The Nature of Power

Power is all around us. Human, political power in some form or other is (at least broadly, and often narrowly) the main topic of newspapers, the evening news, and the cable networks on a day-in, day-out basis. When it is pushed out of the headlines and top-of-the-hour updates, the reason usually is the power of some natural event, such as a hurricane or earthquake. Power and power relationships govern much of our daily lives as well. We stop at red lights and at least slow down markedly at stop signs on our way to work, and when we get there we are subject to the power of a boss.

Yet power is a curiously elusive concept. It is difficult to define, as shown by the widely varying definitions of it given even by people who have thought a great deal about the subject, as Wrong and Bachrach and Baratz have. In some of its most important forms it has a nearly magical quality: You have power if people believe you have it; if they cease to believe, your power may well evaporate.

This is markedly the case with political power, even that associated with coercive force. Saddam Hussein recently discovered the elusiveness of coercive state power. His military, as best as we can tell, was not so much defeated by the American forces as it simply evaporated in their presence. Thousands or tens of thousands of Iraqi troops took off their uniforms and melted into the population -- often, apparently, after their

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ng agrees with Bachrach and Baratz in regarding this as not an exercise of power (Wrong, 2002, p. 22). On the other hand, if you do comply, due to the threat of being wrestled down, power has been exercised. To Bachrach and Baratz (and to Wrong as well), power is exercised by the threat of force, not by its actual use. To fall back on the direct use of force -- to actually have to wrestle the suspect to the ground -- represents in some sense the failure of power. Police officers are acutely aware of this. A large proportion of excessive-force cases involve resisting suspects, the officers involved reacting in anger to a defiance of their power. This instance also demonstrates the disadvantages of actual use of force. The overreacting officers may expose themselves to legal sanction for their overreaction. In other respects as well, falling back on force can lead to a lasting reduction in power (Bachrach and Baratz, n.d., p. 104). In the extreme case, the resort to force may fail, leading to the complete collapse of power that depends on the potential sanction of force. If the rebels defeat the imperial force sent to crush them, the empire's days are numbered. Even if the empire then sends a large force that is success

Category: Philosophy - T