Power is not simply the force someone possesses; it is the capacity to steer others' behaviour, to narrow their options and to render some possibilities invisible before they are born. It does not sit in a chair; it lives in the web of relations that make the chair meaningful.
When power is mentioned our eyes usually turn upwards. We look at government buildings, parliaments, heads of state, the boards of large companies and the people constantly on our screens. This view is not wholly wrong, because law, money, media and the capacity for coercion really are concentrated in particular centres. But when we see power only as something standing at the top, we miss how it is produced within everyday relations and how it passes through us.
Power is not simply the force someone possesses. It is the capacity to steer others’ behaviour, to narrow their options, to set the agenda and to render some possibilities invisible before they are born. Sometimes it works through an open command, sometimes through reward, knowledge, habit, or by determining what counts as “normal.” The lock on a door, a required field on a form, a bank’s credit score, a workplace performance measure or the visibility order of social media can shape our behaviour without anyone raising their voice.
A possession, or a relation that is built?
When we think of power as an object we assume that seizing it will solve everything. If power in bad hands passes to good hands the order will improve. Yet those who take over an office often come to resemble the previous rulers, and this cannot be explained by personal weakness alone. The institution’s workings, its secrecy, its distribution of resources and its way of taking decisions shape the new manager too. Power does not sit in a chair; it lives in the web of relations that make that chair meaningful.
We must therefore look as much at how power circulates as at who holds it. A manager commands, but the execution of the command requires an official, an employee, a technical system, a record and usually a degree of cooperation from the governed. This does not mean everyone can step outside the order whenever they wish. Livelihood, debt, law and violence are extremely real limits. Even so it shows that power is not a machine running entirely by itself. When the relation changes, when cooperation is withdrawn or when a different cooperation is built, the balance of power can change too.
Setting the agenda is as strong as taking the decision
Power determines not only which decision will be taken but which subjects may be discussed. If a wage increase never comes onto the agenda at a workplace and meetings are held only about productivity, the field of discussion has been limited in advance. If in an urban project the question “should this project be built?” is closed and only “what colour should it be?” is asked, there is an appearance of participation while the fundamental decision has long been made.
The power of agenda-setting is even more visible in the media. Which event becomes news, in which words it is described and who is invited as an expert affect what the public will count as a problem. Giving false information about a subject is a use of power; so is never showing that subject at all. Needs left invisible cannot become political demands; harm without a name is experienced as personal misfortune. Power sometimes does not impose answers but draws the limit of the questions that may be asked.
Who determines what is normal?
One of the most lasting forms of power is the one that does not present itself as power. Definitions such as “normal person,” “successful life,” “good family,” “reasonable employee” or “trustworthy citizen” quietly steer our behaviour. People arrange themselves not only to avoid punishment but to count as normal and to be accepted. Someone whose body, speech, desire or way of life does not fit the mould must constantly explain themselves, while whoever stays inside the norm may take their position for natural.
Power is therefore not only a force that forbids; it also produces identities, desires and goals. That we want to work more, evaluate ourselves by measures, treat visibility as success or see consumer choice as the basic form of freedom may not be imposed purely from outside. When power takes part in the formation of what we want, resisting it becomes harder. Before us stands not merely an authority that says “no” but a wide culture telling us what kind of “self” we should be.
There is power below as well
That power exists everywhere does not mean everyone is equally powerful. One employee pressuring a colleague is not on the same scale as a company owner’s authority to dismiss thousands. The state’s apparatus of punishment cannot be reduced to emotional steering within a family. If the sentence “everyone uses power” is used to render great inequalities invisible, it loses its critical force.
Still, treating power as belonging only to those above lets us absolve the small superiorities we build in our own relations. Someone hoarding information in a dissident community, an individual leaving the burden of care to another at home, or a person creating silence through mockery in a group of friends also narrows the field of behaviour. It is easy to criticise large structures while overlooking our small powers. Yet another life can be built not only by changing central power but by transforming everyday relations too.
Where resistance begins
If power is relational, resistance does not begin only at the palace gate. Sharing information at work, determining the agenda of a meeting together, dividing care work fairly, demanding the reasons behind an algorithmic decision or objecting to a group’s exclusionary language are small but real interventions. None of these abolishes the great centres of power by itself. But they disrupt power’s everyday reproduction and enlarge people’s capacity to act together.
We should not be romantic here. Saying that power exists in every relation does not mean we can build a pure space wholly cleansed of it. Shared life involves influence, negotiation and mutual steering. The real issue is whether influence becomes one-sided, permanent and unaccountable. When we see power not merely as an object to be seized but as a relation requiring constant supervision, the question changes too: instead of settling for “who holds power?”, we begin to ask “how is this power built, whom does it silence, and how can it be shared?”