Essentially Contested Concept

Power is often described as an essentially contested concept. That term was first introduced into political theory in 1958 by William Gallie, who applies it to various subject-terms including [Page 222]power. In some hands, the use of the idea of an essentially contested concept is taken to entail that the meaning of words such as power or interests has not been universally agreed. The terms have been discussed for many years, so the lack of consensus suggests that there will never be any agreement. However, there are many scientific terms about which there has been much debate and whose meaning in standard definitions has altered over the years. In physics, the concept of atoms has changed over time, and the central concept of gene in evolutionary theory has several meanings that are much debated. However, physicists and evolutionary biologists do not normally consider their concepts to be “essentially contested.” Rather, essentially contested concepts are not merely those over which there happens to be no agreement over a long time, but those that because of their central role in normative theory can never achieve a universally agreed definition. The claim that power has an ineradicably normative nature leads many to suggest that there can never be agreement over its meaning.

If we take the term essential seriously in the idea of an essentially contested concept, then we are suggesting that some terms are necessarily of their nature contestable (and perhaps we should replace “contested” with “contestable” in such discussion). This would mean that even if people do reach agreement, they can never do so decisively; there will always be the possibility that someone can come up with a reason for challenging the definition. As William Connolly maintains, universal criteria for relevant reasons to accept a definition do not suffice to completely settle any debate. In The Terms of Political Discourse, Connolly sets out three criteria for essential contestability. First, that there is no settled agreement; second, that future attempts will fail; and third, that there are good reasons why such attempts will fail. The third makes contestation into essential contestability.

That there can be no decisive agreement might derive from two processes. The first is that there is no empirical evidence that could prove one account of, say, the power structure, over another. The claim here is that empirical evidence will always fail to allow the possibility of agreement. We might illustrate this claim with the old community power debate. In that debate, pluralists maintain one vision of the power structure; elitists maintain another view. Both recognize that within democracies politicians have to consider the views of the masses; otherwise, the politicians will be thrown out of office. Both recognize that democracy is better than dictatorship. However, pluralists maintain that power is generally dispersed among competing elites who represent the interests of different groups, that the same group does not dominate in all issue areas, and that there is some competition between groups within issue areas. Elitists maintain that the same sets of people dominate in all issue-areas and govern in their own interests.

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