Power and the Activist

Jenny Pearce reports on a scoping study called ‘Power in Community’ in which she carried out ‘Power Talks’ with community activists in the North of England. She first gives a comprehensive analysis of the meaning of power, ranging from the classic concept of dominating power (power to) to power to cooperate (power with), to empowerment. She concludes that the community activists involved in the scoping exercise were using non-dominating power. They talked of power as enabling others, sharing and listening with others. She argues that evidence of the practice on non dominating powershould be used to shift the debate from ‘empowerment‘ to ‘tranforming power‘.