Revision summary
A base of power is whatever enables A to affect B. Dahl locates it in observable decisions; Bachrach and Baratz in agenda; Lukes in shaped wants. Weber lists tradition, charisma, and legal-rational legitimacy. Foucault adds productive discipline and knowledge. Gramsci’s hegemony and Indian basic-structure review are further institutional bases.
Model answer
Copper italics in this answer — like this — are the key facts. Each one is unpacked in the Facts & figures rail.
Introduction
Bases of power are the resources and relations that make A able to affect B. Political theory names several maps: decision, agenda, ideology, and the productive routines that form subjects.
Body
Maps of the base
- Robert Dahl treated power as A getting B to do what B would not otherwise do, visible in decisions, as in Who Governs?
- Peter Bachrach and Morton Baratz added non-decision: keeping issues off the agenda is itself a base.
- Steven Lukes added a third face: shaping wants so that conflict never appears.
- Max Weber based legitimate domination on tradition, charisma, and legal-rational office.
- John French and Bertram Raven listed reward, coercion, legitimacy, expertise, and referent identification as social-psychological bases.
- Michel Foucault shifted the base from a stock owned by a sovereign to capillary discipline and bio-power joined to knowledge.
Political use
- A constitution lists offices. Bases of power ask who actually prevails in the municipality, the party, and the clinic.
- Antonio Gramsci’s hegemony is consent in civil society, another base besides the state’s coercion.
- Indian judicial review after Kesavananda Bharati (1973) is a legal-rational base that can check the amending legislature.
- No single list is complete. Dahl’s decisions, Lukes’s silence, and Foucault’s routines must be read together.
Flow diagram
flowchart TD P[Bases of power] --> D[Dahl decisions] P --> N[Bachrach non-decision] P --> L[Lukes third face] P --> F[Foucault discipline] P --> W[Weber legitimacy]
Conclusion
Bases of power are decision, agenda, preference-shaping, legitimacy types, and disciplinary knowledge. Dahl, Lukes, Weber, and Foucault name the main files. Office is only one base.
Quick related
Students also ask
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Locke's Social Contract.
Next question on this syllabus topic (2022 · Q1(e)). View answer →
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Is authority the same as power?
Authority is power accepted as legitimate, in Weber’s sense. Power can also be coercion without that acceptance.
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Can rights be a base of power?
Yes. Justiciable rights and writs under Articles 32 and 226 are legal bases against the state.
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