Power, Politics and the State
Chapter 8 Key Themes

• Power is a central mechanism in all the societies - the means by which 'things get done'. While it is dealt with theoretically in this chapter, power threads its way through all substantive areas of sociology, perhaps especially where issues of social policy are concerned. For example, the interested reader should explore Chapter 11 'Work and Non-Work' to see how power operates in the economic arena.
  
• The State is so central to our lives that we can often take it for granted, but its workings intimately affect our everyday lives. The premise of modernity was that the state could be the vehicle of progress (see Chapter 17 The Foundations of Social Theory) and its activities are important in exacerbating or alleviating inequality and divisions in society (see Chapter 4 Social Divisions).
  
• Ideological hegemony is a situation where a dominant group has established extensive cultural and intellectual ascendancy, so that its ideas, ways of thinking, and frameworks of understanding and interpretation have become the received truths of others. It is usually associated with a Marxist or neo-Marxist approach, the basics of which can be seen in Chapter 17 'The Foundations of Social Theory'. As a concept it is most commonly associated with the substantive areas of the mass media or religion, so the interested student could be directed to Chapters 12 and 15.