Inner truth: Power is a relation

Power is a relation between two persons  When I exercise power over you: I influence your behaviour, or I try to do so. And I try to guide your behaviour, to lead your behaviour. The simplest means of doing this, obviously, is to take you by the hand and force you to go here or there. That’s the limit case, the zero-degree of power.

And it’s actually in that moment that power ceases to be power and becomes mere physical force. On the other hand, if I use my age, my social position, the knowledge I may have about this or that, to make you behave in some particular way—that is to say, I’m not forcing you at all and I’m leaving you completely free—that’s when I begin to exercise power. It’s clear that power takes place when there is a relation between two free subjects, so that one can act upon the other, and the other is acted upon, or allows himself to be acted upon. Therefore, power is not always repressive and it is possible to have open relations of power .

The author (1926 – 1984) was a French philosopher, social theorist, philologist  and literary critic