There is however a theory of power completely different to Karl Marx's. This theory of power is known as Elitism and was developed by two Italian Political scientists, Pareto and Mosca. They believed that power lay with an Elite over the powerless minority. An elite would be someone with supreme psychological characteristics; historical examples of elites are Adolph Hitler and Mussolini.
Another theory on power is that of pluralism. Robert Darhl developed the theory of pluralism; Darhl was an American social scientist. He believed that power was dispersed amongst different groups; society was the plurality of groups. All these groups compete for power and no group will dominate. This theory strongly revolved around politics and different political parties.
So to define power we have turned to the experts, 5 different experts and 4 different theories on power. Power is looking hard to define simply because it seems to be very multi-facetted. If we simplify, power can be coercive or non-coercive, but it can also fall …show more content…
For example in England, we are "run" by a democratic government that is non-coercive. However in Iraq, the people live under an autocracy that is coercive. Both of these examples show power running a country, both types of power however are very different. One is a legitimate authority and the other is an Elite ruling a minority through coercion.
To conclude power is hard to define, as it can be different depending on a society and its government. We could relate this to a saying "beauty is in the eye of the beholder", it could be argued that power is different according to whoever has the power. Power can be exercised in many different ways; it all depends on whoever "wields" it and the people it is being "wielded" at.
In my opinion Marx had the best theory, I do not believe however that it could ever work, but it was a good idea. This is because the person, who "runs" the communist state is always going to have the power, be it coercive or not. Good examples of this are communist Russia ran by Stalin or communist Cuba ran by Fidel Castro. It would be nice to believe that coercive power should never be needed