“Politics is... about the uneven distribution of power in a society, how the struggle of power is conducted, and its impact on the creation distribution of resources, life chances and well being.”[1]
Power is one of the most central concepts in the study of politics. Therefore, it is important to study the concept of power and the way it’s exercised. Under the conditions that the person has power and chooses to use it, the ultimate goal of having power is to make the other person do something that you want. In this sense, the statement in question sums up the essence of political power. However, it is hard to agree completely with the phrase “would not otherwise do”. If we are agreeing, we are assuming we know what the other person’s reactions will be in a certain situation. This is sometimes not possible because everyone does not act the same way in every situation. Human beings often evaluate their potential gains and losses from any situation before they make a decision which may sometimes be or not be the decision we had assumed they would make. However, any ‘powerful’ person will and can certainly influence the other’s choices and can override any objections. This power can be exerted in different ways. The purpose of this essay is to discuss the ways in which political figures exert power over the masses and to prove that it is mostly through constricting the realm in which society acts that power is exerted.
The oxford concise dictionary of politics[2] defines power as “the ability to make people (or things) do what they would not otherwise have done”. Andrew Heywood[3] distinguishes between the two meanings of power. He explains that in a broader sense, power can be defined as “the ability to achieve a desired outcome”. But he explains political power to be “the ability to influence the behaviour of others in a manner not of their choosing”; Or to have power over someone. The German Sociologist, Max Weber defined power as “the chance of a man or of a number of people to realize their own will in a communal action against the resistance of others who are participating in the action”.[4] This means power is the ability to force someone to do things whether they want it or not. Essentially all these definitions sum up the following, with regard to the phrase ‘A has power over B’: A has influence over B’s choices and actions, A has the ability to change B’s choices in the way A wants, A also has the power to oppose and overcome any objections that B might have.[5]
The statement, ‘A gets B to do something that he or she would not otherwise do’, is a definition coined together by Robert Dahl, in his essay, ‘On the concept of power’. It has come to be widely used but has been criticized as well. It ‘disregards the possibility of mutually convenient power relations’[6] where power maybe a resource benefiting both A and B. It also disregards the process of selective decision making. Clearly some decisions are more important than others, so to base the defining of a broad concept such as power, only on the amount of times they get their way is not a very valid approach. It is true that sometimes, ‘a strategic or hegemonic group will allow minority interests to prevail on certain issues which do not directly threaten its domination, reserving its influence for matters of greater significance’[7]. Dahl’s concept of power is easy to observe and measure. However in defining power in this way, as possessed by individuals in decision making process, power is being widely distributed; everyone has power. This is the pluralistic view of political power. In the pluralistic viewpoint, power is widely distributed and evenly dispersed in society.[8] Therefore, patterns in preference shaping are hardly predictable. People, who aren’t necessarily knowledgeable or have no meaningful political voice, also have power. The pluralists’ concerns are to “(a) select for the study a number of “key” as opposed to “routine” political decision, (b) identify the people who took an active part in the decision making process, (c) obtain a full account of their actual behaviour while the policy conflict was being resolved, and (d) determine and analyze the specific outcome of the conflict”.[9] It does not take into account that power may sometimes be exercised in confining the arena of the decision making process to suit the powerful. It is more concerned with the more obvious, observable faces of power. When saying that A gets B to do something he otherwise would not have done, it is also essential to know what B might have done without A in the picture. Would B follow A’s preferences or would B have his own choices to follow? Human rationality is not so powerful that one can be sure of how another person will react in any given situation.
How can one be sure that the non-visible factors do not affect a decision making process? This is where Bachrach and Baratz definition of power comes in. Critical of Dahl’s pluralistic view, they provided an elitist view that said, “Power is also exercised when A devotes his energies to creating or reinforcing social and political values that limit the scope of the political process to the public consideration of only those issues which are comparatively innocuous to A.”[10] In this situation, A is not sure of what B’s preferences will be and A does not care about them. A is merely making sure that he gets what he wants by reducing the options available to B at the time of decision making. This is known as agenda setting. It is common to see issues that are of tremendous importance to the society or is gaining popularity to be left out of the political agenda. For example, until recently, environmental issues have been left of political agendas and not discussed in policy making meetings. However, now it is gaining more popularity amongst politicians. One may wonder how these items got on the agendas. And the answer is that powerful elites felt that now was a convenient time for the issue to be discussed. It is common to come across situations where a person of tremendous calibre remains silent because he/she fears that they would be in the minority group, their decision will not tally well with the ‘authorities’ or they might end up losing their credibility and popularity. It is clear that it is because of certain restrictions that have been put up by the authoritative figures that one is constrained to act like one would feel. The critiques point out that like Dahl’s method, Bachrach and Bratzs’ view also conforms to only the observable acts of power. They exclude possibilities in which the subjects do not identify themselves as being subordinated or having a preference over something which they are being stopped from accomplishing.
Giving more credibility to the less visible is Lukes’ definition of power. He outlines the three dimensional view of power which is a more complex understanding of power and away from the Behaviouralism approach. He argues that A certainly exercises control over B, but a more “effective and invidious” [11] form of power is exercised when A shapes the preferences of B. Lukes asks, “…is it not the most insidious exercise of power to prevent people, to whatever degree, from having grievances by shaping their perceptions, cognitions, and preferences in such a way that they accept their role in the existing order of things…”[12] Lukes simply coins together the arguments’ proposed by Dahl, Bachrach and Baratz together with his own to provide a three dimensional view of power which comprises of “(1) the strategies, struggles and practises that characterise the decision-making process; (2)the actions and inactions involved in the shaping of the agenda for decision-making process; and (3) the actions and inactions similarly implicated in the shaping of perceived interests and political preferences.”[13] This gives rise to the idea of a society which is created to fulfil the needs of the elite and more importantly, the society’s interests and preferences are also shaped by the elites. As Dahl said in “the Ruling Elite”[14], “...one could argue that even in a society like ours a ruling elite might be so influential over ideas, attitudes and opinions that a kind of false consensus will exist...the manipulated and superficially self imposed adherence to the norms and goals of the elite by broad sections of the community”. In a situation such as this, either the consensus can be broken or it may be maintained. Dahl talks about the ensuing decision making process that follows after the consensus has been broken. Lukes’s argument is more on the time before the consensus breaks where people can be ‘bullied’ into ‘an incorrect appreciation of the interests and act against them’.[15] Lukes portrays a society which is structured in a way that people do not know their real interests from what they believe their real interests to be. This is referred to as thought control or what Lukes called “the radical view of power and it overlaps with the notion of soft power.”[16] The notion of soft and hard power is an important one here. Hard power refers to the ability of one actor to influence another with the use of threats and sanctions or rewards. This would apply more to the observable exercise of power that Dahl, Bachrach and Baratz defined. Soft power is “the ability to influence other actors by persuading them to follow or agree to norms and aspirations that produce the desired behaviour.”[17] Soft power does not use threats or force. It usually is seen to reduce the need for hard power as it’s more important in a world of “global interdependence and freer flow of communication and information”.[18] Lukes argument is essentially similar to the concept of soft power.
Max Weber, in his essay, Politics as a Vocation,[19] talks about three ways in which individuals can acquire power; patriarchal power or traditional power supported by traditions and myths, Bureaucratic power or legal power supported by legal agreements or structures which gives certain rights and authority to the persons in power and finally charismatic power which is supported by the leader’s personality. All of these are ways in which an individual can control the society by either being the powerful in decision making process, agenda setting or by preference shaping.
Powerful figures may restrict the items on the agenda of policy makers, duel it out in the decision making process or in fact shape the way people think and what they believe. These are the three faces of power as proposed by Dahl, Bachrach, Baratz and Lukes. Others have proposed other definitions of power such as power as context shaping.[20] Whatever the definition, essentially, power is to exercise control over another person and to get them to do something you want. It may not necessarily be something that the other person might not have wanted. It may in fact be exactly what he would have done. However, it is safe to say, the statement “A gets B to do something that he or she would otherwise not do” somewhat sums up the essence of power.
Bibliography
Bachrach, P. & Baratz, M.S., ‘Two Faces of Power’, American Political Science Review, 56, 1962, p947-52
Barry, B., (eds), ‘Power and political theory’
Gerth, H.H. and Wright Mills, C. (eds), ‘From Max Weber: Essays in Sociology’
Goodwin, B., ‘Using Political Ideas’, 5th edition
Hay, C., ‘Divided by a Common Language: Political Theory and the Concept of Power’, Politics, 17 (1), 1997, p45-52
Heywood, A., ‘Key Concepts in Politics’
Heywood, A., ‘Politics’, 3rd edition
MacDonald, K. I., ‘Is ‘Power’ Essentially Contested?’, British Journal of Political Science, Vol. 6, No. 3, Jul. 1976, p380-382
Martin, R., ‘The Concept of Power: A Critical Defence’, The British Journal of Sociology, Vol. 22, No. 3, Sept., 1971, p240-256
McLean, I. and McMillan, A. (eds), ‘Oxford Concise Dictionary of Politics’, 2nd edition
Morriss, P., ‘Power in New Haven: A Reassessment of ‘Who Governs?’, British Journal of Political Science, Vol. 2, Oct. 1972, p457-465
Oppenheim, F. E., ‘Power’ Revisited’, The Journal of Politics, Vol. 40, No. 3, Aug. 1978, p589-608
Stoker, G. and Marsh, D., ‘Introduction’, in Marsh, D. and Stoker, G. (eds), ‘Theory and Methods in Political Science’, 2nd edition
Young, R. A., ‘Steven Lukes’s Radical View of Power’, Canadian Journal of Political Science/ Revue canadienne de science politique, Vol. 11, No. 3, Sep. 1978, p639-649.
[1] Stoker, G. and Marsh, D., ‘Introduction’, in Marsh, D. and Stoker, G. (eds), ‘Theory and Methods in Political Science’, 2nd edition, p9
[2] McLean, I. and McMillan, A. (eds), ‘Oxford Concise Dictionary of Politics’, 2nd edition, p431
[3] Heywood, A., ‘Key Concepts in Politics’, p35
[4] Weber, M., ‘Economically Determined Power and the Social Order’, in Gerth, H.H. and Wright Mills, C. (eds), ‘From Max Weber: Essays in Sociology’, p180
[5] McLean, I. and McMillan, A. (eds), ‘Oxford Concise Dictionary of Politics’, 2nd edition, p431
[6] Martin, R., ‘The Concept of Power: A Critical Defence’, The British Journal of Sociology, Vol. 22, No. 3, Sept., 1971, p240-256
[7] Hay, C., ‘Divided by a Common Language: Political Theory and the Concept of Power’, Politics, 17 (1), 1997, p45-52
[8] Heywood, A., ‘Key Concepts in Politics’, p35
[9]Bachrach, P. & Baratz, M.S., ‘Two Faces of Power’, American Political Science Review, 56, 1962, p947-52
[10] Bachrach, P. & Baratz, M.S., ‘Two Faces of Power’, American Political Science Review, 56, 1962, p 947-52
[11] Hay, C., ‘Divided by a Common Language: Political Theory and the Concept of Power’, Politics, 17 (1), 1997, p45-52
[12] Lukes (1974), p. 24, quoted in Hay, C., ‘Divided by a Common Language: Political Theory and the Concept of Power’, Politics, 17 (1), 1997, p45-52
[13] Hay, C., ‘Divided by a Common Language: Political Theory and the Concept of Power’, Politics, 17 (1), 1997, p. 45-52
[14] Quoted in Hay, C., ‘Divided by a Common Language: Political Theory and the Concept of Power’, Politics, 17 (1), 1997, p. 45-52
[15] Young, R. A., ‘Steven Lukes’s Radical View of Power’, Canadian Journal of Political Science/ Revue canadienne de science politique, Vol. 11, No. 3, Sep. 1978, p639-649.
[16] Heywood, A., ‘Politics’, Chapter 1, p11
[17] Heywood, A., ‘Politics’, Chapter 7, p142
[18] Heywood, A., ‘Politics’, Chapter 7, p142
[19] Weber, M., ‘Politics as a Vocation’, in Gerth, H.H. and Wright Mills, C. (eds), ‘From Max Weber: Essays in Sociology’, p77-128
[20] Hay, C., ‘Divided by a Common Language: Political Theory and the Concept of Power’, Politics, 17 (1), 1997, p45-52
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