The Bases of Power: Origins and Recent Developments

Abstract

The history and background of the analysis of the basis of power is examined, beginning with its origins in the works of Kurt Lewin and his followers at the Research Center for Group Dynamics, particularly the early research by John R. P. French. The original French and Raven (1959) bases of power model posited six bases of power: reward, coercion, legitimate, expert, referent, and informational (or persuasion; Raven, 1965), Since then, as the result of considerable research, the model has gone through significant developments. A more comprehensive model is presented here that reviews the following: various motivations of the influencing agent; an assessment of available power bases in terms of potential effectiveness, time perspective, personal preferences, values and norms; consideration of other strategies such as manipulation; utilization of various preparatory and stage‐setting devices to strengthen one's power resources; implementation of the power strategies; assessment of effectiveness of influence attempt and its positive and/or negative aftereffects; use of various ameliorative devices; and review, reconsideration, and another round of influence strategies. The overall model is examined in terms of its applicability to various settings including hospital infection control, patient compliance with physicians' recommendations, confrontations between political figures, children's influence on their peers, conflict resolution and negotiation, as well as supervisor/subordinate relationships.

Exploring power assumptions in the leadership and management debate

“…As Clegg and Ross-Smith (2003) highlight, it was the philosopher Bertrand Russell (1938) who said that just as the fundamental concept in physics is that of energy, so power is the fundamental concept in social science. The term 'power' is highly contested in itself and can be conceptualized from a behavioural perspective (French and Raven, 1959;Raven, 1992Raven, , 1993) and a charismatic perspective (Yukl, 1994). It further includes perspectives on gender, networks, decision processes, boundary management, uncertainty, control of technology, control of counter-organisations power (Morgan, 1986), sexual power (Foucault, 1984), knowledge and information (Jackson and Carter, 2000;Morgan, 1986;Pettigrew, 1972), ecological control (Cartwright, 1965;Oldham, 1976), and truth (Jackson and Carter, 2000).…”

Power Congruence Approaches to Downward Influence in Malaysia Manufacturing Industry

“…This could probably be due to the fact that supervisors were reluctant to admit or recognize the referent or expertise power bases of their subordinates, and in such situations those power cannot be translated into influence on the supervisors (Rodrigues & Lloyd, 1998). As noted by Greene and Podsakoff (1981), when the leaders were under pressure to maintain high-productivity deadline, they would tend to disregard their subordinates' power and judged the targets as unworthy and hence use more hard tactics (Raven, 1993).…”

Reflexões Sobre as Concepções Clássicas De Poder Nas Redes Interorganizacionais: Uma Proposta Conceitual Para Futuros Estudos

“…Entre os teóricos mais citados, quando o assunto redes se encontra associado ao tema do poder, encontram-se Foucault (1979), French e Raven (1959), Raven (1992), Krausz (1988) e Zaheer, Gözubüyuk e Milanov (2010), por suas importantes contribuições à academia (SATYRO; TELLES; GIGLIO, 2014;OLIVEIRA;SACOMANO;BOAVENTURA, 2016).…”