Political authority and legitimacy
What Political authority and legitimacy means in History A-Level, as defined for AQA.
Definitions of Political authority and legitimacy
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Reference: AQA
Democratisation produced a fatal loss of Communist Party control, weakening its authority and empowering nationalist factions that undermined the entire Soviet state.
The political impact of the First World War shifted power from the Kaiser to the military high command and caused political breakdown by 1918.
The CCP's victory rested on political factors such as popular land reform policies winning peasant support, weighed against GMD corruption.
Topics that use Political authority and legitimacy
- 1L The quest for political stability: Germany, 1871–1991 – Empire to democracy, 1914–1929 (AQA A-Level)
- 2P The Transformation of China, 1936–1997 – Communist victory and the consolidation of Mao's rule, 1946–1952 (AQA A-Level)
- 2T The Crisis of Communism: The USSR and the Soviet Empire, 1953–2000 (A-level only) – The Gorbachev Revolution, 1985–2000 (AQA A-Level)
Related terms
- Authoritarianism versus democracy
- Class Struggle
- Coalition politics
- Coercion and Control
- Constitutional strengths and vulnerabilities
- Crisis and collapse
- Cultural experimentation and polarisation
- Democracy versus authoritarianism
Using Political authority and legitimacy in the exam
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