Beyond Resistance: Rethinking Modes of Confronting Power

Power and the ways of confronting it have always been controversial and contested. In classical definitions of power, understood as repressive, negative, and exercised from a clearly identifiable center, confrontation with power is explained either through the Hegelian master-slave dialectic or through Marx’s concept of false consciousness. More recent definitions, largely inspired by Foucault, rightly conceptualize power as plural, decentered, and ontological rather than as a possession, attribute, or “thing” that some have and others lack. However, in explaining how power is confronted, these approaches strongly emphasize the concept of resistance, a notion largely neglected in classical theories of power. Foucault’s well-known statement that “where there is power, there is resistance” is emblematic of this shift. Both classical and post-structuralist accounts, however, ultimately reduce power relations to a binary logic. This paper argues that both theoretically and empirically, understanding networks of power relations requires moving beyond such binaries. By adopting a post-structuralist definition of power on the one hand, and Vinthagen’s definition of resistance which resistance can only be said to exist when it affects power, on the other, this paper identifies three distinct modes of confronting power: acceptance of power, subjective powerlessness, and resistance. To explain these modes, I distinguish between two concepts that are often conflated or used interchangeably: subjectivity (reflexivity) and agency. When an actor lacks subjectivity, agency is also absent, resulting in the acceptance of power. When subjectivity exists but action is impossible due to a lack of power resources, the situation can be described as subjective powerlessness. Finally, when both subjectivity and agency are present, resistance emerges. These three modes are illustrated through several empirical studies conducted at the level of everyday life, brief reports of which will be presented in this paper.