The illusion of power is that more power solves a problem through more control.  Tighter control and more regulation prevents financial collapse.  More police and prisons reduce crime.  More laws lead to a safer society.  Centralisation and scale lead to prosperity for a company.  More procedures improve business results.  Central budgeting is effective for running a large corporation.

Using power to run roughshod over reality and impose controls ironically leads to more problems, not fewer problems.  This is the paradox of power, and its unintended consequences. Read on to find out more.

The former Soviet Union was a good example of a centrally planned and controlled economy.  By the logic of more power allowing more control, leading to better results, you would think that the Soviet Union would have been the most prosperous economy in the world.  The collapse of that economy was the result of wielding the power of the State to control all aspects of life.

For example, the edict one year was to produce a certain mass of glass.  So the factories cast heavy blocks of glass to achieve under the plan.  These blocks fell out of windows due to the weight.  The next plan called for a certain area of glass (to fix the problem of massive glass slabs), so the factories made the glass as thin as possible to maximise the area and achieve the goal.  The glass was so thin that even a breeze shattered it.  The idea was to use the power of the State to make glass as efficiently as possible.  Without being close to the market, unintended consequences came into play.

North Korea is a contemporary example of the effects of power.  Despite a completely controlled economy, with the State having the power of life and death over every citizen (a “right” that a collective entity should not have), the country is unable to feed itself and relies on aid from market economies with decentralised decision making.

More control reduces adaptability as those who are best able to make decisions are disempowered.  Decisions become removed from the source of facts.  Power leads to arrogance.  The arrogant assumption that the powerful person can transcend reality leads to decisions and dictates that have no connection with the real world, and therefore do not achieve anything positive.

Power is based around the following assumptions:

• Scarcity – there is a limited pool of resources that are divided up.  The main task is allocation rather than creation.
• Stability – order and constancy are key goals.  Anything that may change the status quo is a threat and must be treated as an enemy.
• Top down, hierarchical decision making – based on military style commands rather than consensus or individual empowerment.
• Elite knows what is best – only a few at the top are thought to have knowledge, skills and insight.  Others are there to execute their directives.
• Rules – strict process with penalties restrict freedom.  Only what is explicitly permitted is allowed – everything else is banned.

In The Fountainhead, Ayn Rand refers to the person who desires power as “a secondhander”.  This means that they seek approval from others.  Power is required for due to a need for self esteem, not in order to efficiently achieve any goals.  In any case, it seldom works in quite the way that is expected.

The trouble with making decisions based on perceived power is that unexpected consequences always occur.  This is because life is complex and chaotic, and slow centralised decision making based on edict and decoupled from reality always introduces problems.  For example, forcing employers to pay a higher wage than someone is worth is intended to increase opportunities for the low paid workers.  Instead, it cuts another segment of society out of employment, and makes it harder to keep existing workers employed.   Prohibition in the 1930s lead to an explosion in illegal “speak-easies” and gave a lucrative new business to the Mafia.

In Atlas Shrugged, the government rules through power, introducing a series of new laws intended to create stability that simply bring the country to its knees by alienating the producers in society.

What is the alternative to the endless cycle of wielding power, increasing control and unintended consequences, and trying to fix the problems this causes with more control and regulation?  It is letting go, and letting the people close to the action make their own decisions, and letting them take the consequences of those decisions, good or bad.   In Atlas Shrugged, Ayn Rand called this “decontrolling”.  This is a completely different mindset to that of power:

• Abundance – wealth is created, not divided up.  This is a result of people being able to move quickly and responding to market needs.
• Fluidity – the world is in rapid motion.  Change is expected and welcomed as an opportunity rather than being resisted.
• Decentralised decision making – decisions are made at the lowest possible level: the individual.  This is close to the action, so decisions are informed and rapid.
• Individual knowledge – everyone decides what is best for them.  Knowledge and skills are widely disbursed and shared, not centralised.  The network transcends the hierarchy.
• Principles not rules – each person decides the best way to achieve goals that they believe in.  Procedures and processes are guidelines, not absolutes to be obeyed.

Power never achieves its underlying objective, either for the individual, or for the organisation.  There are healthier and more effective approaches

The self actualised person has moved beyond the goal of possessing and using power.  They have no need for it.  The only power that they seek is over their own lives.  They work with others constructively and achieve what is truly important, rather than what others see as valuable.

Tags: power

This entry was posted on Thursday, July 9th, 2009 at 9:55 pm and is filed under Lies and truth. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.