Power in dialogical interactions

Collaborative-dialogical approaches promote an egalitarian relationship between all those involved in a network meeting. This has created some debate over the role of the therapist and their authority and position of power. To consider how power is enacted in dialogical meetings, we reviewed discursive research into dialogical meetings with a view to understanding how power is presented and negotiated in actual therapeutic interactions. In the presentation part of this workshop, I will first describe ways that power has been theorised and how they may relate to dialogical practices. I will then present the findings of our review focusing on the deontic/interactional dimension about how therapists direct and manage the structure of a session, and the epistemic/semantic dimension concerning claims of knowledge and truth. We will also discuss the organisational and social pressures on therapists to enact power in various forms and the idea that the exercise of power, in appropriate ways, may actually facilitate the development of dialogue.

In the interactive section of the workshop there will be time allocated for small and large group discussions. I will nominate some open questions that participants can focus their discussion around such as: How do the presented findings fit with your ideas about power? How do you see the role of power in dialogical practices? How do you negotiate power relationships in your own work?