Decisions and Nondecisions: An Analytical Framework

American Political Science Review - Tập 57 Số 3 - Trang 632-642 - 1963
Peter Bachrach1, Morton S. Baratz1
1Bryn Mawr College

Tóm tắt

In recent years a rich outpouring of case studies on community decision-making has been combined with a noticeable lack of generalizations based on them. One reason for this is a commonplace: we have no general theory, no broad-gauge model in terms of which widely different case studies can be systematically compared and contrasted.Among the obstacles to the development of such a theory is a good deal of confusion about the nature of power and of the things that differentiate it from the equally important concepts of force, influence, and authority. These terms have different meanings and are of varying relevance; yet in nearly all studies of community decision-making published to date, power and influence are used almost interchangeably, and force and authority are neglected. The researchers thereby handicap themselves. For they utilize concepts which are at once too broadly and too narrowly drawn: too broadly, because important distinctions between power and influence are brushed over; and too narrowly, because other concepts are disregarded—concepts which, had they been brought to bear, might have altered the findings radically.Many investigators have also mistakenly assumed that power and its correlatives are activated and can be observed only in decisionmaking situations. They have overlooked the equally, if not more important area of what might be called “nondecision-making”, i.e., the practice of limiting the scope of actual decisionmaking to “safe” issues by manipulating the dominant community values, myths, and political institutions and procedures. To pass over this is to neglect one whole “face” of power.

Từ khóa


Tài liệu tham khảo

Russell, 1938, Power: A New Social Analysis, 35

Taylor, 1959, The Uncertain Trumpet

Dahl, 1960, Social Science and Community Action, 26

Friedrich, Authority, 36

10.2307/2088619

Schelling, 1960, The Strategy of Conflict, 38

Shirer, 1960, The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, 366

Alsop, 1963, Saturaday Evening Post, 80

Neustadt, 1960, Presidential Power, 21

Rossi, 1958, Approaches to the Study of Politics, 359

Dahl, 1961, Who Governs?

10.2307/1952796

10.2307/2390960

Rossi, 1958, Approaches to the Study of Politics, 364

Hobbes, 1937, Constitutional Government and Politics, 12

Hunter, 1953, Community Power Structure

Drury's, 1962, A Shade of Difference, 82

Lasswell, 1950, Power and Society, 75

Alsop, 1961, Saturday Evening Post, 26

1950, An Analysis of Social Power, American Sociological Review, 15, 733

Rovere, 1959, Senator Joe McCarthy

Friedrich, 1958, Authority, 37

Bensman, 1958, Small Town in Mass Society

Thông tin
Thông tin xuất bản

American Political Science Review

Tập 57 Số 3

632-642

Thông tin tác giả