IMPLICATIONS OF POWER:

1. Power is not just a social or economic phenomenon but also a political one;
2. Power, influence, control, authority and rights are all distinct concepts;
3. Power is latent force, force manifests power and authority is institutionalized power;
4. Power resides in numbers, social organization and resources.
 Hannah Arendt defines authority as a non-power. It demands obedience but is beyond
power or violence; where there arises a need for violence, authority itself has failed. It is
also not synonymous to persuasion—as persuasion alludes to a sense of equality and the
logical process of argumentation. Authority is related to power but it is not the same.On the
other hand, authority is legitimized power. So, when we are talking about powerful people
that make sense, we are actually talking about people who have authority. Authority
emerges as a form of compulsion that is distinct from violence but has something in
common with it because it requires unquestioned obedience; its hallmark is unquestioning
recognition by those who are asked to obey, neither coercion nor persuasion is required
(Arendt, 1970). Authority a la Joseph Raz—is a normative liberal theory giving primacy to
freedom. Raz echoes the basic of Weber and Arendt’s theory, that is, authority is not
equivalent to coercive power. Replacing coercion with authority is a move in the direction of
legitimizing political institutions.