Theorising Power: A Pragmatist Approach

• In Event: 352 - Theory Section Roundtables (one-hour)
  In Refereed Roundtable: Table 04. Power and Social Movements

Abstract

Power is one of the central concepts of social theory, but the literature on it is fractured. Though this fracture is mainly expressed in terms of ‘power-to’ versus ‘power-over’, there is a deeper and more salient fracture: power as an intervention by agents into their worlds, intended to transform, and power as a generative force, constituting agents and their worlds alike. This distinction arises from different ontological starting points, and there is no obvious ‘bridge’ across the divide—though critical realist approaches come very close. I propose a new view of power based on pragmatist philosophies of action and social construction, mainly taken from John Dewey and some more recent neo-pragmatist social theorists, most notably Hans Joas. On this view, power inheres not in agents or in structures, but in actions. It is analytically divisible into sustaining and evolutionary forms, which function to maintain and transform social worlds and their inhabitants, respectively.
A pragmatist view of power is no via media between interventionary and constitutive theories, and scholars adopting it must commit to a distinct theory of subjectivity, experience, mind, world, and action. However, by doing so, it is possible to retain many of the analytical or critical goals of social science theorising while also achieving two worthy benefits: a more unified conversation about power across the discipline, and a compelling framework for analysing the politics of identity negotiation and strategic interaction during periods of rapid social change.

Author

• Simon Frankel Pratt, University of Toronto