When you click the Amazon logo to the left of any citation and purchase the book (or other media) from Amazon.com, MIT OpenCourseWare will receive up to 10% of this purchase and any other purchases you make during that visit. This will not increase the cost of your purchase. Links provided are to the US Amazon site, but you can also support OCW through Amazon sites in other regions. Learn more.

Readings and films are also listed by session.

Books Available for Purchase

Lukes, Steven. Power: A Radical View. New York, NY: Palgrave Macmillan, 2004. ISBN: 9780333420928.

Goffman, Erving. Asylums. Garden City, NY: Anchor Books, 1961. ISBN: 9780385000161.

Appignanesi, Michael. Marx for Beginners. New York, NY: Pantheon Books, 1979. ISBN: 9780394737164.

Marx, Karl, and Frederick Engels. The Communist Manifesto. New York, NY: Penguin, 2002. ISBN: 9780140447576.

Giddens, Anthony. The Consequences of Modernity. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1990. ISBN: 9780804717625.

Wrong, Dennis. Power: Its Forms, Bases and Uses. New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction Publishers, 1996. ISBN: 9781560008224.

Recommended Books on Writing

Cuba, Lee. Writing About Social Science. New York, NY: Longman Press, 2001.

Strunk, William, and E. B. White. Elements of Style. New York, NY: Penguin Press, 2005.

Readings and Films by Session

Course readings.

Lec #	TOPICS	Readings/Films
1	Introduction, Opening Discussion - How is power defined? Is it possible to use a single definition of power to describe a variety of social situations? - How do people get and use power? - How much power is lodged within personality and how much is part of the structure of the situation? - How does the use of power sometimes mystify the targets so that they do not recognize that power is being exerted? - Can power be equalized, or must some people always have more? - What is resistance? How might we identify resistance in situations of institutionalized power?
I. Defining the Concept of Power: A Preliminary Analysis
2-3	What is Power? Action and Intention	Gouldner, Alvin. "Basic Assumptions." The Coming Crisis of Western Sociology. New York, NY: Basic Books, 1970, pp. 52-54. ISBN: 9780465012787. Simmel, Georg. "On Superordination and Subordination." The Sociology of Georg Simmel. Edited and translated by Kurt H. Wolff. New York, NY: Free Press, pp. 181-189. ISBN: 9780029289204. Wrong, Dennis. Power: Its Forms, Bases and Uses. New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction Publishers, 1996, pp. 1-20. ISBN: 9781560008224.
4-6	What Power is Not: Influence and Conformity	Film: "Obedience and Conformity." Asch, Solomon. "Effects of Group Pressure upon the Modification and Distortion of Judgements." In Doing Unto Others. Edited by Zick Rubin. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1975. ISBN: 9780132175968. Stanley, Milgram. "Behavioral study of obedience." J Abnormal Soc Psychol 67 (1963): 371-8. Janis, Irving. "Groupthink Among Policy Makers." In Sanctions for Evil. Edited by Nevitt Sanford, Craig Comstock and associates. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass, 1971. ISBN: 9780875890777. Zimbardo, Philip, Craig Haney, W. Curtis Banks, and David Jaffe. "The Psychology of Imprisonment." In Theory and Research in Abnormal Psychology. Edited by D. Rosenhan, and P. London. New York, NY: Holt, Rinehart, and Winston, 1969, pp. 271-287. ISBN: 9780030745607.
7-10	Force: The Limiting Case	Goffman, Erving. Asylums. Garden City, NY: Anchor books, 1961. ISBN: 9780385000161. Wrong, Dennis. Power: Its Forms, Bases and Uses. New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction Publishers, 1996, pp. 21-34. ISBN: 9781560008224.
11-12	Leadership and Charisma: Personal and Inspirational Power	Film: Riefenstahl, Leni. The Triumph of the Will, 1935. Rustow, Dankwart A. "The Study of Leadership." In Philosophers and Kings: Studies in Leadership. Edited by Dankwart A. Rustow. New York, NY: George Braziller, 1970, pp. 1-32. ISBN: 9780807605394. Tucker, Robert C. "The Theory of Charismatic Leadership." In Philosophers and Kings: Studies in Leadership. Edited by Dankwart A. Rustow. New York, NY: George Braziller, 1970, pp. 1-32. ISBN: 9780807605394. Weber, Max. "Charisma." In On Charisma and Institution Building. Edited by S. N. Eisenstadt. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1968.
13-14	Authority (1): The Ability to Command	Wrong, Dennis. Power: Its Forms, Bases and Uses. New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction Publishers, 1996, pp. 35-83. ISBN: 9781560008224.
II. The Sources, Structure and Institutionalization of Power
15-16	Some Classical Views	Denby, David. "Aristotle." Great Books. New York, NY: Touchstone, 1996, pp. 117-127. ISBN: 9780684809755. ———. "Machiavelli." Great Books. New York, NY: Touchstone, 1996, pp. 194-201. ISBN: 9780684809755. ———. "Hobbes and Locke." Great Books. New York, NY: Touchstone, 1996, pp. 206-220. ISBN: 9780684809755. ———. "Marx." "Hobbes and Locke." Great Books. New York, NY: Touchstone, 1996, pp. 338-352. ISBN: 9780684809755. Machiavelli, Niccolo. "How a Prince Must Act In Order to Gain Reputation." The Prince. New York, NY: Signet Classics, 1999, pp. 110-113. ISBN: 9780451527462. Hobbes, Thomas. The Leviathan. pp. 344-261. Pareto, Vilfredo. "The Circulation of Elites." Marx, Karl, and Frederick Engels. The Communist Manifesto. New York, NY: Penguin, 2002. ISBN: 9780140447576. ———. "Preface." A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy. New York, NY: International Publishers, 1979. ISBN: 9780717800414. Appignanesi, Michael. Marx for Beginners. New York, NY: Pantheon Books, 1979. ISBN: 9780394737164. Tocqueville, Alexis de. "That Aristocracy May be Engendered by Manufactures." Democracy in America. New York, NY: Signet Classics, 2001. ISBN: 9780451528124. Michels, Robert. "Democracy and the Iron Law of Oligarchy." Political Parties. New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction Publishers, 1999. ISBN: 9780765804693. Weber, Max. "Class, Status and Party," and "Three Types of Legitimate Rule." Theory of Social and Economic Organization. New York, NY: Free Press, 1964. ISBN: 0684836408. Foucault, Michel. The History of Sexuality. New York, NY: Vintage Books, 1980, pp. 3-13, 17-35, and 92-114. ISBN: 9780394740263.
17-18	Modern Debates	Bachrach, Peter, and Morton Baratz. "Two Faces of Power." Power and Poverty; Theory and Practice. New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 1970. Lukes, Steven. Power: A Radical View. New York, NY: Palgrave Macmillan, 2004. ISBN: 9780333420928.
19-20	Authority (2): Power Redefined, Institutionalized, and Disciplined	Foucault, Michel. "Truth and Power." In Power/Knowledge: Selected Interviews and Other Writings 1972-1977. Edited by Colin Gordon. New York, NY: Pantheon Books, 1980. ISBN: 9780394739540. Peller, Gary. "Reason and the Mob: The Politics of Representation." Tikkun Magazine 2, no. 3 (1987): 28-31, and 92-95. Scott, Joan Wallace. "The Pitfalls of 'Scientific' Feminism." Tikkun Magazine 4, no. 2 (March 1989): 90-91. Fallows, James. "The Case Against Credentialism." The Atlantic Monthly (December 1985): 49-67.
III. Institutionalized Power: Examples and Transformations
21-22	Bureaucratic Organizations and Entrepreneurial Corporations	Herzfeld. The Social Production of Indifference. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1993. ISBN: 9780226329086.
23-24	Modernity, Post-modern Colonialism, and The Global Community	Silbey, Susan. "Let Them Eat Cake." Law and Society Review 31, no. 2 (1997): 207-236. Sasson, Saskia. The Global City. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1991, pp. 3-34. ISBN: 9780691078663. Mintz, Sidney. Sweetness and Power. New York, NY: Penguin Books, 1986. ISBN: 9780140092332. (Excerpts) Giddens, Anthony. The Consequences of Modernity. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1990. ISBN: 9780804717625. (Excerpts)
25-26	The Possibilities of Resistance	Ewick, and Silbey. "Narrating Social Structure: Stories of Resistance to Law." American Journal of Sociology 108, no. 6 (May 2003): 1328-72.
27	Powersharing Can Power be Distributed Equally?