The Shadow Sides of Our Personal Power

A skillful mediator or dialogue facilitator can recognize the power dynamics present in a room and call attention to them, inviting participants to bring their power to bear on the conflict at hand in an explicit way. (This, by the way, is what I believe callout culture and social justice movements like #metoo and the conversation around white privilege and white supremacy are attempting to do: invite us to acknowledge and articulate our own personal sources of power and then grapple with the ways that we use and benefit from them.)

Diana Leafe Christian's book Creating a Life Together: Practical Tools to Grow Ecovillages and Intentional Communities contains a short list of types of coercive power balancing moves that often arise within relationships and communities. This list blew the lid off my understanding of personal power when I first encountered it, both because these power balancing strategies give names to some of the bad behaviors I witness in myself and others when we feel trapped and powerless, and because they shine a light on the (perceived or real) imbalances of power that give rise to these behaviors in the first place.

This is not to say that coercive power plays are not abusive or toxic. But a fuller understanding of a conflict includes an awareness of the types of power being wielded on all sides, as well as of the relational and often reactive nature of power itself.

Leafe's list includes:

Intimidation power

Habitually emanating anger, suppressed rage, "panic-anger", and burning intensity; speaking sharply or harshly, bossing people around, criticizing people frequently, and sometimes name-calling and shouting people down.

The person with intimidation power wields power over other members because it's difficult to muster the courage or energy to disagree with their opinions or ask them to change their demeanor. People may have tried many times to ask for change and have given up, or the person is now less aggressive as a result of past feedback and others are too worn down to ask for further change, or the person also offers such beneficial qualities that others resign themselves to having a mixed blessing and letting it go.

Undermining power

"Bad-mouthing," discrediting, and undermining another person's behavior and/or character to other community members; assuming the worst about the targeted person's motives and then criticizing those motives to others ("He's just trying to rip us off," "She's just trying to control everyone"); not distinguishing between one's own fears about the person and objective reality; not talking about these concerns with the targeted person or setting up a third party mediation.

The undermining person wields power over others in the community because s/he operates behind people's backs, and others are reluctant to voice concerns about this behavior for fear they'll be targeted next.

Hypersensitive power

Reacting to even mildly worded feedback or requests for change as though it were an intolerable personal attack; becoming visibly upset when others disagree with one's views or beliefs; responding with such defensiveness and self-justification so that people give up: "You can't tell Reginald anything."

This wields power over other community members because no one has the energy or patience to deal with this person's high level of fear and drama. People with hypersensitive power, like those with intimidating or undermining power, maintain their power over others because they rarely receive feedback.

Power exists in all relationships, and how we use it matters. People are more likely to have an enduring influence on others when they engage in dominant behavior that reflects social skill rather than intimidation (Guerrero et al., 2011).

By now I'm sure you've identified a handful of people who make liberal use of these types of coercive power -- they are easy to identify when you're on the receiving end of their harmful effects. More challenging is realizing and acknowledging when we ourselves invoke one or more of these tactics in an attempt to empower ourselves or disempower others. When we choose to use our personal power, are we enabling or disabling? Recognizing when these tendencies in ourselves arise, we can choose instead a more stable, sustainable, and ethical source of power: referent power, for example, or the kind of power that lies in creating and expressing strong, clear personal boundaries.

How has the shadow side of your personal power shown up in relationship, and how are you working to cultivate a more healthy and ethical way of relating?

Image credit: Arm Wrestling by Huebucket