Essay Sample on Social Power: Using Knowledge to Achieve Desired Goals

Introduction

Social power refers to the capacity of an individual or a group to achieve their desired goals even if other people are opposed to it. In every society, there are influential people or systems of governance that exercise power upon the people by way of illegitimate force. Based on Foucault's understanding, power and knowledge have direct links, where people utilize powers within their means to shape up knowledge according to its intentions. In that regard, this paper seeks to provide a discourse analysis on the Clip of live broadcast of the Democratic presidential candidate's debate in Las Vegas, Nevada, hosted NBC Live News on February 20, 2020.

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Discourse Analysis

The Las Vegas Democratic presidential debate of February 2, 2020, was one of the many debates that seek to arrive at the final candidate who will face off with the GOP's Donald Trump in the forthcoming US presidential elections. According to the moderator, the Democratic Party and its supporters are keen to end up with the most popular candidate among the six aspirants who will trounce on Trump, sine their top priority is bidding on him. Therefore, the debate must be based on proper policies and ideologies that put the interest of the United States ahead. Six candidates Joe Biden, Senator Bernie Sanders, Mike Bloomberg, Elizabeth Warren, Pete Buttigieg, and Amy Klobuchar take to the stage to ventilate on issues that would see any of them elected as the ultimate democratic candidate. The debate is quite long; however, we are focusing on the first ten minutes excerpt, where the moderators focus on why each candidate thinks there is the best choice for the Democratic Party. One of the hosts, Lester Holt, briefs the debaters on the rules, saying that each one of them will get one minute and 15 seconds to answer each question, followed by 45 seconds for follow-ups.

The first section of the debate comprises of first one minute 15 seconds where the host asks Senator Bernie Sanders why as a self-described democratic socialist, he thinks that his revolution is a better bet despite the centrist Bloomberg who thinks he is the best. Lester Holt is excellently controlling the flow of the conversation among the debaters. There is reasonable evidence to believe that senator Bernie Sanders is winning this debate due to his bipartisan approach on the issue of voter mobilization and turnout. According to Senator Sanders, democrats need the most massive voter turnout in the history of the United States to beat Trump.

From the clip, Sanders is quoted as saying, "Mr. Bloomberg had policies in New York City of stop and frisk for the African-American and Latino people in an outrageous way." In that context, Sanders has a crucial point, which depicts that the ultimate Democratic candidate must be someone with an ideology of inclusion which does not think in a discriminatory manner like Mayor Bloomberg. It is common knowledge that many candidates have previously failed to make it to the top race due to their racist thinking on the issue of the African-Americans, Latino and the Hispanics. In that regard, Senator Sanders's thinking sounds brilliant since mobilizing the most massive democratic voter turnout is the surest way to beat President Trump in the forthcoming elections.

Bringing together the working-class people, Native Americans, Latino, Asian-American, and all black and white people is what Mr. Sanders' movement stands for. That agenda may work better than just the billionaire class. There is also evidence to believe that joining the rest of the industrialized world may guarantee may increase the minimum wage to a $15 an hour living wage, as well as providing adequate health care to all based on the human rights requirements.

Senator Sanders and Mayor Bloomberg are talking actively, while the rest are listening. However, Warren interrupts to criticize Bloomberg, arguing that he is a whole billionaire calling women "hose-faced-lesbians and "fat broads. According to Warren, Democrats stand slim chances of winning if they end up with a tax-avoiding nominee who supports racist ideologies such as redlining and frisking and harasses women at the same time. At the same time, Elizabeth Warren thinks that replacing Trump with another oppressive billionaire in the name of Democratic nominee is entirely unacceptable. As Sanders and Bloomberg do most of the talking, Warren and Buttigieg interrupt, as booth Biden and Amy Klobuchar remain quiet. One of the most significant indicators of political power in the debate is the tendency of candidates to change from one topic to another based on their relative power. According to Foucault's theory of power dynamics and knowledge, the debate seems to pick a lot of power dynamics. From the first section of the clip, one realizes that power and knowledge play in the interactions in the debate as it takes a twist when all the candidates turn against Mayor Michael Bloomberg. Both Sanders and Warren call Bloomberg an oppressive billionaire who cannot be the best nominee for the democrats, and the indicator of power plays a lot in the shift of topics and the prowess or arguments.

The second session of the excerpt comes as Fester Holt, the host, asks Senator Klobuchar what she thinks is the best path to the Whitehouse. Just like Bernie Sanders, Senator Klobuchar responds by arguing that the best path to Whitehouse is too mobilize the highest voter turnout for the democrats. Klobuchar argues that she is the only one who had the highest voter turnout in all the states throughout the country when she led the ticket. She equally confronts Mayor Bloomberg by claiming that Bloomberg's manifesto wants women to step aside and pave the way for him. According to senator Klobuchar, Bloomberg is an oppressive billionaire who thinks that other people, including women, should stand aside for him, something she thinks is quite unpopular.

At this point, there is huge applause from the audience, as Holt Ushers in Bloomberg to respond to the many accusations against him. It is imperative to note that the dynamic of power of debate come to play as each candidate intelligently argue reasonable facts and logic for people to believe that they are the best nominee. Bloomberg also responds by reasoning that he is a New Yorker, and he is the only person who stands the best chance to deal with an arrogant conman like Trump. According to Mike Bloomberg, he is a mayor and a good manager, particularly after restoring the city of New York back to normal after the 9/11 terror attacks. Generally, there is a lot of power play in the debate and all the candidates tend have what it takes to run against Trump.

At this phase, Holt is requesting Vice president Biden to air his point of view concerning who he thinks can succeed Trump. Bidden is in support of what the opinion poll is saying that he is in the right position to succeed Trump, stating that he knows the techniques that are used by Donald Trump and can use the techniques to his advantage. Bidden as well applauses what Mayor says concerning the administrative records that he has that can make him lead the people. Holt interrupts the session by asking whether Biden by asking Mayor if she would weigh in. Buttigieg by stating that the people should be capable of electing someone visionary, someone who can make better policies to develop the country and at the same time can bring the Americans together. Moreover, peace and unity are being spoken to a greater length by Sanders, and he thinks that the only way to go through the next election is to ensure that people are united to win the next election.

The debate is done appropriately with everyone making their point of view concerning the presidency, what they want, the changes they wish to undertake, the improvements that they have in mind in connection to the seat of administration. From the analysis of the debate, it can be depicted that at least every candidate is having candid opinions that they think can help in the practical selection of the best candidates. Both views presented by the candidates are worth; nevertheless, at the end of the day, the best candidate would be selected from the debate.

I think the best candidate that is likely to win the debate is Saunders. The opinions that are presented by Saunders are tangible and can be used to properly form a political alliance that can win the presidency seat. For instance, Senator Saunders talks of inclusion as a strategy that he would work on to defeat the sitting president. In his view, he stated that there is a need for different races to come together, such as the Hispanics, the American Indians, Whites, Black Americans, Asian Americans, and other groups in the United States. This strategy will help in mobilizing high voters turnout; thus, winning the election. Again the strategy will help in eliminating the racial barriers that are a significant issue that affects elections in the United States.

Conclusion

In conclusion, emerging as a president in the United States requires that a politician comes up with an excellent policy that can help in attracting everyone in the United States. The race is not won by losing to the president, but by ensuring that the candidate has a proper strategy that can help in luring voters. In the debate, I think the best bid that can help one to rise to the presidential seat is through inclusion strategy and eliminating the racial boundaries that are crucial determinant in the elections.

References

Craig, P. (2016). Pressure and politics in a decentralized candidate selection system: the case of the United States. American Behavioral Scientist, 60(7), 799-818. https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0002764216632819

Live TV broadcast Clip of the Democratic Presidential Candidates Debate in Las Vegas Nevada, 20 February (2020). Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TZkV0ISxcQY

Visser, J., Konat, B., Duthie, R., Koszowy, M., Budzynska, K., & Reed, C. (2019). Argumentation in the 2016 US presidential elections: annotated corpora of television debates and social media reaction. Language Resources and Evaluation, 1-32. https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10579-019-09446-8