> - "capacity" to denote the possession of necessary resources to pursue a
> certain course of action
> - "disposition" to denote the willingness or propensity to pursue a
> certain course of action (which can be imputed or demonstrated)
> - "coercion" to denote the capacity or disposition to overecome
> opposition to a certain course of action
> - "authority" to denote the perceived legitimacy to pursue a certain
> course of action by certain types of actors
> - "feedback" to denote the type and magnitude of effects of a certain
> type of action or interaction on the actor and his/her capacity,
> disposition, and authority
>
> These are different aspects of human interaction that are all confounded
> in the notion of power. For that reason, the concept of power often
> obfuscates more than it can explain.
But the point is that these different modes of power, different power relations, and there are more as well, can move through and into one another, and are themselves defined/understood differently in different contexts. For those reasons alone, the concept of "power" is itself still useful.
> What is more, it has been often
> used as a claim in a political discourse, to counterbalance the official
> postion that almost always claims legitimacy. In this context, the
> notion of "power" takes yet another meaning that can be summarized as
> "the social reality is not as consensula as the authorities claim."
I am not sure what you mean here.
> Another thing - in B/D relationships, power and its asymmetrical
> distribution are a desirable thing. Would you say that such
> relationships are inconsistent with "love" ?
In every relationship power can be asymmetrical and often is, and that asymmetry is often desirable, inspiring, seductive, pleasurable, fun.
Catherine