LEGITIMACY – A PREREQUISITE FOR A SUSTAINABLE DEMOCRATIC COMMUNITY

In short, there is no sustainable democratic community without legitimacy. A prerequisite for sustainable development, political and security stability is a political system that legitimizes itself—where legitimate is the government that accepts, and even initiates, the process of its own legitimization; a government that reexamines itself. The concept of political legitimacy expresses the need for a political order—or government—to be based on the voluntary consent of the members of a political community and on their support. Conversely, from the perspective of those who are governed by a particular order or authority, that order and authority must be worthy of the support they have received or will receive. For a government and order to be legitimate, they must have the support of the majority, adherence to appropriate procedures, and value-based legitimacy. Liberal values give full content to the democratic principle: human rights and freedoms, the rule of law, separation of powers. Undemocratic political culture, façade constitutionality, and authoritarian rule are natural enemies of pluralism. In practice, citizens and their political representatives declaratively accept constitutional democracy based on equal citizens, while in concrete political terms, they overwhelmingly advocate for special collective rights that lead to the ethnicization of society. Particular interests are imposed as primary, so instead of an integrative political community based on equality and the preservation of cultural distinctiveness, political activity is driven by collective ethnic ambitions, which have led to division, exclusion, and general social disintegration.