Political Power
Political power is the capability to influence political decisions. Power is derived from personal and organizational sources and resources of the actors and is subject to the perceptions of the power positions as viewed by the competing forces seeking a political decision.
German sociologist Max Weber suggests that the notion of power related to politics means ìstriving to share power or striving to influence the distribution of power, either among states or among groups within the stateî (1946, 78). He contends that those active in politics attain power for one of two motives: ìeither as a means in serving other aims, ideal or egoistic, or as ëpower for powerís sake,í that is, in order to enjoy the prestige-feeling that power givesî (78). David Truman concludes from Weberís views that ìin the governmental activity of interest groups both motives are frequently at work, but the former is perhaps more often dominantî (1971, 264). Truman contends that whichever of the power motives defined by Weber is operative at any point of time, ìpower of any kind cannot be reached by a political interest group, or its leaders, without access to one or more key points of decision in the governmentî (271). He suggests that the key decision points ìmay be explicitly established by the formal legal framework of the government, or they may lie in the gaps and interstices of the formal structure, protected by custom or by semi-obscurityî (271).
In a nineteenth-century letter to Mandell Creighton concerning the review of Creightonís third and fourth volumes of the History of the Papacy during the Reformation, Lord Acton warned the institutions of liberty of the need to limit political power:
I cannot accept your canon [Creightonís] that we are to judge Pope and King unlike other men, with a favourable presumption that they did no wrong. If there is any presumption it is the other way against holders of power, increasing as the power increases. Historic responsibility has to make up for the want of legal responsibility. Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power tends to corrupt absolutely [highlight added]. (1948, 364)
Finer counters Actonís connotation of power with the following observations and counterpoint:
Against the corruption that results from the exercise of power is to be weighed its benefits to the statesman or thinker or priest or citizen (who may be all three) who wields it. Power heightens sensitiveness; it stimulates the imagination of purposes and expedients; it generates invention; it increases compassion when it places men where they confront the sorrows which government exists to assuage and the trials that must be visited upon some in order that others may have a more abundant life; and it develops fortitude and humility. Power compels men to think, to choose, to endeavor towards the conquest of pain and the discovery of truth. Is this catalogue not at least as tenable as Actonís sweeping anathema? (1949, 18)
The views of Weber, Truman, Acton, and Finer suggest that power is a human phenomenon, that power interacts at key points in the decision process, that power may have a corrupting dimension and thus must be limited, and that the positive nature of power contributes to the progress of society.