The institutionalization of political power
The institutionalisation of political power
The multiplicity of the questions we have raised, however cursorily, in the second section of this chapter, and the diversity and complexity of the answers we have sketched, emphasise a point made above: political power is a momentous, pervasive, critical phenomenon. Together with other forms of social power, it constitutes an indispensable medium for constructing and shaping larger social realities, for establishing, shaping and maintaining all broader and more durable collectivities.
So far we have considered political power in its generic aspects. From now on, our attention is focused on the most massive and significant of its modern manifestations, the state. Before that, however, we may reflect that the state itself constitutes only one modality of a somewhat wider phenomenon - the institutionalisation of political power.
That wider phenomenon comprises three aspects, according to the German sociologist Heinrich Popitz:
First, there is the growing depersonalisation of power relations. Power no longer stands or falls with one particular individual who at any given time happens to have a decisive say. It connects progressively with determinate functions and positions which transcend individuals. Then, there is growing formalisation. The exercise of power becomes more and more oriented to rules, procedures and rituals. (This does not exclude arbitrium. But one may speak of arbitrium, or of favour, only in so far as arbitrary decisions and acts of favour stand out over against what is done as a rule.) A third aspect of the institutionalisation of power is the growing integration of power relations into a comprehensive order. Power gears itself into the existent conditions. It embeds itself, and becomes absorbed into the social edifice, which it supports and by which it is in turn supported, [my translation]23
In the next three chapters, first by developing a conceptual portrait of the state, and then by reviewing
The multiplicity of the questions we have raised, however cursorily, in the second section of this chapter, and the diversity and complexity of the answers we have sketched, emphasise a point made above: political power is a momentous, pervasive, critical phenomenon. Together with other forms of social power, it constitutes an indispensable medium for constructing and shaping larger social realities, for establishing, shaping and maintaining all broader and more durable collectivities.
So far we have considered political power in its generic aspects. From now on, our attention is focused on the most massive and significant of its modern manifestations, the state. Before that, however, we may reflect that the state itself constitutes only one modality of a somewhat wider phenomenon - the institutionalisation of political power.
That wider phenomenon comprises three aspects, according to the German sociologist Heinrich Popitz:
First, there is the growing depersonalisation of power relations. Power no longer stands or falls with one particular individual who at any given time happens to have a decisive say. It connects progressively with determinate functions and positions which transcend individuals. Then, there is growing formalisation. The exercise of power becomes more and more oriented to rules, procedures and rituals. (This does not exclude arbitrium. But one may speak of arbitrium, or of favour, only in so far as arbitrary decisions and acts of favour stand out over against what is done as a rule.) A third aspect of the institutionalisation of power is the growing integration of power relations into a comprehensive order. Power gears itself into the existent conditions. It embeds itself, and becomes absorbed into the social edifice, which it supports and by which it is in turn supported, [my translation]23
In the next three chapters, first by developing a conceptual portrait of the state, and then by reviewing