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C. POLITICAL POWER

What is the relationship between politics and political power? What is political

power? What is political behavior? What is the relationship between political

power and political behavior? What is the relationship between political power

and public policy? What is the ultimate purpose of political power? What aretwo major forms of political power? What is political authority? When is

political authority legitimate? What is political influence?

1. Politics and Political Power:

Many political scientists, focusing upon the concept of "poli tical power," define

politics as the pursuit of political power and competition for political power.

John M. Pfiffner and Frank P. Sherwood define politics as "the process by which

political power is acquired and exercised."[Note 5]Politics involves the pursuit,

acquisition, and exercise of political power.

2. Political Power and Political Behavior:

a. Political Power--A Definition. Poli tical poweris the ability to shape and control

the political behavior of others and to lead and guide their behavior in the

direction desired by the person, group, or institution wielding the political

power. Political power is the capacity to influence, condition, mold, and control

human behavior for the accomplishment of political objectives. That is to say,

political power is the ability of one political actor--e.g., an individual citizen, a

family, an interest group, a political action committee, a political party, or thegovernment--to effect a desired change in the behavior of other political actors,

persuading or forcing the latter to act in a manner they would not act in the

absence of the former's impact on the situation. Actor A has political power over

Actor B to the degree that he is able to motivate, inspire, incite, stimulate, or

otherwise bring about some modication of B's political behavior--a modification

in behavior favored by Actor A. A's political power, of course, would also include

his capacity to induce B to continue doing something he is currently doing, if B

would discontinue the behavior in the absence of A's inducements.

b. Political Behavior--Definition and Examples. Poli tical behaviorconsists ofhuman activities relating to the government and its processes of authoritative

decisionmaking and action. Examples of political behavior, or political activity,

include such actions as (1) voting in elections, (2) contributing money to political

parties or to the election campaigns of candidates running for government office,

(3) attending and actively participating in party caucuses, or meetings (e.g.,

precinct meetings and county, district, state, and national conventions), (4)

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serving on party and campaign committees, (5) serving as campaign workers for

particular candidates, (6) working for political action committees, (7) active

membership in political interest groups, (8) lobbying, (9) engaging in protest

demonstra- tions, (10) writing to or otherwise contacting members of the

legislature or other govern- ment officeholders, (11) disseminating political

propaganda, (12) writing letters to newspaper and magazine editors--letters

discussing politics and issues of public policy, (13) writing and publishing books,

periodicals, articles, and other literature dealing with public issues, (14) running

for government office, and (15) governmental activity--the govern- ment's

making and enforcement of authoritative decisions, decisions that are vested with

the authority of the society for and in the name of which they are made and

carried out, are binding on all members of the society, and have the effect of

authoritatively distributing resources and values for the society.

While the term "poli tical behavior" refers to many different types of human

activity, all of these types of activity are concerned ultimately with public policy.

All types of political behavior, in the final analysis, relate to authoritative

decisionmaking and action by the government and to the resulting authoritative

allocation of the benefits and costs of living in the political society.

3. Political Power and Public Policy:

a. The Relationship between Political Power and Public Policy. The ultimate

purpose of acquiring political power is to use it to shape and control public

policy--public policy in generalor some aspectof public policy. Those who

possess political power and utilize it to influence, shape, and control the political

behavior of others--whether to influence a decision of a political party or a

political action committee, to impact on the outcome of an election, to influence

the decisions and actions of government offices and institutions, or to obtain for

themselves election or appointment to public office and thereby gain personally

the legal right to actively and officially participate in the processes of

authoritative decisionmaking by the government--are concerned ultimately with

influencing, conditioning, shaping, and controlling the content and direction of

public policy. Political power is acquired and exercised in order to significantly

affect the government's authoritative decisions and actions on public policy--

either decisionmaking and action on public policy in generalor decisionmaking

and action in a particular areaof public policy (let's say, public education,

national health insurance, immigration, drug enforcement, civil rights, affirma-

tive action, taxation, energy policy, environmental protection, gun control, or

regulation of abortion).

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b. Political Power Defined in Terms of Public Policy. Poli tical powermay be

defined as the ability to influence, condition, shape, and control the content and

direction of public policy. Political power is influence or control over or

participation in the making and implementa- tion of official decisions of

government offices and institutions--i.e., the authoritative, binding decisions

made and carried out by the government for and in the name of the entire

society.

4. Government, Private Citizens, and Political Power:

In a modern constitutional democratic political society, such as Britain or the

U.S.A., do allpersons who wield political power hold formal positions in the

government? The answer to this question is, of course, no. One who possesses

and exercises political power may or may not be an official governmental

decisionmaker, or an official participant in govern- mental decisionmaking. A

political actor wielding political power may or may not hold a government officerelevant to the particular policy decision or decisions he is seeking to mold and

control. If he does hold such an office, he operates as a formal-legal participant

in the public-policy decisionmaking processes carried on by the government. If

he does not occupy a relevant public office, he plays the role of a private citizen

who, through mobiliza- tion of political resources available to him, effectively

exerts pressure on the government and thereby influences, conditions, and

modifies the government's decisionmaking behavior in one or more areas of

public policy. In the latter case, the citizen may act as an individual, as a member

of a politically influential family, as one who is highly respected and strategically

located in a politically influential "Old Boys" or "First Families" network, as a

member or hired lobbyist of a political interest group, as a leader or active

member of a political party or faction, or in two, three, four, or all five of the

foregoing capacities.

5. Political Authority and Political Influence:

Two major forms of political power are poli tical authori tyand poli tical inf luence.

a. Political Authority. Poli tical authori tyis governmental power, the formal-legal

authority of the public officeholders and institutions comprising the government

to make and carry out decisions on public policy--to adopt and implement the

authoritative decisions that have the force of law and are binding on all members

of the society. Political authority is the legally established power of the

government to make rules and issue commands and to compel obedience to them,

making use of physical force and coercion when deemed necessary. Political

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authority, in short, is the legal right--the legally established power--to govern

society.

The political authority exercised by a government may

be legitimateor illegitimate.

b. Legitimate Political Authority. If the political authority exercised by a

government is willingly and widely accepted by the population comprising the

society the government endeavors to control, that government will not have to

rely entirely or almost entirely on naked force to maintain order and obtain

compliance with its decisions. Under these conditions, the authority exercised by

the government is legitimate, and the government itself is legitimate.

Legitimate poli tical authori tyis the legitimate right of the government to govern

the entire society, the widely recognized right of the government to adopt and

enforce public-policy decisions for and in the name of the entire politicalcommunity. Legitimate political authority is governmental power derived from

willing and widespread acceptance by the citizenry of the right of the organs of

their government to make rules and issue commands and to expect obedience to

them. Legitimate political authority, in short, is governmental power based

on poli tical legitimacy.

Politi cal l egitimacyexists in a political community, or society, when most citizens

(1) perceive the government as having the moralas well as legal right to make

and enforce decisions binding on the whole community, (2) see the decisions

themselves as being legitimate, and (3) consider it the duty of all citizens tovoluntarily comply with these decisions, thereby substantially reducing the

government's need to employ armed force or expend other resources to compel

or induce compliance. The existing political regime, or system of government, is

considered to be legitimate because, according to widespread and deep-seated

feelings and beliefs among the members of the political society, those persons

occupying the offices and institutions comprising the government obtained their

positions by legitimate means and therefore have the moral and legal right to

hold these formal governmental positions and to exercise the powers legally

assigned to the positions. Absent, under normal conditions, are efforts of

substantial segments of the society to employ force and violence--armed

insurrection, or rebellion--in order to overthrow the political regime, to prevent

effective enforcement of the government's decisions, or to secede from the

existing political community and form a separate and independent community

and governmental system of their own.

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c. Political Influence. Poli tical inf luenceneeds to be distinguished from political

authority. While political authority is the formal-legal right of the government to

make and enforce official decisions on public policy, poli tical inf luenceis the

ability of private individuals and groups to impact on the government's making

and implementation of official policy decisions.

Poli tical inf luenceis the ability of private individuals and groups to influence,

condition, shape, and thereby control the authoritative decisions and actions of

those who possess the formal-legal authority to take these decisions and actions.

The individuals and groups exercising political influence do not hold

the relevantgovernment offices and therefore do not possess the formal-legal

authority to make the official governmental decisions they seek to shape and

control; but they dohave and exercise the ability to shape and control the

decisionmaking behavior of those officeholders in the government who dopossess

the formal-legal authority to make the relevantdecisions on public policy. Such

individuals and groups exercise significant influence over particular policy

decisions made by particular government offices and institutions. These

individuals and groups have acquired and are exercising that form of political

power called "political influence." A private individual or organization possesses

and exercises political influence to the extent that its interests and demands have

to be taken into accountby the government--or an office or institution of the

government--when making and carrying out decisions on public policy.

Poli tical inf luence, in short, is the form of political power exercised by those who

do not possess the formal-legal authority to make and enforce particular

governmental decisions on public policy, but have and utilize the ability to

condition, modify, and control the official decisionmaking behavior of those in

government office who dopossess the authority to make and implement the

decisions.

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Conflict and Decision MakingPosted January 17, 2012 inConflict,Leadership- 4 comments

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There is an article in the Volunteer Leadership issue ofAssociations Now titled, Balanced Conflict, Better Decisions.

The conclusions in the article concern me. Im paraphrasinghere, but the article says:

Cognitive conflict is about contradictory perspectives,

where affective conflict is personalized, emotional, andpolitical. Association boards make better decisions by delegating

cognitive conflict to task forces, but dealing with affectiveconflict at Board meetings.

For-profit boards do this the other way around. In a fair and transparent process for strategic decisions,

conflict managed or preempted is step NINE in an eleven

step process.I am a conflict resolution professional, and I spend a LOT ofmy time helping people tounderstand what conflict is and howto resolve it. Most of us grow up, go through school, andadvance in our careers without getting any formal instructionin conflict or conflict resolution. So I spend a lot of timeeducating. My twenty years in the conflict resolution field runscounter to the above conclusions in some pretty important

ways.First, Ive had it with the good/bad conflict thing, particularlywhen all things rational are good and all things emotional orpolitical are bad. Stop this. Brain science tells us otherwise.The emotional center of your brain literally sends its signalsfaster than the rational center. You have your emotions

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BEFORE you have a chance to rationalize them away. Assuch, all conflict has an emotional component to it simplybecause all conflict involves human beings. We need toaccept this fact and start dealing with it. Politics are woveninto our cognitive conflict all the time. Conflict is aboutdiffering interests and needs, which sometimes connect torational ideas, and sometimes to things like meaning, values,emotions, and the political needs of interest groups. Its all inthere, and we need to build the capacity to deal with all thatcomplexity.

Second, you dont delegate conflict. If you can delegate it toanother group, then wasnt really your conflict to begin with.Im all for pushing conflict down in the organizationget thepeople who have the conflict to actually resolve it, instead ofletting them push it up the chain. Often, they are just beingweak/lazy when they ask the higher ups to resolve it. Ofcourse if the Board is supposed to be making strategicdecisions, and those strategy choices have conflict embedded

in them (which they usually do), then that Board needs tosuck it up and deal with the conflict. If the Board doesnt havetime to do this, then we should be more honest and say thatour Boards role is in high-level oversight of strategicdecisions, rather than in making strategic decisionsthemselves.

Third, Im going to go out on a limb here (since I have ZERO

experience with corporate boards) and boldly declare thatcorporate boards have absolutely nothing to do withassociations and should never be used as a basis forcomparison. Period. Its useless to compare because thecontext and rules are so different. Lets not waste our time.

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Fourth, you dont manage conflict at the end. You manage itall the time. You manage it when the issues are defined at thevery beginning, you manage it when you decide how to collectdata. You manage it when you analyze the data, and youobviously manage it when you work through to agreement onwhat to do next. And when you resolve a particular conflict, itoften simply sets you up for the next conflict you are going todeal with. Conflict is a natural part of every system. It flows allthe time. It emerges on a timeline that you cant particularlycontrol. Forcing these organic dynamics into our mechanicalprocesses is a recipe for failure.

I know conflict is not easy. And I know that when emotionsand politics get involved, it can get harder. And yes, weve allbeen part of groups where decisions fail (or are not made)because conflict got in the way. But the question is not shouldconflict be a part, or what kind of conflict should be there.Conflict is there. The systems that are most effective inshaping their own future will have very strong and refined

skills in dealing with conflict (of all types). The people whooperate in positions of authority in these systems will be ableto behave more effectively in conflict situations. Start buildingthat capacity, and youll start to see better decisions.

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