Steven Lukes’ Powerful Theory in real life
Steven Lukes’ book Power: A Radical View (1974) is only 63 pages long, yet it has been greatly influential in the field of social sciences. Ever since it appeared in 1974, it has spawned debates on the definition of power, and how something as abstract as power can be measured. In his book, Lukes claims that power is exercised in three different ways. In order to present these dimensions the clearest, each will be paired with an example from the documentary Bottled Life, which discusses the business practices of the transnational food and drink company Nestlé in regards to their billion-dollar water business.
The first dimension is pretty straightforward and probably aligns the most with evryday understanding …show more content…
The second dimension focuses on the capacity to shape the political agenda, specifically, the capacity to keep issues off the political agenda. According to political scientists Bachrach and Baratz, the representatives of this particular dimension, power should be assessed ‘’to the extent that a person or group -- consciously or unconsciously -- creates or reinforces barriers to the public airing of policy conflicts, that person or group has power’’ (1962). This immediately rings familiar if one has been paying attention to modern day politics, where powerful individuals quite frequently limit the political debate to safe issues. Many conflicts and issues thus never succeed in obtaining a place on the agenda; these are known as non-decisions (Bachrach & Baratz 1962). This dimension can be seen in the documentary in the form of a conflict with Poland Spring and another town in the US where they extracted water. Even though the local town residents opposed Nestlé’s presence, mostly for the same reasons as the people of Fryeburg, the billion-dollar corporation was able to keep the issue off of the political agenda by working with local governmental establishments. In this incident, the conflict was observable in the form of the consequences of Nestlé’s presence and protests, and Nestle …show more content…
Lukes’ analysis of power focuses on relationships; a group or an individual has power if it has power over others. When reading Lukes’ theory, one might notice that he always refers to the three elements of his theory as ‘dimensions’ of power, rather than aspects, perspectives or forms of power. To call them ‘’dimensions’’ implicates that these aspects are inherently separate from each other and that they therefore do not occur simultaneously. The legitimacy of this claim is debatable. Critics of Lukes have argued that these ‘dimensions’ can exist at the same time. However, this discussion is very extensive, and it is not relevant enough to delve deeper into. Because of the notoriety of this work, it has collected many supporters as well as
Steven Lukes’ book Power: A Radical View (1974) is only 63 pages long, yet it has been greatly influential in the field of social sciences. Ever since it appeared in 1974, it has spawned debates on the definition of power, and how something as abstract as power can be measured. In his book, Lukes claims that power is exercised in three different ways. In order to present these dimensions the clearest, each will be paired with an example from the documentary Bottled Life, which discusses the business practices of the transnational food and drink company Nestlé in regards to their billion-dollar water business.
The first dimension is pretty straightforward and probably aligns the most with evryday understanding …show more content…
The second dimension focuses on the capacity to shape the political agenda, specifically, the capacity to keep issues off the political agenda. According to political scientists Bachrach and Baratz, the representatives of this particular dimension, power should be assessed ‘’to the extent that a person or group -- consciously or unconsciously -- creates or reinforces barriers to the public airing of policy conflicts, that person or group has power’’ (1962). This immediately rings familiar if one has been paying attention to modern day politics, where powerful individuals quite frequently limit the political debate to safe issues. Many conflicts and issues thus never succeed in obtaining a place on the agenda; these are known as non-decisions (Bachrach & Baratz 1962). This dimension can be seen in the documentary in the form of a conflict with Poland Spring and another town in the US where they extracted water. Even though the local town residents opposed Nestlé’s presence, mostly for the same reasons as the people of Fryeburg, the billion-dollar corporation was able to keep the issue off of the political agenda by working with local governmental establishments. In this incident, the conflict was observable in the form of the consequences of Nestlé’s presence and protests, and Nestle …show more content…
Lukes’ analysis of power focuses on relationships; a group or an individual has power if it has power over others. When reading Lukes’ theory, one might notice that he always refers to the three elements of his theory as ‘dimensions’ of power, rather than aspects, perspectives or forms of power. To call them ‘’dimensions’’ implicates that these aspects are inherently separate from each other and that they therefore do not occur simultaneously. The legitimacy of this claim is debatable. Critics of Lukes have argued that these ‘dimensions’ can exist at the same time. However, this discussion is very extensive, and it is not relevant enough to delve deeper into. Because of the notoriety of this work, it has collected many supporters as well as