The power of metaphor/the metaphor of power

ABSTRACT

Power is a central concept in social theory and political discourse. Concepts are much used metaphors that seem to fit the world as collectively experienced, in the process losing their freshness as metaphors unless freshened by association with other metaphors. Soft power is a case in point. Power and causation are metaphors turned concepts with a long history of mutual refreshment; Aristotle’s four causes capture competing ways of talking about power. Once power became metaphorically associated with mass, weight and strength, talk shifted from agents’ powers to states as hard objects possessing comparable properties, measurable as power. Defined as attraction but explicated as attractiveness, soft power is ambiguously related to metaphors pointing up strength, preferences, competence and expertise. Thanks to functional differentiation and professionalisation, experts individually have powers and exercise power on a small scale. Collectively they have massive effects on social relations at every scale.

KEYWORDS:

• Metaphor
• power
• cause
• soft
• weight
• powers

Acknowledgments

I presented an abbreviated version of this paper as the Annual Soft Power Lecture, Soft Power Analysis and Resource Centre, Macquarie University, 19 September 2016. I am grateful to Naren Chitty for inviting me to the Centre and for his many helpful comments.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes on contributor

Since 1966, Nicholas Onuf has been affiliated with 16 universities on four continents. He is author of six books, two with his brother and many dozens of articles in journals and edited volumes. His latest book, Making sense, making worlds: constructivism in social theory and international relations (2013) was published in conjunction with the republication of World of our making: rules and rule in social theory and international relations (1989).