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Authority
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What is Authority?

Authority is one of the most broadly examined concepts across the humanities and social sciences, appearing in courses ranging from political science and sociology to legal studies, literature, and philosophy. It raises fundamental questions about where power comes from, how it is granted or taken, and what obligations it creates for individuals and groups. Works like The Crucible and One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest give literary dimension to these questions, while legal frameworks around common law and judge-made law ground them in institutional practice. Historical episodes — such as Pope Boniface VIII's claims to papal supremacy and James Otis's challenge to the Writs of Assistance — show how disputes over authority have shaped societies across centuries.

Student papers on this topic approach authority from several distinct angles. Literary analyses examine how characters resist or submit to institutional power, often through close reading of conflict and consequence. Historical and political essays trace how authority has been organized, contested, or transferred across governments and religious institutions. Legal papers explore the relationship between different sources of law and who holds the right to interpret them. Psychology-oriented work, drawing on studies like the Stanford Prison Experiment, investigates how individuals behave when placed inside authority structures. Philosophical and epistemological papers question how authority claims are justified, including the nature of argument by authority itself.

A strong essay on authority needs a focused thesis about a specific form or exercise of power rather than treating the concept in the abstract. Evidence drawn from primary texts, legal cases, historical events, or documented social behavior tends to carry the most weight. The most common pitfall is conflating authority with raw power — a careful essay distinguishes between legitimate, institutionally recognized authority and coercive force, and explains why that distinction matters for the argument being made.

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Essay Doctorate

Virginia's state court system structure and judicial hierarchy

The state of Virginia's court system is structure in a way that is similar to, though not identical to, the federal court system in the United States. "The present system consists of four levels of courts: the Supreme…

Research Paper Doctorate

Ken Blanchard's four leadership patterns and situational leadership effectiveness

The concept of leadership in current business world has resorted to a new way in the current environment. It is not any longer parallel with the statement of traditional management.

Essay Doctorate

Circular 230 and the IRS regulation of tax preparers

Although the majority of Americans view tax season as an annual burden that is more bother than benefit, America's ascendancy to the realm of undisputed superpower was fueled by the willingness of its citizens to contribute as individuals for the sake of the whole. For many, however, tax preparation can become a dreadful experience defined by ignorance of the law and inexperience with financial matters, and every April millions of unsuspecting Americans are duped by duplicitous tax preparation services. By manipulating the information entered into an individual's tax forms, or neglecting to inform a client about possible refunds and other benefits that they are rightfully due, nefarious tax preparers can easily defraud the unsophisticated taxpayer out of thousands of dollars, inflicting dual damage on both the individual victim's pocketbook and the federal government's coffers. With the recent national recession reminding the IRS and individual taxpayers alike that disposable income is a luxury to be treasured, revisions made to Circular 230 have been made to tighten regulations on unethical tax preparation experts, and to reduce the risk posed by negligent and unqualified tax preparers. As recent testimony delivered to the U.S. House of Representatives, during a meeting of the Committee on Ways and Means' Subcommittee on Oversight, Representative Jim Ramstad expressed the situation thusly, explaining that "the individual most responsible for claiming tax refunds is not the individual taxpayer but rather a professional tax preparer … (and) unfortunately, taxpayers receive little or no guidance on how to avoid a bad or unscrupulous preparer. Tax preparers are not licensed by the IRS … and although the IRS administers a detailed set of rules that governs tax practice, known as Circular 230, hundreds of thousands of income tax preparers are not covered by these rules" (2005).

Essay Doctorate

Ethics of care in public administration and leadership

In my opinion, the fundamental part of Stensota's article is her argumentation, where she mentions that the concept of an "ethics of care" is centered on "human dependency" and on "relations between people." This means…

Ethical dilemma and corporate responsibility in the Parable of the Sadhu

In the story "The Parable of Sadhu," author Bowen H. McCoy explores the question of ethics while his narrator hikes in Nepal. McCoy himself was the managing director of Morgan Stanley.

Paper Doctorate

Starwood hotel expansion into Kazan: socio-cultural and human resource challenges

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Factors influencing China's rise to superpower status

In evaluating China's prospects for achieving superpower status, especially during this economic crisis, the first research question would take into consideration whether and to what degree the United States is in decline as a superpower, and if it is, then whether China is simply going to achieve superpower status by default. This is what happened to the British Empire after decades of economic decline and then bankruptcy as a result of the Second World War: the U.S. took its place as the leading world power. Certainly the U.S. position seems far shakier today than it did in the 1950s and 1960s or in the 1990s after the collapse of the Soviet Union. Even the predominant economic model that it has been propounding worldwide since the 1980s, that of free trade and free markets is no longer sweeping all before it as it did after the Cold War.

Paper Doctorate

The rhetoric of incarceration as modern slavery

This paper discusses the rhetorical device of using the term "modern slavery" to refer to those who are in prison. Such a term is intentionally hyperbolic because it equates imprisonment with the forced labor of slavery. There are both positives and negatives associated with using this device which are further discussed in this document.

Paper Doctorate

Medicare Diabetes Prevention Act of 2013: policy analysis and implementation

Democrats in the Senate and House have introduced a bill that would provide a mechanism for Medicaid-eligible individuals to qualify for free diabetes preventive services. The services that would be made available would be screening and interventions, with the latter designed to improve glycemic control through medications and lifestyle changes. This essay examines the policy implications and cost savings predicted to occur should this bill be passed.

Paper Undergraduate

Nursing theory and practice in patient care delivery

This paper consists of four short essays about the application of theory in the practice of nursing. It focuses on nursing from a graduate perspective, so that the questions are answered from the perspective of a nurse who has been involved in patient care. The questions look at the role of theory in nursing, the applicability of theory to practice, and whether theories should be operationalized for practice.

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