Power and discourse
3.2 Power relations
38
Foucault’s conception of power goes beyond that of Habermas’s ‘power as a form of social interaction’ drawing on domination as alluded to by Gidden’s above. He offers a productive model of power where modern power is neither possessed by individuals nor is it the sovereign power of the state; power emerges not as positional power (for example, the appointment of a school principal into a leadership position at the school) but as an effect of discourse circulating in the leadership space (for example, the professionalization discourse- see Chapter 7). For Foucault:
We must cease once and for all to describe the effects of power in negative terms: it
‘excludes’, it ‘represses’, it ‘censors’, it ‘abstracts’, it ‘conceals’. In fact, power produces;
it produces reality; it produces domains of objects and rituals of truth. The individual and the knowledge that may be gained of him belong to this production (1977, p. 194).
Taking this view as the point of departure for the study, offers insight into the relationship between discourse and power and how power is exercised in particular interactions. It illuminates what the rules of the game are and what kinds of knowledge are produced in the practice of leadership. Solely attributing power to an effect of discourse is limiting as discourses will not emerge in all practices and interactional events. Therefore a multi-dimensional view of power is explored. I will highlight the critical research questions again to remind the reader of how these questions are embedded in the theoretical context for the study:
(i) What are the leadership discourses in a school setting?
(ii) How does power and subjectivity play out within daily interactions of the school management team (SMT)?
39
The productive nature of power is maintained through the variety of responses, reactions, results that emanates in the power relationship. Foucault makes the assumption that where there is power, there is resistance:
I do not think that a society can exist without power relations, if by that one means the strategies by which individuals try to direct and control the conduct of others. The problem, then, is not to try to dissolve them in the utopia of completely transparent transaction but to acquire the rules of law, the management techniques, and also the morality, the ethos, the practice of the self that will allow us to play these games of power with as little domination as possible. (Foucault, 2000, p. 298)
The extract contains concepts of power relations, resistance, domination, morality, networks, ethics, self and how power relations are linked to these concepts. Here Foucault (2000) makes explicit how morality enables us to play the games of power. Relations of power thus allow power to operate in a network. Acquiring the rules of the game and the ethical foundation allows individuals to exercise power in useful and productive ways. Later in this chapter I will present a detailed discussion on ethics and morality and the ethics of power. For Foucault (2000) power relations are unstable and can be reversed allowing a certain degree of freedom on both sides of the relationship. Included in this freedom is the ability to act ethically (Foucault, 2000). Foucault held strong views on the link between ethics and freedom and purported to the view that “for what is ethics, if not the practice of freedom?” (2000, p. 284). He sets the relationship of power within practices of the self, ethics and freedom.
Where there is domination, resistance is a likely reaction. Domination would imply reverting to a definition of power that indicates that power resides in individuals. According to Foucault, relations of power imply that power is not some force that resides within specific individuals or institutions:
The individual is not to be conceived as a sort of elementary nucleus, a primitive atom, a multiple and inert material on which power comes to fasten or against which it comes to strike, and in so doing subdues or crushes individuals…The individual is an effect of power, and at the same time, or precisely to the extent to which it is that effect, it is an element of its articulation (Foucault, 1980,p.98).
In an interaction process, a multitude of actions and responses to power are possible. Butin (2001, p. 16) argues that:
40
Power is embedded in the relations among individuals and groups. Power relations are unstable and prone to change and reversal. Power relations are not always productive.
Violence or coercive relations of power do exist; violence is one extreme aspect of power relations where resistance is minimized to the point of practical non-existence. Similarly, coercive relations of power consist of what Foucault (1976) termed ‘determining factors’.
These are constraints upon actions that thwart resistance to domination.
If power is embedded in relations, this then has clear implications for leadership practice at schools if productive relations are to be harnessed. This emphasises the earlier point made by Silins and Mulford (2003), in Chapter 2, on how a key driver to success is how people are treated in relationships. The verbal possibilities in discourse are larger for persons more powerful (Wodak, 1995). Persons exercising power determine the course of interaction or the issues discussed. Through the choice of words, they can determine the length of the verbal contributions by allowing, continuing, or interrupting these contributions. Such persons also determine the beginning or end of the interaction. In addition, the interaction can be manipulated by passing on information selectively, for example, withholding information that could undermine those in power (Wodak, 1995).
Carspeken’s model of four types of power relations: normative, coercive, contractual and charm, exemplifies the discussion above.
Figure (ii): Carspeken’s Model of power relations (1996, p. 130)
1. Normative power- subordinates consent to the higher social position of the super-ordinate because of cultural norms (e.g., consenting to the instructions of the principal who has positional power).
Power Relations
Contractual
Coercive Normative
Charm
41
2. Coercive power- subordinates act to avoid sanctions by a super-ordinate (e.g., instructions issued by a Head of Department to a subordinate that the subordinate would have to follow).
3. Contractual power- subordinates act for the return of favours or rewards from a super- ordinate (an example of this n the school setting could be service level agreements with service providers).
4. Charm- subordinates act in loyalty to the super-ordinate because of the latter’s personality (this is where the super-ordinate has a charming and persuasive disposition.
Carspeken (1996) acknowledges that this typology of power relations is incomplete as it does not take into account individual (subordinate) agency. A useful model would be to draw upon a hybrid of concepts (Fig (ii) and enquiry questions- see Chapter 5) to analyse power relations in the institution of the study as shown in Figure (ii). These concepts have been used to analyse the data in the analysis chapters 6 to 10.
In a study of power relations within a school partnership, Wodak, Andraschko, Lalouschek and Schrodt (1992) attempted to take due account of this complexity by using detailed discourse analysis to uncover the dialectics of power and helplessness, of controlling and being controlled, as well as of activity and passivity in institutions. Foucault held the view that “power relations [are] rooted in a system of networks” (1982, p. 202).
Foucault’s (2000) four distinct relations of power (see Figure ii) – economic, political, judicial and epistemological – sheds more light on the internal functioning of educational institutions by describing them as a “polymorphous, polyvalent amalgamation of economic, political, judicial and epistemological relations of power” (Foucault, 2000, p. 82). Foucault argued that education, which includes the entire field (schools, universities, and colleges), is set to become increasingly important politically as political relations of power develop between the state and school and between various stakeholders. Consistent with this argument, Bloch (2009) has made this observation when looking at factors that cause dysfunctionality in South African schools.
Politically, schools are places where people “give orders, establish rules, take measures, expel certain individuals, admit others” (Foucault, 2000, p. 83). Economically, schools, aside from being
42
crucial sites for the production of future human capital, directly or indirectly charge fees in return for access to their functions and resources (Deacon, 2003). Third, the school system is based on a kind of judicial power as well. One is constantly punishing and rewarding, evaluating and classifying, saying who the best is and who is not so good. A judicial power within the school simulates the judicial model of power. Foucault (2000) criticized this relation of power against the goals of teaching thus: “why must one punish and reward in order to teach something to someone?” (Foucault, 2000, p. 83).
Foucault made reference to "an epistemological power – that is, a power to extract knowledge from individuals and to extract knowledge about those individuals who are subjected to observation and already controlled by those different powers" (Foucault, 2000, p. 83). The special importance of this last, 'epistemological' relation of power can be found in the fact that Foucault characterised it as "a power that, in a sense, traverses and drives these other [economic, political and judicial] powers" (Foucault, 2000, p .83). 'Epistemological power' operates in two ways.
Firstly, a pupil's or teacher's personal knowledge of how schools function, along with any technical improvements and micro-adaptations they might make in order to function better "are immediately recorded, thus extracted from his practice, accumulated by the power exercised over him through supervision" and "gradually absorbed into a certain technical knowledge of production which will enable a strengthening of control" (Foucault, 2000, p. 84). This knowledge is generated depending on who is being supervised by whom (educator and learner; educator and principal). Secondly, epistemological power generates "an observational knowledge, a clinical knowledge, ranging from educational psychology through teacher appraisal to whole school evaluation, which, stemming from observation, recording, classification, analysis and comparison, also makes possible new forms of control” (Foucault, 2000, p. 84). Proponents of ethical leadership would argue that far from the technical knowledge the epistemological relation of power creates, it’s also necessary for the duty of care (the loco parentis) role of the educator.
The shift towards more child-centred pedagogies during the course of the twentieth century could be seen as an example of this latter form of epistemological power, where techniques of educational psychology were used to generate knowledge about how children learn. Similarly, the strong current emphasis on pupil participation, at the level of classroom activities as well as that of
43
school governance, and attempts to tie parents and communities legally, financially and managerially more closely into the everyday life of the school, could be argued to be “premised at least as much on a desire to know and therefore manage people better, as on schools' centuries-old desire to eliminate 'idleness' once and for all, by 'attaching' the maximum number of people to the tasks at hand, for greater utility and regulation” (Foucault, 1986, p. 210; 2000, p. 78).
Nevertheless, in real life context of South African schools, this could be interpreted as a strategy for survival rather than a desire to eliminate idleness. These relations of power provided useful analytical tools to understand the effect of the exercise of power in leadership practices in the school, for example, the appraisal system or the tribunal system for disciplining learners, collection of school fees etc. Relations of power evident in these practices are explored in the analysis chapters.