Determinants of State Legitimacy: An Empirical Study of 177 Countries Ahmad Idrees Rahmani Pardee RAND Graduate School March 2010 Abstract There is a popular belief that states cannot maintain authority unless they are legitimate. In this paper we will empirically examine the relationship between state’s legitimacy and a number of popular determinants including those suggested by the current literature, using a panel dataset of 177 countries covering 2005 – 2009. Albeit the common belief that provision of political goods and services is the primary determinant of state’s political legitimacy, the cross-country analysis suggests that fractionalization of political elites matters more. Given that legitimacy is the most important prerequisite of maintaining authority, the findings of this study could have considerable policy implication for the current process of state building operations in countries such as Iraq, Afghanistan, and possibility, Iran and Pakistan. Towards the end, findings from this study are used to explain certain trends in each of those countries. The analysis suggests that investment in state’s service delivery capacity might be helpful for a number of good reasons, but not necessarily improving state’s political legitimacy. Additional measures are necessary to tackle fractionalization of political elites to improve legitimacy of states.