  One reason for keeping our minds open to different accounts of political authority is that there are different kinds of political authority.  Different accounts may be suitable to different kinds of authority.  Indeed, different principles grounding authority may be suitable to different kinds of authority.  One thing that is not often enough discussed in treatments of political authority is the fact that there are very different kinds of political authority.  Within the state alone there is legislative authority, executive authority, judicial authority, and administrative authority; these different kinds of authority can have distinct sub-branches of authority.  And there are political authorities outside of the modern state, namely international institutions.  These have a very distinct kind of authority at least in the contemporary world and the authority of these different agencies is grounded in different principles.