legitimacy and interest. The domination of legitimacy needs to be explained within the framework of social action, which primarily concerns the interest relationship among agents. Based on this analysis, we realize that in political action, the motivation world of agents contains multiple factors, rather than one single motivation, and the factor of interest-based motivation, in particular, cannot be ignored.

Key words: domination, legitimacy, organization, violence, interest