One of the oldest insights of sociologists of religion is that religions and national governments are drawn to each other. Nevertheless, the kind of power necessary for governments of nations is the ...

California Gov. Jerry Brown (D) raised some eyebrows while attending the United Nations Climate Summit in Paris, proclaiming the "coercive power of the central state" is needed to promote good public ...

President Theodore Roosevelt addresses officers and crewmen of the USS Connecticut upon her return from the Atlantic Fleet’s cruise around the world, February 1909 (U.S. Navy photo by Lt. Cmdr.

Reporting from Paris — Gov. Jerry Brown has been doing more than just touting California’s environmental policies here – he’s been making an explicit case for the power of government. It’s rare for a ...

In the recent distressing case in Ireland in which a man abandoned his two-year-old daughter on the road at night to punish her mother, one point struck me as very telling, apart from the sheer ...

In Paris, Gov. Jerry Brown gave every indication that government will continue to force businesses to respond in certain ways. He called it using the “coercive power” of the state to do good—his ...

In 1959, social psychologists John French and Bertram Raven studied power, classifying five kinds: legitimate, reward, coercive, expert and referent. These power bases still figure prominently in ...