Power, hierarchy and belonging

When seniority becomes power

India gives us an interesting example. The practice known as ragging can involve intimidation, humiliation and physical or psychological harm. Indian regulations also recognise the importance of power, authority and superiority, particularly in relationships involving established students and newcomers. A new student may want acceptance from people who have been there longer and may not yet know the informal rules of the institution. In that situation, seniority can create power even without physical strength.

But this is not uniquely Indian. For centuries, some British public schools operated a system known as fagging, in which younger boys performed duties for senior pupils. School authorities sometimes formally supported the authority of older boys over younger ones. Indian parliamentary discussions have themselves connected the history of ragging with traditions found in British public schools. We should not assume that every form of contemporary ragging simply descended from Britain, but the historical connection is useful because it turns the question back towards us. Hierarchy can become normal simply because it has been repeated for generations. Someone who endured an initiation themselves may later regard putting the next generation through it as part of the tradition. That leaves us with a question that could be asked in India, Britain or almost anywhere else:

When does tradition stop explaining a practice and start preventing us from questioning it?

When belonging becomes power

Japan and South Korea draw our attention towards another form of power. Research surrounding Japanese ijime and Korean social exclusion shows how significant belonging to a peer group can become. Imagine discovering that everybody except you has been included in something, or entering a room and sensing that the conversation has changed because you arrived. Nobody may have threatened or touched you, yet the message can still be powerful.

You are not one of us.

Belonging can therefore become something that other people have the power to give, withhold or threaten. That does not mean exclusion is particularly Japanese or Korean. Looking at these experiences simply helps us recognise the power contained in belonging wherever it occurs. It also changes the familiar picture of bullying as one powerful individual facing somebody weaker. Sometimes the imbalance of power is created by relationships around them. A person's influence may grow because others join in, laugh, share something or quietly accept what is happening. This was one of the important insights developed through Finnish peer group research. Power can be maintained socially, which also means it can sometimes be changed socially. Instead of asking only who has the power?, we can also ask:

What is creating the power?

How easy is it to belong while being different?

Every group develops expectations about how people behave. Some are explicit. Others become visible only when somebody breaks them. Cross cultural research comparing children's attitudes towards exclusion has shown why we need to be careful about simple cultural explanations. Children within the same country do not all think alike, and age, circumstances and individual judgement can be as important as nationality. So rather than saying one culture values conformity and another values individuality, perhaps there is a more useful question we can ask wherever we are:

How easy is it to belong here while being different?

Belonging can also work in the other direction. It can provide connection, support and the confidence to participate. Ireland's recent work on bullying and student participation gives us an interesting example because children and young people have helped shape national thinking rather than simply receiving policies written for them. That gives belonging a deeper meaning. It is not simply being allowed into a community. It may also involve having some influence over what happens within it. This takes us back to a question running throughout AntiBullyingWeek.co.uk:

Do we make anti bullying work for young people, or with them?

Power is not fixed

Talking about an imbalance of power can sometimes make us imagine two permanent positions, one powerful and one powerless. Real relationships are often less stable. Someone may feel confident in one group and powerless in another. Formal authority may matter greatly in one situation and hardly at all inside a friendship group. Online spaces can change the balance again. This is one reason to be careful about treating bully and victim as permanent identities. They can make changing relationships look fixed. Understanding where power comes from may be more useful than assuming we already know who possesses it.

What if I feel powerless?

All of this becomes much less theoretical if you are the person who feels unable to change what is happening. Feeling powerless does not necessarily mean having no choices. Sometimes the balance changes when somebody else stands beside us. A friend, colleague, family member or trusted adult may not solve the situation, but not facing it alone can alter how much room we have to act. Knowledge can sometimes create room too. Understanding what choices exist, knowing what an organisation is responsible for or having a record of what has happened may make a situation feel less impossible.

Empowerment does not necessarily mean confronting somebody or becoming more powerful than them. Moving away from danger, asking somebody else to intervene, finding allies or choosing when and how to respond can all increase agency. The group around a situation can matter just as much. If someone's influence depends upon an audience, that audience has choices. If exclusion creates power, even one person making a different decision about inclusion can begin changing the relationship. None of this makes the person experiencing harm responsible for fixing the situation.

Perhaps empowerment is better understood as gaining enough support, knowledge, connection or choice to have more influence over what happens next. Looking internationally gives us different ways to recognise where that influence might come from. Ragging and fagging draw attention to seniority and inherited hierarchy. Japan and South Korea make us look closely at belonging and exclusion. Ireland reminds us that having a voice can itself be a form of participation and power. The practical question is therefore not necessarily:

How do I become more powerful?

It might be:

Where is the power in this situation, what is creating it, and what might give me more choice?

Next: How do we learn conflict and non violence?

Power and belonging are shaped partly by what we learn from the people and communities around us. That takes us to a different international question. Historical research with Semai communities, experience among the Temiar and contemporary Orang Asli responses to conflict invite us to explore whether aggression and non violence are simply human instincts, or whether the ways we respond to conflict are also learned.

If aggression can be learned, can non violence be learned too?