Political Power

Power: the ability of one person to get another person to act in accordance with the first person’s intentions.

Authority: the right to use power.

Legitimacy: political authority conferred by law or by a state or national constitution.

Who Has All 3 Aspects?

Direct Democracy

All or most citizens participate directly.

Representative Democracy

Leaders make decisions by winning a competitive struggle for the popular vote

There are 4 views of who governs…

• The Marxist View

• The Power Elite View

• The Bureaucratic View

• The Pluralist View

Marxism

• Karl Marx

• Government is a reflection of underlying economic forces.

• Capitalists vs. workers

• In the U.S. large corporations hold power.

Power Elite

• C. Wright Mills

• Control emanates from elites – a group of people who possess a disproportionate share of a valuable resource.

• Corporate leaders, top military officers, handful of elected officials, major media chiefs, top labor union officials, heads of various special interest groups.

Bureaucratic View

• Max Weber

• It doesn’t matter who makes the laws, large government agencies and the people who work there actually operate the government on a daily basis.

Pluralism• No single founder.

• Political resources (money, prestige, expertise, organizational position, access to the media) are so scattered that no single group of elites has a monopoly on them.

• These resources are distributed unequally.

• There are so many different government institutions at every level of government that no single group could dominate the entire political process.