ABSTRACT
It has become more commonplace to stress the centrality of the concept of
power for constructivist meta-theory and theorising (see, in particular, Hopf
1998, Guzzini 2000a). Moreover, constructivism has put some order into its
own power concepts, which usually come as variations on the theme of
‘Lukes-plus-Foucault’ (Guzzini 1993, Barnett and Duvall 2005a). Therefore,
this article will take a slightly different tack. Rather than exploring once
again what the concept of power can mean for constructivists, it analyses
the implications of constructivism for doing a conceptual analysis, here of power.1 It will try to show that besides an analytical assessment (‘What does
power mean?’), a constructivist conceptual analysis also includes a study of
the performative aspects of concepts (‘What does ‘‘power’’ do?’), which, in
turn is embedded into a conceptual history or genealogy (‘How has ‘‘power’’
come to mean and be able to do what it does?’). Indeed, by stressing the
reflexive relationship between knowledge and social reality, such a conceptual
analysis is itself part (but only part!) of a more general constructivist power
analysis. After a short preface on my take on constructivism, the following article
exposes in some detail the results of such a threefold analysis. Turning to
the classical focus of conceptual analysis on the meaning of power, the first
section disputes the viability of attempts to find a neutral meaning across
meta-theoretical divides. Although such attempts clarify thought, and
would undoubtedly facilitate scientific communication, as well as enhance
our capacity for the construction of variables, the meaning of most central
concepts in the social sciences is dependent on the theoretical or metatheoretical context in which they are embedded. When applied to concepts
in explanatory theories, this results in explanatory perspectivism. As long as
we have to live with our meta-theoretical dilemmas, such as the agency-
structure debate, concepts cannot be neutral.
