Constructing knowledge-power

Here I want to give a brief overview of some of the ways that discourses construct power, and how that power produces knowledge. When we say that someone has power, what we mean is that we have imagined a concept of power in a manner that provides that person with a lot of it.

Democratic knowledge-power

Votes are a type of power. Who wins an election is decided by the votes of the people. Someone is not legitimately allowed to hold an office unless they win those votes. This is generally accepted, and people who do not win the votes concede and those who do win the votes are considered allowed to hold that office, even by people who wish that they didn't.

Votes are something that we collectively imagine. There are things that we write on bits of paper, or record electronically, but their power comes from us collectively agreeing that this is a process that should decide who holds office and who doesn't. Voting is a discourse about who is justified in behaving in a certain way (that is, who is justified in holding office) and who is not (that is, who we should remove because they aren't supposed to be there).

Similarly, the powers of those offices are also something that we collectively imagine. Certain ministers are allowed to use particular powers, such as deciding who is and who is not allowed in the country, or who should or should not be prosecuted in certain circumstances. That these people are legitimately allowed to exercise these powers is something that is justified by discourse; the discourse is that certain people are justified in behaving certain ways and other people are not. Not only that, but that when these people make certain statements, we are justified in following them and not justified in ignoring them - that is the type of power that they wield.

This type of power comes from a knowledge base of the principles of democracy, and why they make things legitimate, and this type of power also produces knowledge. Democracy works because it follows the will of the people, but what is produced by democracy is knowledge of the will of the people - that something can be "right" because the people have deliberated upon it. What politicians and ministers say hold weight because these people are in positions of authority, and the authority is not arbitrary.

Economic knowledge-power

A common form of power is economic power (I've written extensively about this in my discussion of exchange economies and non-reciprocal gifting economies). Exchange value is the core of economic power. This includes having things like money, money-like things like stocks and bonds, and assets that are valued in monetary terms. None of these things has exchange value in an inherent way. Instead, they have exchange value because we collectively agree that they do. We collectively agree that money is something that we can use to trade for goods and services. Without that collective agreement, money is just metal circles, or rectangles of plastic, or bits of data in a computer.

However, once we agree that it has exchange-value, it is now something that gives people access to goods and services. It can be used to justifying denying people food and shelter, or to justify giving some people lots of luxurious goods, or justifying hurting people. Economic power has an enormous impact.

The utility of the economy comes from academic and practical knowledge about ther fairness of exchanging goods, and how markets provide means for people to make rational decisions about resource allocation. And this type of logic suggests that whatever market outcomes occur are the most rational outcomes - that is, that the market is always "right" when people are allowed to engage with exchanges freely. The people who have the most market power and can direct the most resources using exchanges are therefore generally considered to be "right" or "rational" in what they do.

Legal-moral knowledge-power

Associated with things like democratic power is legal-moral power. This is the justification that we can treat people certain ways - such as taking their things, restricting their movement, locking them up, hurting them or even killing them - because there is something called the "law" that we agree it is appropriate to enforce. The discourse of the law is that the law is a legal-moral code that applies to everyone and that certain people are justified in taking action that enforces it.

Legal-moral power shows up in a variety of ways. The police and the armed forces are justified in using violence. Judges are justified in directing the behaviour of others to use violence. And governments are also not justified in taking certain actions against citizens, because of their rights. Sometimes citizens are justified in using violence because of these rights.

Judicial power comes from legislation and judicial tradition, but also continues to create more legal tradition through precedence.

Violent knowledge-power

Perhaps the most common discourse is that of violent power. Violence, some say, is the ultimate type of power - the one that underlies everything else. According to this type of discourse, there is no other "real" power, and whatever else we might imagine exists (such as legal power) is really a dressed up use of violence.

One such pervasive discourse is "might makes right", which suggests that the capacity for violent power is the source of all legitimacy. This particular discourse doesn't really suggest that violent power is justified, but it does imply that it needs to be accepted and is therefore tacitly permissive of it. It can justify why people prepare to use force, and in some cases it is the justification of the pre-emptive use of force.

But it doesn't seem to be a universally practiced discourse. A lot of ancient societies had elders as their leaders, including many indigenous societies, ancient Athens and the Roman Senate. I would guess that Trump is unlikely to win a fight, nor Elon Musk, and yet they can direct around vast amounts of resources and direct violence at others. The reason it would be tricky to overpower Trump is not because he is particularly strong, but because of the belief of the people around him who protect him (such as the Secret Service), who are following something other than strength, such as loyalty to democracy, procedure or employment.

In fact, sometimes the use of violent power can lead to condemnation that means that desired goal was not achieved - the relevant members of society are far more likely to refuse to cooperate or include the violent members. When violent power occurs in groups, something must bind the group together so that they can trust each other - some loyalty to a purpose or identity that is constructed, such as nationalism or anti-authoritarian revolution.

Violent power is a common discourse, but it is still a construct of discourse and not something that transcends it.