3.6 Introducing power analysis
Power analysis is a tool to deepen understanding of where power lies in social change processes. It helps us identify who we need to engage with to achieve change and it stimulates questions that ensure that any action is built upon involving those that we seek to support and who we hope will benefit from the change.
The outcomes of change can be unpredictable and may cause harm to the very people we are trying to help or to others we had not considered. Ensuring that people are consulted and participate in any change process which affects them removes some of that unpredictability and ensures better outcomes.
There are lots of different ways to understand power.
Two frameworks that many activist organisations find useful are the Four Expressions of Power approach, and the Forms of Power approach. Frameworks like these can help us to understand different aspects of power and from that derive strategies that help us to influence or contribute to change. No one framework is right all the time, and indeed you may have your own. It is a case of trying different tools out and seeing which way of thinking about power is useful for a better understanding of any given situation.
We will look at the case study of the Chiquitano people of Bolivia to understand how these two frameworks, the four expressions of power and the forms of power, help us to analyse how change happens.
Chiquitano people of Bolivia
On 3 July 2007, after twelve years of unremitting and often frustrating struggle, the Chiquitano people of Bolivia – a group numbering some 9,000 people – won legal title to the one million hectare (2.4 million acre) indigenous territory of Monteverde in the eastern department of Santa Cruz.
Evo Morales, the country’s first indigenous president, attended the ceremony with several of his ministers. So did three elected mayors, ten local councillors (six women, four men), a senator, a congressman, and two members of the Constituent Assembly – all of them Chiquitanos.
Such an event would have been unthinkable a generation before both for the indigenous community and for women’s representation at the local level. Until the 1980s, the Chiquitanos lived in near-feudal conditions, required to work without pay for local authorities, landowners and the Church, and prevented from owning land.
Now, over 15 years after this historical win to access to their land, Chiquitano leaders have reported that their struggle is far from over. Access to healthcare, education and basic infrastructure such as a mobile phone signal is still lacking. They do note some positive changes, with some young people from their communities now accessing university education for the first time. This raises a new challenge, the risk of these same people leaving the Chiquitano communities for good.
An additional threat is deforestation by loggers and mining companies. The authorities do nothing because the officials are paid off by the companies. They also report that the companies buy off certain communities and community leaders, leading to social division. Logging and mining companies are often seen to be working with outsiders, people from the country’s highlands, closer to the centre of power, where decisions are made over the economic path Bolivia should follow. The government, still led by Evo Morales’ party despite moments of crisis in recent years, appears to need natural resource revenues to fund essential services.
3.5 ‘Power’ defined
