There is no legitimate authority on earth. Any human authority over others is- or becomes corrupted. The Lie that mob-rule democracy is a good solution was disproven at the beggining of Western thought- by Plato in The Republic.
The founders of the United States had a good attempt at a Republic, but as John Adams said: "Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other."
Plato's solution for a Republic included a class of people bred through eugenics who gave up their property rights to become the "Guardians" or "Philosopher Kings" of the Republic.
Barring that, the only way to have peace is pure voluntarism aka Anarchy. If we cannot have it, then humanity would do better with small terrorities under modern types of Monarchy.
See Suadi Arabia and Luxembourg for examples.
Vs Mob-rule aka "democracy" -it is better to know who the king is and to have them stake their bloodline on their responsibility.