What is Controller authorization in Laravel, and what role does it play in a real application?

What is Controller authorization in Laravel, and what role does it play in a real application? In Laravel, controller authorization should be understood as part of a larger application architecture rather than as an isolated API call. Controllers can authorize operations before they perform state-changing actions. A strong understanding includes its purpose, the layer where it belongs, the data or request flow it affects, and the situations where another mechanism may be more appropriate. Practical context: Authorization determines what an authenticated user is permitted to do and can be expressed through gates and policies. The specific focus here is controller authorization: Controllers can authorize operations before they perform state-changing actions. This question is designed to test not only terminology, but also how the concept fits into Laravel's request, application, database, security, or deployment workflow.