SURRENDER OF JUDGMENT AND THE CONSENT THEORY OF POLITICAL AUTHORITY

The aim of this paper is to take the first steps toward providing a re furbished consent theory of political authority, one that rests in par t on a reconception of the relationship between the surrender of judgm ent and the authoritativeness of political institutions. On the standa rd view, whatever grounds political authority implies that one ought t o surrender one's judgment to that of one's political institutions. On the refurbished view, it is the surrender of one's judgment - which c an plausibly be considered a form of consent - that makes political in stitutions practically authoritative.