by According to Max Weber (1947), power is ‘the probability that one actor within a social relationship will be in a position to carry out his own will despite resistance, regardless of the basis on which this probability rests’.
He further writes, positions of power can ’emerge from social relations in drawing room as well as in the market, from the rostrum of lecture hall as well as the command post of a regiment, from an erotic or charitable relationship as well as from scholarly discussion or athletics’. It plays a part in family (husband and wife) and school (teacher and the taught) relationship also.
Thus, for Weber, power is the chance of a man or a number of men to realize their own will in a communal action even against the resistance of others who are participating in the action. Alvin Genldner (1970) noted that power is, among other things, the ability to enforce one’s moral claims. The powerful can thus conventionalize their moral defaults.
Celebrated sociologist Anthony Giddens (1997) sees, ‘power as the ability to make a difference, to change things from what they would otherwise have been, as he puts it “transformative” capacity’. Power can be defined by saying that ‘A exercises power over B when A affects B in a manner contrary to B’s interests’. According to Steven Lukes (2005), power has three dimensions or faces:
- Decision-making
- Non-decision-making
- Shaping desires.
Types of Power
Max Weber (1958) believed that there are three (not one) independent and equally important orders of power as under.
- Economic power
For Marx, economic power is the basis of all power, including political power. It is based upon an objective relationship to the modes of production, a group’s condition in the labour market, and its chances. Economic power refers to the measurement of the ability to control events by virtue of material advantage.
- Social power
It is based upon informal community opinion, family position, honour, prestige and patterns of consumption and lifestyles. Weber placed special emphasis on the importance of social power, which often takes priority over economic interests. Contemporary sociologists have also given importance to social status so much so that they sometimes seem to have underestimated the importance of political power.
- Political power
It is based upon the relationships to the legal structure, party affiliation and extensive bureaucracy. Political power is institutionalized in the form of large-scale government bureaucracies. One of the persistent ideas has been that they are controlled by elites, that is, small, select, privileged groups.
Political power concerns the activities of the states which is not confined to national boundaries. The networks of political power can stretch across countries and across the globe. Political power involves the power to tax and power to distribute resources to the citizens.
Besides, Weber’s types of power, there are a few other types also which are as under:
- Knowledge power
To Foucault (1969), power is intimately linked with knowledge. Power and knowledge produce one another. He saw knowledge as a means of ‘keeping tabs’ on people and controlling them.
- Military power
It involves the use of physical coercion. Warfare has always played a major role in politics. Modem mass military systems developed into bureaucratic organizations and significantly changed the nature of organizing and fighting wars. According to Weber, few groups in society base their power purely on force or military might.
- Ideological power
It involves power over ideas and beliefs, for example, are communism, fascism and some varieties of nationalism. These types of ideologies are frequently oppositional to dominant institutions and play an important role in the organization of devotees into sects and parties. According to Michael Mann (1986), there are two types of power, viz., distributional and collective.
- Distributional power
It is a power over others. It is the ability of individuals to get others to help them pursue their own goals. It is held by individuals.
- Collective power
It is exercised by social groups. It may be exercised by one social group over another.
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