Abstract

Political scientists tend to conceptualize power as a social phenomenon that wears a "face," that is, as an instrument powerful agents use to alter the independent or authentic action of powerless actors. This view is conceptually flawed. It relies on an unsustainable definition of freedom as a state in which action is independent or authentic. What is more, it directs attention away from a series of questions that should be central to the critical analysis of power relations. The author draws on intensive analyses of power relations in one core urban and one affluent suburban public school to make the case that students of power should "de-face" this concept, by conceptualizing it as a network of social boundaries to action---such as laws, norms, social identities, and institutional arrangements---that delimit, for all actors, fields of possibility. The prevailing view of power-with-a-face directs attention toward the distribution of political resources and their intended use in interaction. De-facing power redirects critical analysis toward the differential impact of social practices and institutions on people's capacities to participate in shaping the conditions that govern their lives