Political Science
Essay by cavine • October 14, 2011 • 3,696 Words (15 Pages) • 1,495 Views
1. What is political power and should we be concerned if it is concentrated in the hands of a few?
Political power is the exercise of rule through coercion and consent in liberal democracies. The exercise of power is usually structured within the state and civil societies. Political power can be exercised through different formation of alliances. The alliances are formed to govern different facets of political, economic and social activities. The realms of political power does not emphasize on the personal autonomy, but rather on individuals participation in power operations.
Political power focuses on governmentality. Government exercises the power on wealth, health and happiness of its citizens. It demonstrates a system where the power revolves in the hands of the few who are considered as the rulers. From the system of governmentality, it is evident that political power exists within a government. Government is charged with the responsibility of governing the welfare of the citizen and the transformation of the individuals' social relations. Each government has a system of its own that is constituted in respect to the policies. Through the governments invested by political power, the articulated policies are realized. Political power is therefore, meant to give directions to the beliefs and dreams upon their political environment. It is through the structure of government that the political rules and powers are defined, restricted and related to the will of the citizens.
There is no government without a form of political power. However, the concern of populations regarding political power is how the rule is exercised. To exercise power over individual, knowledge is fundamental. It guides the activities and the formation of the political and the government policies. The other concern of population to the forms of political powers is their rationalities. Rationalities of political powers define the moral justifications of ways of exercising powers to the subjects. It questions the appropriate forms of political power by trying to object and limit certain forms of politics. The concept of rationalization in political power also emphasizes on the distribution of powers to different sectors within a state. The analysis of political rationalities and government machineries help understand the network and connections of the individuals to the political powers. This enables one to determine the level of organizations and expectations of different political authorities to the liberal democracies.
Political power is exercised on the basis of an elaborate form of networks. The networks are usually formed within the institutions and organizations that constitute the government. The states usually constitute themselves to define the various procedures of rule over the state territories. Some of the areas that the state may decide to exercise their political power may include the imposition of national language to enable the fusion of the state territory. However, the key institutions that are involved in such exercise are centralized. Such institutions vested with the political powers have offices and agencies that are permanent. The centralized institutions are usually given the mandate to exercise their rule in areas such as raising funds in form of taxes. The states that are coerced with extreme political powers have the legitimacy to exercise force over its territory and its people. This form of political power is referred to as domestic political power. This kind of political power is centralized and concentrated within the hands of the few state machines. The few that exercise their power have considered ruling majority in a unified form of actors. They normally have the autonomy over its subjects with a domestically pursued interest over the populations perhaps through warfare or diplomatic ideals.
This system of political power is in contrast to the modern political power. In modern terms, the state has no functionality as witnessed in the traditional form of political power. The state, here, is viewed as a system in which the government problems are channeled and embedded. It divides the political sphere with other systems of political rules such as coercion. The systems also divide on the machineries to be used by the state government in establishing the durability of a certain political rule. The modern system of political power no longer concerns with the powers that are accrued to the state and the individuals. Its central concern in the political power spheres is how and to what extent the state and its rulers ascertain its political powers. Government of a state analyses the relationships between the political powers and the authorities who exercise the power. Other concerns are on what resources are utilized within the system, how are they acquired and the operations embedded on these different techniques.
Political power is relevant in the hands of the few to extend that the state government is able to understand what power is and to what extend should it be exercised. It is also rational if those who are entrusted with power are able to analyze the effects that the political power is able to produce and issues that must be put into considerations in order to govern. The second area of attention to political powers is how it affects the language of a nation. The political wheels have forgotten the way significance should be accrued to issues of states language. Through language, the state is able to conceptualize and articulates its rules. Language is regarded as being perfomative and should not be perverted by the rule of the political power. It is used as the machine through which the political powers and authorities structure their thoughts and analyze the problems of exercising too much power to the populations. Language is also the wheel through which the systems encode their actions in order to give effect to the political power (government) over its subjects.
Political powers can sometimes be a demeanor to political authorities. Political power empowers particular entities to act and speak on behalf of the territories of a particular nation. It might establish the limits and the excess of power. This system of the political power is usually referred to as geopolitical. The system demarcates the boundaries of rule of politics and constitutes certain agencies to speak for a population. The authorities also place the populations in isolation with other external entities. The fostering of such configurations is usually meant to boost conceptual relationships with events in particular locations.
Political powers are linked to various networks of rule. This has enhanced divisions and relations of rules and other political powers in the state administration. Actors of political powers are often elected into the state office. They are then given the political authorities
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