The Secret of Power

[rogue]

The 48 Laws of Power by Robert Green

1. Never Outshine the Master
2. Never put too Much Trust in Friends, Learn how to use Enemies
3. Conceal your Intentions
4. Always Say Less than Necessary
5. So Much Depends on Reputation – Guard it with your Life
6. Court Attention at all Cost
7. Get others to do the Work for you, but Always Take the Credit
8. Make other People come to you – use Bait if Necessary
9. Win through your Actions, Never through Argument
10. Infection: Avoid the Unhappy and Unlucky
11. Learn to Keep People Dependent on You
12. Use Selective Honesty and Generosity to Disarm your Victim
13. When Asking for Help, Appeal to People’s Self-Interest, Never to their Mercy or Gratitude
14. Pose as a Friend, Work as a Spy
15. Crush your Enemy Totally
16. Use Absence to Increase Respect and Honor
17. Keep Others in Suspended Terror: Cultivate an Air of Unpredictability
18. Do Not Build Fortresses to Protect Yourself – Isolation is Dangerous
19. Know Who You’re Dealing with – Do Not Offend the Wrong Person
20. Do Not Commit to Anyone
21. Play a Sucker to Catch a Sucker – Seem Dumber than your Mark
22. Use the Surrender Tactic: Transform Weakness into Power
23. Concentrate Your Forces
24. Play the Perfect Courtier
25. Re-Create Yourself
26. Keep Your Hands Clean
27. Play on People’s Need to Believe to Create a Cultlike Following
28. Enter Action with Boldness
29. Plan All the Way to the End
30. Make your Accomplishments Seem Effortless
31. Control the Options: Get Others to Play with the Cards you Deal
32. Play to People’s Fantasies
33. Discover Each Man’s Thumbscrew
34. Be Royal in your Own Fashion: Act like a King to be treated like one
35. Master the Art of Timing
36. Disdain Things you cannot have: Ignoring them is the best Revenge
37. Create Compelling Spectacles
38. Think as you like but Behave like others
39. Stir up Waters to Catch Fish
40. Despise the Free Lunch
41. Avoid Stepping into a Great Man’s Shoes
42. Strike the Shepherd and the Sheep will Scatter
43. Work on the Hearts and Minds of Others
44. Disarm and Infuriate with the Mirror Effect
45. Preach the Need for Change, but Never Reform too much at Once
46. Never appear too Perfect
47. Do not go Past the Mark you Aimed for; In Victory, Learn when to Stop
48. Assume Formlessness

[Water-quan]

Cripes, sounds like advice for the anti-christ, lol...

[BruceSteveRoy]

actually i have been using it as a checklist of things to do.

[Water-quan]

actually i have been using it as a checklist of things to do.

Have you achieved more power?? And, have Pink Floyd written a gatefold concept album about you yet?

[BruceSteveRoy]

well i just started using it this afternoon. and so far no. the universe is not yet bending to my will. and i have been waiting on the pink floyd things since i was 13. i think i might have to settle for something like a winger power ballad.*cringes*

[Water-quan]

i think i might have to settle for something like a winger power ballad.*cringes*

Aya! At least hold out of Survivor!

[IronFist]

I read another book in that series. Did I say "read?" I meant "skimmed through a few chapters cuz it was long and the font is small." It had some good concepts and stories to illustrate, even tho some of the stores were a bit dated.

[SanHeChuan]

Sounds like the secret to being an aswhole!
A powerful technique indeed.

[SevenStar]

that's an interesting list. I use most of those on both of my jobs. in 50 cent's book "from pieces to weight" he summed it up in a sentence - reputation is the cornerstone to power. your list breaks down how to establish a rep.

[SevenStar]

Cripes, sounds like advice for the anti-christ, lol...

why? there is nothing inherently bad about the list. What is bad is what you do with the power you gain. A lot of these are just good business practice. Heck, business isn't always ethical.

On my day job, I am a web developer. I constantly debate with the marketing department about what should or shouldn't be on the website or how something should work. Sometimes I know the answer to something from the get go and know that marketing is making a mistake, but I don't play all of my cards, I keep quiet. In the short term, they "won". But, once we load what they wanted, and it screws up, then they need a fix. That is when I come in. I tell them what went wrong, and make it known that I can fix the issue. I just accomplished several things.

1. I discredited marketing
2. I made it known that I am more knowledgable in the given area
3. established myself as a person familiar with said area and any other area it may impact.

I just improved my reputation with them, thus increasing my power.


When I go to restaurants, I trip my friends out, because I leave large tips. I've had waitresses grinning ear to ear because I tipped them 10.00 on a 9.00 tab. My friends think I am crazy. But they are looking at the short term. The waitress remembers me. She tells her co-workers about me. they point me out when I walk in and make it a point to know my name and all of my preferences. It gets to the point that when I walk in, no matter who is working, they are like "Seven, what's up! I've got a table over here for you - do you want your usual drink and appetizer?" My friends are like WTF? because I get treated like a king. I accomplished some things here:

1. increased rep among my friends because of the treatment I get
2. increased rep with the workers, as they know that if they give me top notch service, they get a nice tip.

in both situations, I have increased my reputation and thus my power.


In the club, I see a patron who needs to get put out. He tries to agress and I choke him out. The next week, he comes in and apologizes, so I am cool with him.

I have done several things here:

1. I gain a rep among the onlookers as someone not to mess with, as they saw me choke someone out.

2. the guy who got choked knows not to get wrong and spreads the word to his friends, which not only makes them respect my position, but it makes the job easier, because they are less likely to act up again.

3. by being cool and accepting the apology, even socializing with the guy, he now respects me more as a person, as I'm not always just an arsehole bouncer. I COULD put him out everytime I see him because I recognize him as a problem, but I do not. I made a friend or associate out of an enemy.

I increase my rep and thus my level of power. It is the most noticible at the club. I have people I have never seen before tell me stories that have heard about me fighting people... it almost gets to the point where it's legendary. One woman told another bouncer that she saw me beat four guys at once... I don't even know what she's talking about. But now that she is telling people this, there are several people talking about it. that in itself increases my rep and thus my power. Word of mouth is a powerful thing.

[rogue]

The book itself is interesting in that it's not judgmental about the list. Think of it this way, most of the items on the list can be used by a great guy or a real asshole. Another thing to think about is everyone either uses items off of the list or dealing with someone who is using the list on them. Think traditional martial arts for example.

7, I don't think the list is how to establish a rep, as a rep on it's own is just that and easy to lose.
Reading your last post I can tell that you get it.

[David Jamieson]

Quite a lot of that list is in Sun Tzu's book.

It's a modern redaction in many respects. Which is probably needed because people don't readily understand some of the more cryptic stuff in sun tzu's work.

anyway. It can be corrupted. Like anything. And as stated it is probably important to not look at the list or the people you use the concepts on with emotionalism.

Coolness is a huge factor in how you exercise power or i can all be dashed on the rocks with a single "woo hoo"

[SPJ]

nothing will overcome the power of love.

be sincere in your intent and doing.

be honest about it.

treat others like you would like to be treated.

--

our days will be a lot happier for us and others.

--

[Nick Forrer]

You guys should read Machiavellis the prince

It really is *the* case study in the perennial laws of power politics (i.e. how to get power and how to maintain it.)

Again morality isnt a concern...essentially what he says is whether you are good or bad if you dont follow what he prescribes you wont get anywhere....In fact you can very easily look at contemporary politics and see clear instances of what he describes.

One quick example...if you have to make a policy decision which you know will be unpopular...delgate executing that policy to someone who you think is expendable...get them to carry it out (they will be pleased you trust them with the authority and you should sell it to them in those terms) and then let them take the inevitable flack for doing it....then get rid of them totally....In doing so you will have a) accomplished your original goal and b) increased your rep by getting rid of someone who was universally unpopular.

[KC Elbows]

Most Caesars died because of the purple cloak, not in spite of it.

In imperial China, virtually every dynasty ended with people trying to use their social power/influence to avoid taxation, to avoid loss of prestige, etc, and the interrums between dynasties killed the elite and the lowly alike due to starvation from the state's bankruptcy, or wars between rivals who were very likely to die in the end as well.

In short, follow all of these rules and you'll still die in soiled trousers.

Additionally, power is a really poor choice of terms for it, it's influence. This is why several of the rules discuss not trusting people overly much: it's other people's power that is mostly being discussed, how to get it, how unreliable it is, et al. It does not directly become anyone's power in a reliable sense except the people who directly hold that power.

Take a Mao, for example: he had absolute control, and found he could only keep it by making it the higher priority over governing well, thus reducing the power of the country he controlled, and thus lessening his own potential power. Only reform free of Mao increased the overall influence of China to the power we see today. In fact, a strong case could be made that #15 is actually counter to amassing influence, since such practices more commonly lead to overextension than to the destruction of the Carthaginians. One simply cannot hold great influence and afford to easily accept the concept of enemies. The US has been proof of that: two parties who despise each other but consistently choose to fall short of doing away with the systems that prevent them from destroying their rivals.

Had Mao managed to destroy the reformers in his own system, China would be economically irrelevant today. Deng Xiaoping, who had far more reason to consider the hardliners mortal enemies than Mao had to fear the reformers, recognized that far greater power was available by a more moderate, inclusive stance.

In short, influence is fine, but it is not a costless commodity. There really are few numbers in that list that recognize this fact: even Stalin could not act with absolute impunity, there were others he always had to worry about, no matter how many he killed, and the more he secured power, the more he guaranteed he would have to endlessly secure it at the cost of other more productive action.

Every friend is a potential liability that, if you choose to ignore it, creates an enemy, destroys your reputation, etc. Every person who you discount is a potential unknown that can later come back to haunt you.

The list reads like a list of ways people who don't really have any place having influence can get it and then get beheaded by a mob because qualifications never entered their minds. It lacks concepts of moderation required in real human interaction. To use Sevenstar's example, he is discussing a circumstance where he had both a use for social pressure and an expertise and knowledge of the organization that made that social pressure relevant to getting something useful done in the long run. The list itself seems to have no use for such distinctions.

To use another example, say a politician strong on influence but shy on ability used this sort of conduct to surround himself with yes men, ran for president, and Rogue voted for him...