The Problems of Power
Sibley, Mulford Q.
DEMOCRACY AND THE CHALLENGE OF POWER, by David Spitz. Columbia University Press, 1958. 179 pp. $5.00. "Power" seems to have a peculiar fascination for the modern mind, in part, perhaps,...
...that subjection to some restraints and possible "abuses" of power is always the cost for the removal of restraints in other areas...
...What is more, all the devices which have been suggested to limit the abuses of power in so-called democratic societies are inadequate...
...We have sometimes minimized the inevitable costs, whether under capitalism or socialism, of technological growth...
...trapped by the superordinate-subordinate relations which become more ubiquitous as technological and industrial processes grow in complexity...
...Any discussion of power in an industrialized would-be democratic sosiety, moreover, will certainly raise for socialists the whole question of the relation between socialist values and technology...
...It stresses the limitations of merely mechanical schemes, to which, unfortunately, even socialists are often attached...
...In the last analysis, "the question for the democratic (as for every) state is not whether or not there shall be restraints, whether or not there shall be abuses...
...Power" seems to have a peculiar fascination for the modern mind, in part, perhaps, because men feel en...
...and democratic society is forever confronted by the quest for piecemeal rather than over-all "solutions...
...Here again the critic is doubtful...
...It is questions of this order which the critical socialist will ask himself when confronted by the problems of power in a democratic society and by the inevitable value choices to which those problems give rise...
...Throughout most of his discussion, David Spitz treads familiar ground and with relative brevity...
...In the first place, our ability to discriminate between "democratic" and "authoritarian" personalities is not really very great...
...True, it has been suggested that the rediscovery of "right" principles and an appeal to them might tend more nearly to make power the instrument of equity and justice...
...This way of putting the problems of power and freedom is, of course, not essentially a new one but it is, I think—provided one does not exclude the "single problem" approach —a valid one...
...for in the very effort to implement primary socialist values, he may have to subordinate other values to which, traditionally, he has also been attached...
...Would we not in this event be on the road to a solution...
...All "democratic" states, he correctly maintains, have in fact denied the legitimate rights of at least some of their citizens and have failed to make power-holders fully responsible...
...Like most non-socialists, we have frequently accepted increasingly complex technology as a given, to which we must somehow "adjust...
...and the person, however "democratic" he may be in terms of the psychological tests (assuming the tests are valid), will find that in a position of authority the tendency for power to corrupt is still present...
...Too often in the past we have tended to accept a kind of "cultural lag" doctrine, which seemed to say that while society had been unable to control technology for democratic socialist ends in the past, in the future our methods of control would "catch up" with technological development...
...for a democratic system must be aware that both varieties will help shape the possibility of "freedoms" in particular areas...
...And the "conserva tive" appeal to "tradition" is correctly countered by the question, "Which tradition...
...For churches, corporations, and unions, either through their own internal undemocratic structures or through their utilization of the inevitable social power which they possess, have made it more difficult to implement democratic ideals...
...Ought we not recognize more frequently that socialist values could force us in some contingencies to sacrifice economic efficiency in behalf of what we deem higher social and political values...
...The "problem" of power, far from being a single issue, is in reality a series of problems...
...and while from one point of view this may bring hope, from yet another it can only lead to dilemmas and often to despair...
...Is a trade union operating under a "union-shop" con tract within the confines of a complex labor relations law and under conditions of quasi-monopoly capitalism exercising "political" or "nonpolitical" power when it threatens a member with expulsion...
...As for the union of economic and political orders through government ownership and administration, it would perhaps make economic power publicly responsible and accountable but at the same time could greatly enhance the danger of tyranny...
...The question is one of values, of the proper primacy or hierarchy of freedoms, and of the order or classes of men who shall enjoy or be denied these freedoms, or some of them...
...It takes us back to value choices and re-emphasizes that there is a price tag attached to the enlargement of every particular freedom...
...But Spitz rightly criticizes Mr...
...Institutional schemes for the fragmentization and decentralization of power, such as one finds in the American political system, tend to fail: they become so complicated that governments cannot act, thus leaving crucial decisions to private power structures which are not effectively accountable to the community as a whole...
...Under industrialism, whether "mature capitalist" or socialist, all major aspects of society tend to become politicized...
...Ought we not to stress the notion that in a socialist society our scheme of values might lead us to limit or impair technological growth as well as, under certain circumstances, to encourage it...
...Moreover, self-criticisms by those of us who call ourselves socialists have centered in considerable measure on our alleged past deficiencies in this field...
...A whole school of political thinkers has told us that "power" is the essence of politics and during the past generation studies by Bertrand Russell, Charles Merriam, and Bertrand De Jouvenel have sought to probe its anatomy and physiology...
...To the former, the objection is made that full workers' control would impair "efficiency...
...For the structure of social and political relations has an autonomy of its own...
...Walter Lippmann and all those who claim that they can discover and make evident such principles...
...The answers which the socialist of 1959 provides will not be nearly as clearcut or certain as those which the traditional socialist, whether Marxist or non-Marxist, has often given...
...There is also a brief (too brief, in my opinion) inquiry into socialist positions, both from the viewpoint of workers' control and from the perspective of uniting "political" and "economic" power...
...Conversely, it is a question of which restraints or oppressive measures men are willing to accept the better to eliminate or to avoid other, and more intolerable, restraints or oppressive measures...
...Indeed, it would seem that the distinctions we make between "political" and "non-political" power are often tenuous at best...
...Natural law" doctrines are subjected to a criticism which, in some measure at least, they certainly deserve...
...They have also endeavored to show us how it can, in the words of one writer, be "tamed...
...SPITZ CONCLUDES by asserting the need for a reformulation of the problem...
...Of great importance to socialists is the stress placed on the mutual relations of "political" and "nonpolitical" power...
...Do we as socialists have answers to the problems of power which nonsocialists do not possess...
...Moreover, private associations—whether economic, religious, or cultural—while outside the formal structure of democratic government as such, have in many instances impaired the possibility of effective control...
...Secondly, even if we could somehow separate the sheep from the goats, one can legitimately ask whether "personality" is the only or even the major factor to be considered...
...But suppose we can discover what the psychologists call "democratic" personalities and then proceed to put them in positions of leadership...
...And to differentiate between central and non-central values in the context of power relations is never an easy task—indeed, the pain considerably outweighs the pleasure...
Vol. 6 • September 1959 • No. 4
