Works
- Power-Dependence Relations, American Sociological Review, 1962
In Tactics of Organizational Politics
Ideas
Power as dependence. The power of one party over another rests on the other's dependence, and dependence grows with how much the other values what the first provides and how few alternative sources it has. Power is therefore a property of the relationship, and Emerson described balancing operations that change it, among them reducing dependence by finding alternative sources and extending one's network of relations.
What it explains
Emerson explains why controlling something others need, and for which they have no substitute, gives leverage, and why the remedy for being dependent is to develop alternatives. Inside organizations, every unit's power over another can be read as the other's dependence on it.