ABSTRACT
Sovereignty is one of the most vexing concepts political scientists have attempted to theorize. Its difficulty is located at several levels: first, as a concept theorists have tried to define and explain, often motivated by a sense of urgency, second as a recurring problem or question of rule endowed with a considerable status in the modern epoch, and third as a contingent notion that is intricately bound up with at least four others – the subject, power, legitimacy, and community – to which sovereignty stands in some necessary though ambiguous relation. Admittedly, each of these levels shares features of the other two, but examining each as a single category of analysis can illuminate neglected aspects of sovereignty’s function in modern thought, and this may lend new insights into the nature and limits of world-political power in a perilous time.
