Power and Authority

Many people think that power and authority is the same thing. They are not. They have the same desired outcome but by definition are different. Merriam-Webster defines power as “the ability or right to control people or things” (“Power”). Authority is defined as “the power to give orders or make decisions: the power or right to direct or control someone or something” (“Authority”). Power is often identified by people who hold a particular office or position. Just because a person may assert a powerful role, it does not mean that they have the authority to do as he or she wishes. The text, Writing and Reading Across the Curriculum in the chapter Obedience to Authority: The Follower Problem, states “Legitimate power is built on a series of paradoxes: that leaders have to wield power while knowing they are corrupted by it; that great leaders are superior to their followers while also being of them; that the higher they rise, the more they feel like instruments in larger designs” (650). Power should be used to build up and bring people together instead of being one big puppet show. Dwight D. Eisenhower conveyed this guidance to us in his memoir, At Ease: “Always try to associate yourself with and learn as much as you can from those who know more than you do, who do better than you, who see more clearly than you.” Ike slowly mastered the art of leadership by becoming a superb apprentice. To have good leaders you have to have good followers— able to recognize just authority, admire it, be grateful for it and emulate it. Those skills are required for good monument building, too. An experience I had in my role as a nanny was with a family I had been a nanny for previously. At the time the oldest boy was fifteen, and the twins were seven years old. Their mother is a widow in her late forties and did not go off to work during the day. She also had a bit of a problem with pain killers. Somehow they ended up making her extremely paranoid, to the point where she had

Cited: "Power." Merriam-Webster. Merriam-Webster, n.d. Web. 4 Apr. 2014. . "Authority." Merriam-Webster. Merriam-Webster, n.d. Web. 4 Apr. 2014. . Broobs, David. "Obedience to Authority: The Follower Problem." Writing and Reading Across the Curriculum. 12th ed. New Jersey: Pearson, 2013. 650. Print. Ross, Lee, and Richard E. Nisbet. Writing and Reading Across the Curriculum. 12th ed. New Jersey: Pearson, 2013.629. Print.