Those who adhere to elitist theory suggest, without quite saying so, that the power elite is engaged in a conscious conspiracy. However, many elitists, including Mills, perceive subtle forces which enable members of the power structure to act in concert. Thus, for elitists, this suggests something is terribly wrong with American politics and that it requires substantial change. Indeed, they believe that we, as Americans, deceive ourselves into unwarranted complacency when we allow our current policymaking processes to be called "substantially democratic." They say this because their studies suggest otherwise, and indeed over time, most pluralists seem to have come around, as it were, to having agreed with some of the fundamentals of elitism (Stone, 1989; Ricci, 1979). Presumably, the Kennedy-King assassinations, the Vietnam War, WaterGate, the Iran-Contra incident, the Savings and Loan scandal, urban decay, and other national nightmares have provided them with food for thought about the existence of elite power and the ability of our system to govern that power.
But, turning back to the debate, before elitists or pluralists could claim victory for themselves, a team of authors, Bachrach and Baratz, would publish two articles, "Two Faces of Power" (1962) and "Decisions and Nondecisions: An Analytical Framework" (1963), which would add yet another dimension to an already no-win debate. The authors did so by identifying a number of means by which potential power could be exerted, covertly, to keep potential issues off urban agendas altogether. They referred to their outcomes as "nondecisions" and submitted that these were as important as those decisions which were well-publicized and easily observed. For nondecisions, they argued, power was "evidenced" as an unstated quid pro quo. For instance, while certain decisionmakers appear to play active roles in areas that are highly visible to outside observers other elites may exert the real power. Behind the scenes, they presume, this second set of actors (i.e., the "second face of power") actually determines which issues will, and which will not, be openly discussed.
To evidence their theory, the authors point to the fear of possible sanctions that, presumably, keeps a number of citizens from voicing their opinions publicly. Public housing residents, for instance, face the fear of eviction; the same applies to welfare recipients who confront the fear of losing their eligibility status; and for police, most of whom adhere to the maxim that you do not turn in other police. Recent upheavals (1994) at the New York City Police Department represent a current example of the difficulties involved here.
While pluralists reject the idea that a "nondecision" can be empirically observed (Debnam, 1975), Crensons (1971) study of U.S. Steel in Gary, Indiana suggests it is not altogether impossible to document its existence (Ross, Levine, Stedman, 1991: 56). Cobb and Elder (1983) and Kingdon (1984) would, later, underline the relevance of Bachrach and Baratzs original thesis by highlighting the importance of controlling the formal agendas of local policymakers.
Although the community power research remains valuable for shedding light on an important aspect of American urban life, I have tried to show that it leaves an entire paradigm of normative questions unaddressed. Because of this, and in an attempt to rationalize the transition from community power to urban development politics, Clarence Stone (1989) organizes the collective logic of community power and contrasts this with one of his contributions a paradigm which details the logic of urban politics.
For Stone, the community power paradigm is informed by the classic social theory of Max Weber (1947). Weber seems to be a natural selection in that he is credited, intellectually, with setting many of the terms within which the community power debate would ultimately be conducted (Stone, 1989; Hawley & Wirt, 1968; Hunter, 1953; Presthus, 1964; Debnam, 1975). Thus, in order to understand Stones contribution, it is important to understand the Weberian paradigm.
Author: Steven A. Maclin, Ph. D.
About the Author: Dr. Maclin has been a university professor of public administration and policy since 1994. Recently, from 1998 - 2004, he lived and worked with American military troops in Japan, Okinawa, and South Korea. He has previously edited and published dozens of articles in professional administrative journals and recently, in his ‘spare time,’ he’s been building websites for distributing materials to his graduate students. Hes now stateside, teaching graduate students online, writing articles and developing a small online business (see
http://buyfromart.com); he can be reached at info@buyfromart.com.