Truth vs. Unity

After I began blogging last week, I realized my blog was solely based on my university lectures, that, to my sorrow are supposed to finish in exactly a month. Ever since this realization, I have been pondering how, if at all, I can continue my blog over the summer. Fist of all, I will indeed have two lectures a week that are to continue after Pesach both of which provide a ray of hope. Secondly, I still have several papers that I have yet to research and write which should still provide me with opportunities to blog, albeit, less frequently. I realized this, when, yesterday, I couldn't come up with something random and interesting from my lectures until I started doing some preliminary research for one of my papers...

There are two basic prototypes that demand our attention regarding the authority that is recognized in Torah scholars. The first is the legitimacy that is granted from bottom up. This legitimacy is based upon our recognition of the scholar's superior knowledge. We thus obligate ourselves to obey this scholar only because of his knowledge and the relevance of his arguments. The second is legitimacy that is from top down. We are obligated to listen to and obey such a scholar because his legitimacy is more or less G-d given. It is our obligation to accept his words and teachings no matter what their content is.
To make a crude generalization, it seems that the second model fits the chareidi community whereas the first model seems to jive more with modern orthodoxy and others. What's interesting about this is that regarding the second model, one of the many reasons given for our strict adherence to the scholars words-no matter what they are-is that we are interested in preventing halachic anarchy i.e. that everyone does what they see fit(Sefer Hachinuch). For this reason, we find Talmudic statements to the fact that even if a scholar tells you that right is left and that left is right, you must listen and accept it. What we see is that, the chareidi community (again a gross generalization), a community that often makes claims of containing absolute truth actually has little interest in what the truth actually is, whether left is right or right is left. What concerns the chareidi community is to ensure scholarly unity in the face of anarchy. On the other hand, the first model i.e. that of a scholar's authority based on his superior knowledge, is one that is generally adopted by more open communities. These same communities are more apt to opinions and positions that negate or lessen absolute truth. Yet, in light of the model mentioned above it is specifically those same scholars who are not so much looking to protect scholarly unity at all costs. Rather they seem to be striving to reach the truth (which is ostensibly less important, or even non-existent) because it is their scholarship, their knowledge, their arguments that grant them our legitimacy.
It is important to note, that in real life, nothing is so extreme and generally we find ourselves somewhere in between the two models, or creating some combination of both.

If the above is not 100 percent clear, I apologize. I am not even sure it is clear to myself. But when I read it, I thought that it reflected a certain inconsistency in our understandings of the different communities and/or perceptions of halachic authority.
Have a good night.