 This entry follows the traditional practice of equating political obligation with a moral duty to obey the law of one’s country or state. How does one acquire such an obligation, and how many people have really done what is necessary to acquire it? Or is a political obligation more a matter of being than of doing – that is, of simply being a member of the country or state in question? To those questions many answers have been given, and none now commands widespread assent. Indeed, a number of contemporary political philosophers deny that a satisfactory theory of political obligation either has been or can be devised. Others, however, continue to believe that there is a solution to what is commonly called “the problem of political obligation,” and they are presently engaged in a lively debate not only with the skeptics but also with one another on the question of which theory, if any, provides the solution to the problem.