In this brief chapter, we will discuss the conceptual framework for understanding power as a relational dynamic. It flows from various levels of social and cultural institutions, and it permeates every interpersonal relationship we have.
Figure \(\PageIndex{1}\): Sign and crowd at the Boston MA 50501 protest February 5 2025, demonstrating a tension between groups of power. (CC0 1.0 Universal: Mmangan333 via Wikimedia Commons)
Learning Objectives
Define power as a relational communication concept involving the ability to control circumstances and influence the achievement of goals.
Explain why power exists between people and groups rather than as an individual possession or personal trait.
Differentiate power from empowerment and privilege by identifying the distinct roles each concept plays in social relationships.
Identify how social location, cultural context, and access to resources influence power dynamics.
Recognize how power operates within everyday interpersonal relationships and communication interactions.
Defining & Describing Power
"Power" is a word that is part of a long list of words that have one usage and meaning colloquially and socially, but have a very specific definition and description when used in the social sciences. There are several ways of describing power that all speak to the same phenomena. For our purposes, we can borrow one from Gust Yep (2013):
Definition: Power
Power is the ability to control circumstances (like access to financial, social, and cultural resources), and to get things done (like fulfilling personal goals and dreams and helping others achieve theirs; all individual and social relationships operate within relations of power.
We can break this definition down in other ways to fully grasp the concept and its effects on interpersonal relationships and communication:
Power is the ability to control circumstances of self and target group.
Power is the ability to influence the attainment of goals for self and others.
Power is a productive tension resulting from our different social locations within a cultural context.
All of these articulations point towards power being a substantial leverage or influence over others.
Layers of Power
There are broadly speaking three layers of power:
Macroscopic Power: This is the large overarching systems of power that influence large groups of people, such as entire communities, nations, or cultures. Macroscopic power forces are often intangible cultural values, such as the law, faithin a higher power, intrinsic goodness of knowledge, etc. These power forces will rise above and beyond individuals and groups.
Mezzoscopic Power: These are often related to macroscopic forces of power, but in a more confined and defined institutional framework. Due to a macroscopic power force of the law, a judge has a lot of power in a courtroom. We will never personally see or meet the President of the United States, but the President still has sway and influence over how we live our lives. Even as faculty members at a college, its possible we may never personally meet the president of our college! But that president still has sway and influence over our lives. This is mezzoscopic power.
Microscopic Power: As the name implies, this is the smallest scale of power dimensions: one person to another person, or one person to a small group. Consider perhaps the eldest care-giver in a home, or a shift-supervisor overseeing a staff during a 6 hour window at a coffee shop. This is a very direct and very confined relationship of power. It may be related to a mezzoscopic or macroscopic dimension of power, but it is very tangible and exists on a very small scale.
Foucault Descriptions of Power
French philosopher Michel Foucault (1980) wrote and spoke extensively on the nature of power. Between several of his works, we can summarize power as having four distinct characteristics.
Power is Relational
This is a pretty important place to start our detailed understanding of power. Power is not a characteristic that one person or group just has because they so so. It is not a quality that one possesses in a vacuum. Power, in fact, only exists betweentwo people or groups. If you can reflect upon examples of powerful people or powerful groups throughout your life and history, you will always be able to identify another person or group in relationship with those in power: every leader is only a leader because they have followers.
This might be a good moment to differentiate a couple of terms:
Power is not the same as empowerment. Power is a dynamic in relationships: it exists between people. Empowerment is an "up from within" personal quality resulting from self-confidence. Often when we think of power we think of personal qualities such as strength, confidence, self-assuredness, etc. But, again, these are significant and perhaps important personal qualities, but these are different than having influence or leverage over someone. I can have all the self-confidence in the world, but that alone doesn't mean I can dictate the decisions of the president of my college. Perhaps people in power also have qualities associated with empowerment, but these two things are not the same.
Power is not the same as privilege. Privilege can generally be described as a matrix of unearned advantages resulting from our social location in relationship to social institutions. We will discuss later in this chapter where power comes from, and we'll see that power and privilege may come from similar places. Again, like empowerment, power and privilege are similar but not equivalent. I enjoy many privileges as a white heterosexual US American born man. One of my close colleagues in my department is an accented speaking woman of color. We have the same position in our college, and my pathway to this position was much different and in many ways much easier than hers... but that certainly does not mean I get to tell her what to do. Privilege would be the ability to navigate social institutions with ease, but just because we have fewer obstacles than our peers doesn't mean we inherently or necessarily have any leverage over those peers.
Power is not the same as privilege or empowerment, because power is relational; it exists between people.Power is not only a phenomenon that exists in relationships, though: its a phenomenon that exists in everyrelationship.
Power is Ubiquitous
Power is everywhere. Power is in every relationship. This may make more sense after we read about how power is dynamic, but i think it bares mentioning here. Every relationship has some element of power in it. Power is very dynamic (as we'll discuss in a moment) and the differential of power between two people can be very large (perhaps a teacher in a classroom over their students) or it can be very small (such as two close friends), but it never truly goes away. It's ever present in every relationship, even if it does shift and move.
Power is Dynamic
Power is always present, but its also always moving and moving in multiple directions simultaneously. First, power is relative to the context: if the context shifts, so does the power differential. Second, power can ebb and flow. This is a typical scenario among good friends, romantic partners, family members of equal standing, colleagues, etc. If we feel that the power differential is zero, what is more likely happening is that it shifts back and forth fluidly. Third, we are all situated within multiple dimensions of power. As is often said in a capitalist economy, "everyone has a boss." Power is very dynamic, flowing through our social systems in multiple directions in multiple ways simultaneously, and we are all embedded in very dynamic systems of power. However, the currents of this flow of power sometimes need to be shifted.
Example \(\PageIndex{1}\)
Example 1:
In a college classroom for example, the instructor has quite a lot of purview to make decisions on exactly how the class operates, and the students give the instructor a lot of power to control circumstances on the assumption that they will get a positive learning experience in return. However, that instructor is not allpowerful. They still have a dean or a vice president that they must answer to. Furthermore, although they do have flexibility in the day-to-day operations of their classroom, they are still obligated to meet expectations of the course that have been decided by powers at a district or state level.
Example 2:
One day you have just gotten paid and have a little extra money, so you treat your friend to lunch at a restaurant of your choosing (since you're paying, you decide where to go). But a week later, the tables have turned and now your friend is the one with a little extra cash, so now they are going to decide what to do when you hang out. The power differential may be small, but more importantly it shifts back and forth and ebbs and flows in a way that feels very egalitarian.
Power is Productive
When studying communication from a critical perspective in graduate school, my cohort had come accustomed to using the word "crunchy" to describe a concept or a theory that was particularly nuanced and complex in its intellectual and moral framing: this might be something we would have considered "crunchy." Power exists within relationships, which means that in any and every relationship at any given time there is a person or group in a higher power position and a person or group in a lower power position. Both parties understand their position, and to some extent the parties in the lower power position willfully accept their lower power status. The group in the lower power position would accept their lower power status due to some form of social contract. There would be some understanding that this arrangement of power dynamics would come with some guarantees; the lower power party would get something back in return. A person with a part time job will allow their manager to dictate when they come to work and how long they stay and what tasks they will do when they get there, because in return they will be financially compensated and there may also be a promise of raises and promotions in the future. A student will show up to class at the designated time, do the assigned readings, and turn in the expected assignments, because in return they will receive the knowledge they seek and a passing grade which will allow them to continue on their academic journey. The power dynamic usually comes with some sort of tacit or explicit social contract. But what happens if the terms of this contract are unacceptable? What happens if the lower power party decides that they are not getting what was promised or what they deserve? The short answer is change. Either the person or group in the higher power position willfully adjusts what is happening or the lower power party forces the adjustment, but one way or another, Foucault would argue, that change is the result of the tension imbued by power. We'll talk more in depth about exactly how this happens, but its a very basic description of all social movements throughout history. Power is productive in the sense that power is the catalyst for change.
Example \(\PageIndex{2}\)
Example 3:
Think about the example of a shift supervisor at a coffee shop and their staff. During the working shift, the supervisor will delegate tasks and let staff take breaks at certain times (controlling circumstances of self and others), but that supervisor is not all powerful: they are usually carrying out the expectations set forth by a store manager, operating within a dynamic system of power. And once the staff clocks out and leaves, the power of the shift supervisor over the baristas dissipates and shifts. If the staff at this coffee shop - baristas and supervisors alike - are frustrated, exhausted, or hurt by the expectations of the store manager or district supervisors or other corporate decision-makers, members of that coffee shop may elect to unionize. A labor union is an example of individual persons who on their own have little power in their system can coalesce and combine forces to bring more power for themselves and push back against the higher power group.
References
Foucault, M. (1980). Power/knowledge: Selected interviews and other writings, 1972–1977 (C. Gordon, Ed.). Vintage Books.
Yep, G. A. (2013). Privilege and culture. In A. Kurylo (Ed.), Inter/cultural communication: Representation and construction (pp. 211–228). SAGE Publications.
