Intro
Let us look at the different meanings of power and then map out these meanings to the different theoretical approaches to power.
Three meanings of power:
-
Power as ‘capacity’ i.e. the possession of control or command over others. The conception of power here is that of capacity, meaning the capacity to get others to do what you want them to do.
-
Power as “legal ability, capacity or authority to act; especially delegated authority”. Here power is the ‘right’ that some people have to tell others what to do.
-
Power as the “ability to do or affect something or anything”. Power, in this sense, relates to human agency; that is, to one’s ability to ‘make a difference’ in the world.
Finally, it should be noted that these three meanings of power can overlap. Continue reading ‘Seminar Eighteen: Power and the new politics’
In the last seminar we mentioned trends that showed higher levels of religiosity in the United States, compared to Europe, yet ironically America has a stricter separation of state and religion, then say Britain. For example, Britain has an established state Church and a network of faith schools under the state sector (where some individuals may claim membership of religious organizations to access these schools for their children). In the United States, on the other hand, there is a complete separation of religion from all state functions and provisions. At first it would seem that a state sponsor of a religious tradition would result in higher levels of religiosity, but in the case of Britain and the United States the opposite is true. To understand these differing trends you might want to consider the writings of Roger Finke & Rodney Stark. In their book ‘The Churching of America, 1776-1990: Winners and Losers in Our Religious Economy’ they liken religious activity to a marketplace. What concerns them most is the market supply of religion, and in countries where religious activity is deregulated, as in the United States, and there exists a vast plurality, each religious organisation is in competition with the other — as is the case when companies outbid each other in the production and marketing of consumer commodities. 
The objective of this seminar is to examine the relationship between consumption, late modernity and identity (and specifically class identity). First let us start with Baudrillard’s extreme post-modernist perspective, one that argues that identities in post-modernity have become increasingly frivolous. Rather, we now live in an individualized society, where collective identities no longer define as was the case in the past. 
