Published online by Cambridge University Press: 06 January 2022
The conventional (political science) account of three new institutionalisms created no distinctive space for power, which has correspondingly been treated in a scattershot fashion across a wide range of schools and approaches. This chapter extracts power from its conceptual entanglements and identifies a number of ways in which it shapes and is shaped by institutions. While very strong power-centered approaches leave little space for autonomous institutional effects, even small wedges of separation can position institutions as intervening or moderating variables, while deeper institutionalization can reverse their causal priority. Beyond causal relations, “institutionalized power” binds the two at a deeper, constitutive level. The chapter ranges widely for applications, going beyond self-identified theories of institutions to draw on examples from the French Revolution, international relations, totalitarianism, “weapons of the weak,” the control of violence, politeness, and other issues that spotlight still-untapped possibilities for studying power and institutions. Not surprisingly, sharpening the focus on power also yields new insights into institutional origins, stability, and change.
To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure [email protected] is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.
Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.
Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.
To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.
To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.