The limits of rational-legal authority
One of the underlying and unquestioned aspects of modern western society is that the power of the state is derived from a rational-legal authority, that is in the Weberian sense of a purposive or instrumental rationality in pursuing some end. But what if it isn’t? What if the decisions of the state are more based on belief in how people ought to behave and how things ought to be rather than reality? What, in other words, if the lunatics really are running the asylum?
