Power

Two claims in the first sense do most of the work and both are absolute. There is no idle or inert power, so power is not a capacity somebody has and might not use, and there is no benevolent power, so it cannot be held well. Power is never benevolent and never inert, being the result of active force extracting anima from others, which makes it a continuous operation rather than a position. That rules out the usual defence. Marsh anticipates the objection that those who channel primary anima also seem powerful, and answers it, since such people only have power if they exert unequal force over others, and without that exertion their access to primary anima is more likely to make them prey. Neither does the ability to channel anima usually produce a desire to hoard it, and such people generally seek outlets to release the excess. The second sense describes how power is manufactured socially rather than seized. Social approval causing others to identify with and emulate someone ahead of themselves is what establishes the position, and once established it supplies the unequal force that turns every subsequent interaction into a transaction in which the powerful gain more. That is the compounding Marsh names elsewhere as centripetal, and it is why a power imbalance is built in from the outset in most established hierarchies, since an initial advantage can be used to come out ahead in everything that follows.

Weber defined power as the probability of carrying out one's will despite resistance, and the field has expanded through Dahl's decision-making view, Bachrach and Baratz on agenda setting and Lukes' third dimension of shaping preferences. Foucault reframed power as productive and dispersed rather than possessed, and feminist theory developed power-to alongside power-over. Almost every one of these allows for power that is held without being exercised, and several allow for power used well. Marsh's definition excludes both by construction, which is a far stronger position and one that makes the question of legitimate authority unaskable rather than answerable.