Integration, Manipulation, Alienation

The general issue addressed in the present discussion concerns the ways in which interaction within systems can be determined by forces, processes, and media apparently beyond the voluntary control of individuals. The particular focus in this regard is the medium of power. We will ask whether and how the exercise of power, especially subjection to power, can potentiate interaction such that particular types of interaction tend to occur with a significantly higher degree of probability than others. We will argue that the addition of the subjection to power as a potential to interaction can lead to specific types of meaning being constituted in interaction that may facilitate the functioning and propagation of power.

In addition, we will also question whether and how the exercise of power in the form of the submission to power can act as a formative force upon the operations of the imagination, perception, and cognition by making the constitution of certain types of meaning significantly more likely than others. This restricts not only the types of meaning that can emerge in what seems to be the objective world, but also types of self-reference or self-awareness as well as possibilities for future action on the part of individuals so affected. This results in social life operating with a determining causality to the degree that social integration constitutes subjection to power, the restriction or reduction of alternative ways of thought and action, and the perpetuation and expansion of alienation in both subjective and objective forms.