Power and Leadership
When you reflect on the concept of power, notice what comes up for you. Are you someone who desires power? Do you feel repulsed by it? Do you have other feelings that arise altogether that fall somewhere outside those two binary poles?
“Power properly understood is nothing but the ability to achieve purpose. It is the strength required to bring about social, political and economic change.”
~Martin Luther King, Jr. (Where Do We Go from Here: Chaos or Community?)
In line with the understanding referenced in Dr. King’s quote above, let’s try to look at power from a neutral perspective, without value judgements.
Power just is.
Power is everywhere, like energy or electricity. It is the key to any kind of change–positive or negative. If you are a Star Wars fan, think of power like the Force–a continuum of power that moves between the dark and light side. In A New Hope, Obi-Wan Kenobi explains the Force to Luke this way, “It’s an energy field created by all living things. It surrounds us and penetrates us; it binds the galaxy together.” In other words, power in all its forms shapes our experience of the world around us.
Because of the predominance of unjust systems, power is often held by the few, while many others hold none. At times, those holding power aren’t aware of or even curious about their own privilege and the ways it impacts their use of power. At other times, those holding power may be keenly aware of their privilege and its impact on their experience and that of those around them. What they choose to do with that awareness determines so much for those who are impacted by their leadership.
We might find ourselves feeling angry and frustrated at the thought of anyone holding any kind of power. It can feel constricting, manipulative or coercive, especially if people hoard and oppress by holding power over others. However, if we take a moment to notice what it feels like to have our autonomy taken away–to feel powerless–then we can begin to recognize the significance of power, and the great need not to do away with power (which is simply not an option – remember the Force) but rather to channel it in a just and equitable way.
In the Creating an Ecology of Self-Determination module, we talked about categories and containers. As humans, we need categories and containers to organize and make sense of all the stimulus that comes our way. Similarly, we also need human systems to organize ourselves and bring order to the chaos. Again, we may feel resistance to this idea if we’ve experienced oppression and injustice within such systems; the reality is that most systems today were built on a foundation of colonialism that continues to harm people. But there are other ways to wield power. There are other ways to lead.
The questions we must ask as individuals and as a collective society are: How do we want to wield and share this power? Do we want to live in societies and systems where a small group of people in charge hoard power, o