Theories of power: Weber

Question 1

Power (3):

Answer 1

• Machiavelli: political and economic sphere.
• Habermas: public sphere integrated with personal dimensions.
• Weber: concentration of domination as the central element of power, and the manipulation of others.

Question 2

Weber’s forms of power (3):

Answer 2

Emphasis on domination.

• Charismatic (familial or religious)
• Traditional (patriarchs, royal, aristocracy)
• Rational-legal (modern bureaucratic).

Question 3

Weber’s concept of instrumental rationality (stems from legal-rational) [3]:

Answer 3

• Modern bureaucracies wield distinct forms of power, relying on ‘objectivised’ procedures and impersonal relationships.
• Social workers will have this form of authority.
• He describes it as an iron cage, as we lose our humanity and become a part of a machine (efficiency as the goal, not morals).

Question 4

Legal-rational authority relies on (5):

…also note issues with this authority (4).

Answer 4

• Impersonal relations.
• Abstract rules.
• Political neutrality.
• Objective decision-making is removed from any one person’s influence.
• Ascension-based on merit.

Issues: creates a stagnant system; complacent with discrimination/disadvantage; loss of moral guidance; leads to generalist approaches.

Question 5

Modern institutions and bureaucratic domination (3):

Answer 5

• Domination is achieved through knowledge production.
• If you do not share in the knowledge systems that the institutions are built, you are othered.
• Some individuals cannot derive power from legal-rational institutions (e.g. homeless, children, elderly, migrants, First Nations Peoples, etc).