Power, evil and the web

While traveling through the German countryside recently I found myself yet again marveling at the way otherwise decent innocent people allowed themselves to fall under the spell of a much smaller group of deluded and evil individuals and allow inconceivable atrocities to take place.

As I watch the images of current events in Burma I find myself wondering the same thing.

At the same time I am being asked to support a large change programme in a major corporate which would mean easing power away from those who currently have it.

What is it about power that makes people give it away to others? No one has power over us unless at one level we give it to them. Once we have given it to them how do we get it back without being as bad as them? What, if anything, has the web to teach us about how we exercise our rights and responsibilities and how can we use this experience to make the abuse of power less likely or to make the re-distirbution of it more even.

Comments

[cheryl]

there seems to be an assumption in what you write that power is finite - that there's a fixed amount of power that has to be shared. do you think that? i think it makes a massive difference to how your thoughts are responded to.

[Euan]

I reckon it is infinite but tends to congeal ...

[Jon Husband]

What is it about power that makes people give it away to others? No one has power over us unless at one level we give it to them. Once we have given it to them how do we get it back without being as bad as them?

I think that for many people there is a real and visceral need to get a job after they leave school, and of course when you are early in your working life, there is as or more often than not a strong need to "please" others to keep going in the job, acquire experience, etc. And there is implicit power (if not explicit) in the people-managing schemes and structures extant in most organizations of any size, which is still where a majority of people's gainful employment takes place. And I'd argue that there has been an accunulation, layering and refinement of that large process as management "science" has had its way with organizations and management over the past half-century or so.

And so the socialization continues on ... which may be why corporations and corporatism figure prominently in the definition(s) of fascism.

And I also think I think that it takes some experience in adult life, some acquisition and internalization of context, to begin to realize that you are or could be an independent actor, and needn't knuckle under to institutionalized power.

[Euan Semple]

Thanks Jon - you just defined the real work we have to do.

[Jon Husband]

Thanks, Euan. That's a compliment.

And, I could not have written that when I was only 35 or so ... or at least not in the same way.

[Joining Dots]

Well Jon just made my year! I'll stop griping about getting old when I hit 35 later this year :-)

I think there is another aspect to giving power to others - laziness in all its various forms. There's that quote - 'for evil to flourish, it is necessary only for good men do nothing'. On a less drastic scale, you see this all the time in organisations - 'that's the way things are around here' used to justify inaction. Why do so many people settle for the easy option? 'It's not a great job but I get a good pay deal.' When I set up as an independent last year, most of my old colleagues thought I was brave or stupid. They couldn't believe that I was giving up the stability of Microsoft to go solo.

People become conditioned by their environment - 'I have a family to support', 'A mortgage to pay'... it's harsh to say but they are all excuses to take the easy option. And that means handing power over to someone else.