ABSTRACT
The Comprehensive Authorisation Model is a novel account of reparative justice in authoritarian states. It encompasses two distinctive complementary components – anchored in objective and subjective authorisation, respectively. The Objective Authorisation Account is rooted in the view that the government plays an instrumental role in mediating the state–citizen relationship. It posits that a citizen should bear reparative responsibilities for an injustice perpetrated by his state, if the state’s representative – that is, the government – provides him with a sufficiently diverse and abundant range of presumptive benefits; he does not suffer from any violation of core private freedoms by the government; the government’s discretion over the injustice-causing act in question falls within a reasonable interpretation of the state’s overall mandate, and there exists a procedure through which the citizen has a reasonable chance of influencing his government’s decision-making process in relation to the act in question. The satisfaction of these criteria is sufficient for the citizen to be said to have objectively authorised the authoritarian state. The exact extent of responsibility will vary according to the citizen’s extent of benefiting from the state and of meaningful influence over state decisions.
