Defining Surrender ... and making it stick

[TheCurmudgeon]

My last post requires some clarification. Since I am lazy I am going to cut and past in a section from something else I am working on in order to make it clear. In this section I am introducing Weber's ideal types of legitimate authority. I only extract the first two sine the third is not relevant to the discussion.

"Max Weber – Three types. There are multiple types of political legitimacy. Perhaps the best known is Max Weber’s three pure types of legitimate authority. These are traditional, legal-rational, and charismatic. Traditional is legitimacy built on adherence to accepted principles and personal ownership of the public property. An example of traditional legitimacy is the monarchy. The oldest son of the dead king becomes the new king. That is the way it has always been done. That is all the justification that is needed for the oldest son to take the throne and be accepted by the people as their leader. More precisely, there is no other person with a greater claim on the throne than the oldest son. Anyone else is illegitimate. In addition the new king inherits all the property of the kingdom, which is viewed as privately held by the monarch. Loyalty is owed personally to the king and the king often decides whom his ministers are.

Legal-rational legitimacy is built on more bureaucratic ideals. People create political systems and methods of administration to achieve specific goals. Once these systems are created, and as long as they continue to perform their desired function, they are legitimate. There is also a distinction between who owns government property and who controls it as part of their public duties. The bureaucrat never has personal ownership of the money, land or equipment he may use to accomplish his governmental duties. He cannot bequeath his position to anyone and loyalty is not owed to the person but to the position he holds. There is a clear line between his public duty and his private life."

Loosely speaking, traditional legitimacy is associated with autocratic systems while legal-rational legitimacy is associated with democratic systems. So if the autocratic (or theocratic) leader sees the country as his personal possession he is more likely to fight till the end and, when frustrated, do everything he can to stop his enemy from ending up with the prize. "If I can't have it no one can". A democratic leader has no personal connection with the country (other than loyalty to it). He can cut his losses and run. It is also the nature of a democracy that power transfers on a regular basis. Trying to maintain it till death is not in the nature of the political system.

This could be an explanation for why there would not appear to be a "surrender" in the WWII cases as well as why others will destroy everything rather than lose.

This does not explain why religious zealots appear more willing to give their life for the cause. That is a question that has to be looked at from the individual level. But at the system level, some commonality in the way things play out may be possible.