How could we ever do anything without power? Power empowers: yet we know power is a problem. Social interaction is the human condition—and it cannot possibly be improved without exercising power.

The problem is that it is now a universally recognised truism that power corrupts. Why? Read on for a taxonomic answer! But first let's explore some issues.

Recent academic research suggests that power heightens pre-existing ethical tendencies. But this sort of study actually avoids the power issue. It confuses «having power» with «exerting power».  Power in the political or social sense is not just being powerful or having authority, but using it on others. More specifically: “using it to get someone to do what they otherwise would not do”— More...

Good action counts for a lot.  But once a person has the ideology of power fixed in their head, they can never feel safe enough. Goodness flies out the window. There is never enough power, never enough wealth.  It is not the imperative of greed, it is the imperative of survival.  Technology now allows us to survive without willful cruelty and domination, but that does not make sense to power-driven individuals.  They want the power and the glory.

So what do we do about the callous power-centred leaders of most countries whose desire for control and personal wealth is unrestrained?

That’s a trick question.

“We” never do anything. 

If “we” have any influence at all, it is to sustain and support the existing social system. “We” are responsible for those leaders … for the way they think, how they got into such positions, and why they stay there.  So the British “we” is responsible for UK atrocities not the PM and cabinet; the German “we” was responsible for Nazism in Germany not Hitler; More...

I appreciate politics is tough. Even so, it is hard to find kind things to say about politicians in recent times. What do you make of a recent candidate for the US presidency now in court facing 30 years in jail and $1.5 Million in fines? Jack Ashley was cut from different cloth.

Lord Ashley, as he became, stood out from the pack. I realized that all would-be politicians could learn something from him when I read his obituary today.  What an extraordinary person he was—probably far too good for his own good. More...

No doctrine can deliver virtue or character.  So none can ensure that using power to apply the supposedly beneficial doctrine will be safe and wise.

Character flows from our humanity, the same source as the power that we use.  It is wonderful that this humanity and this power is irrepressible.

However, our humanity is a tricky thing and using power is even trickier.  We are not  dealing with good that is unproblematic.  Humanity is built on an endless conflict between one good and something else that is also good.  Of all these conflicts in relation to using power, and there are many, perhaps the most significant is that between what is good for our humanity and what is good for our society. 

As you know: evil is choice of the lesser good, and of these two, More...