Blogger Akarlin described a method he had thought up for measuring (political) power (which should not be confused with influence, which is what you’ve done with your power):
My approach:
(1) First, compile an index of national power (based on subcomponents like economic, military, and soft power). There are several such; here is my modest attempt:
http://www.unz.com/akarlin/top-10-powerful-countries-2015/
(2) Estimate the percentage of power your individuals have over each country.
I think this is a clever idea, but what’s missing is an objective measure of how much power someone has over a country.
Fortunately, in 2014, YouGov polled people in most of the major countries to determine who they most admired. If someone admires you more than anyone else in the World, they worship you like a God, and you have great power over them. In 2014, 10.35% of America worshipped Obama, according to YouGov, so Obama had power over 10.35% of America.
According Akarlin’s ranking, around this time, America had 22.6% of the World’s power. Thus Obama had 10.35% of 22.6% of the World’s power, giving him at least 2.34% of the World’s power. Of course Obama is worshipped in many other countries too, and Pope Francis was even more worshipped in America than Obama, but it’s hard to control your worshippers in a country that is not your own, since you can’t run for office in those countries, nor can you really get away with endorsements, so for the sake of simplicity, I decided to limit the measurement to one’s own country.
According to Akarlin, Russia had only 6.43% of the World’s power in 2015, but according to the YouGov poll, Putin was worshipped by 24.62% of Russia, so that means Putin had 1.58% of the World’s power.
So the top 10 most political powerful people in 2014-2015 were:
- Obama (10.35% of 22.6% is 2.34%)
- Putin (24.62% of 6.43% is 1.58%)
- Billy Graham (6.1% of 22.6% is 1.38%)
- Xi Jinping (9.06% of 11.67% is 1.06%)
- The Queen (18.74% of 4.66% is 0.87%)
- George W. Bush (3.14% of 22.6% is 0.71%)
- Oprah (2.96% of 22.6% is 0.67%)
- Bill Gates (2.96% of 22.6% is 0.67%)
- Bill Clinton (2.4% of 22.6% is 0.54%)
- Rush Limbaugh (2.22% of 22.6% is 0.50%)
Although Oprah is edged out by the Queen, I would say that ultimately Oprah, and not the Queen is the most powerful woman in the World, because while the Queen has a bit more political capital, multibillionaire Oprah has A LOT more economic capital, and as the Queen of all Media, at her peak had vastly more cultural clout. All three types of power and more need to be factored in.
And yet despite all this power, the big brained super star is often mistaken for a nobody in Europe. This must come as a huge culture shock for Oprah is used to be treated like God in North America, and much of the Middle East and Africa. When she asked to see a certain purse in Switzerland, the sales clerk, said simply “no”.
Can you imagine you’re a sales clerk in Europe who sees some woman who looks too fat, or let’s face it, too black to afford the purse she’s asking for. You politely tell her no because she probably can’t afford it, and then a week or so later, you turn on the TV to discover that the customer you turned away is the most powerful woman on the planet, and your entire country of Switzerland is apologizing for your mistake.
This shows what Santoculto called the hierarchal nature of power. Oprah is a nobody in Switzerland, but Oprah largely controls America, the country that largely controls the World, including Switzerland, so suddenly Switzerland is apologizing.
But it wasn’t the first time this had happened to Oprah:
being admired does not imply power over those one is admired by. it’s not as if obama admirers are at his beck and call pp.
“And yet despite all this power, the big brained super star is often mistaken for a nobody in Europe.”
because she is a nobody, in Europe.
oprah is not the most powerful woman in the world.
she’s not even the most powerful woman in les Etats.
There seems to be a very high correlation between being admired and having power. The sitting president (no matter who it is) is virtually always the most admired man in America. And similarly in other countries.
Of course, political capital is only one kind of power. Jews are extremely powerful but they don’t do well on this metric.
and it’s not a causal relationship.
that people admire obama does NOT grant him power over them. that he is the president-elect of the country is what grants him said power.
jews have plenty of political capital with the right people.
why is AIPAC so damn important?
I think there are at least 3 major types of power:
political capital (the ability to win hearts)
economic capital (the ability to win wallets)
cultural capital (the ability to win minds)
Jews are extremely powerful because they have the latter two sources of power (AIPAC is powerful because it makes campaign donations), but their power is sometimes resented because the latter two are top-down power, which is seen as less legitimate than bottom-up power (what presidents have)
“the Queen of all Media” not.
oprah is like the kardashians…famous for being famous.
her show is retarded, she’s never been politically relevant, she’s not economically relevant, et cetera.
the only people whose “lives” she has influenced are sexually frustrated prole soccer moms who need some surrogate activity to avoid crippling depression.
She was smart because she kept her political opinions to herself for decades, building more and more political capital, and then when she saw a super close election where she could have a decisive impact (Obama vs Hillary) she through all her power behind Obama which was statistically shown to have netted him a million votes.
Most celebs have nowhere near that much political capital, and they squander what little they have on battles they can’t win (i.e. taking on the NRA and Rosie tried to do)
And her audience does include proles, but its disproportionately white suburban women who are interested in secular spirituality, recreational literature, therapy and self-actualization. That was part of the reason she became so rich. Advertisers were willing to pay more to reach her upscale audience than they would to reach Jerry Springer or Judge Judy’s, even when the size of the viewership was the same.
the Obama endorsement is the only remotely significant thing she’s done, afaik.
and even then, it’s not that significant. the only difference between a Romney presidency and Obama presidency is that one would have been more enthusiastic about Wall Street and Israel, while the other is more concerned with immigration and Saudi Arabia.
“And her audience does include proles, but its disproportionately white suburban women who are interested in secular spirituality, recreational literature, therapy and self-actualization.”
exactly. unimportant people.
She had nothing to do with Obama beating Romney, but had Oprah not endorsed Obama in 2007-2008, it’s extremely likely Hillary or even McCain would have been president, and that would have likely meant war with Iran and no health care for millions of working poor.
oprah is not the most powerful woman in the world
It’s always going to be an arguable point, because measuring power will never be an exact science. But she has been called the most powerful woman in the World many times over the years, though in the last several years, Merkel is getting called that.
To a certain extent, power perceived is power achieved.
“But she has been called the most powerful woman in the World many times over the years, though in the last several years, Merkel is getting called that.”
by whom?
mommy bloggers? you?
“the most powerful woman in the world” has done essentially nothing with her ostensibly unmatched influence. aside from, what, pushing a few books into the bestsellers list?
New York Times columnist columnist Maureen Dowd stated:
“She is the top alpha female in this country. She has more credibility than the president. Other successful women, such as Hillary Clinton and Martha Stewart, had to be publicly slapped down before they could move forward. Even Condi has had to play the protegé with Bush. None of this happened to Oprah – she is a straight ahead success story.”
And Bill O’Reilly said:
“this is a woman that came from nothing to rise up to be the most powerful woman, I think, in the world. I think Oprah Winfrey is the most powerful woman in the world, not just in America. That’s – anybody who goes on her program immediately benefits through the roof. I mean, she has a loyal following; she has credibility; she has talent; and she’s done it on her own to become fabulously wealthy and fabulously powerful.”
Ben Shapiro said:
Oprah Winfrey is the most powerful woman in America. She decides what makes the New York Times best-seller lists. Her touchy-feely style sucks in audiences at the rate of 14 million viewers per day. But Oprah is far more than a cultural force — she’s a dangerous political force as well, a woman with unpredictable and mercurial attitudes toward the major issues of the day. Her ignorant views and wacky reasoning shape the views of millions.
http://townhall.com/columnists/benshapiro/2003/03/19/the_oprah_schnook_club
She used her power to lead millions of sexual abuse victims to recovery, break taboos, mainstream gays, get millions of people to read, and elect the first black president:
“columnist columnist Maureen Dowd’
moron. you should’ve stopped at “New York Times.”
“Bill O’Reilly”
moral moron.
“Ben Shapiro”
imperialist jew moron.
Good post, interesting method. However I find that power is more nuanced than this method gives credit for. I refer you again to US Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy, who, as the swing vote on the court has, for many years now, had more power over US law than any other person, including sitting presidents.
An example? Citizens United. Those on the left often deride this case as the one that ascribed personhood to corporations and allowed them unlimited amounts of political spending. Kennedy’s was the vote that swung the decision to the right.
Another example? Obergefell vs Hodges, the decision that legalized same-sex marriage in every US state. Again, Kennedy was the deciding vote; though this time he sided with the left.
Time and again, it’s been his vote that’s chosen the court’s outcome. The rest of the justices tend to vote along ideological lines. Kennedy’s less predictable.
Given that, I find him in many ways to be the most powerful person in America today. Before Kennedy, justice Sandra Day O’Connor filled a similar role (notably, both are moderate Republican Reagan appointees.)
I think Akarlin’s original idea of multiplying the power a person has over his country by the amount of power his country has is very good, but measuring how much power one has over their country is so hard. Obviously popularity is only one kind of power though a significant one because popular people can become and endorse presidents, and presidents pick the supreme court, and popular presidents have the political capital to ram through legislation and start wars, and congress is afraid to oppose them. Even popular celebrities have similar powers, though few celebs are really popular, despite the hype.
There may never be a mathematical algorithm that captures all types of power; it may always be a judgement call.
Perhaps an ideal application of AKarlin’s concept would divide the power of America into branches, assigning each branch a percentage: the executive branch, the legislative branch, the judicial branch, the fourth estate (the media), and especially with Citizen’s United, money is like a fifth branch of government.
And then within each pie, you would assign different individuals different slices.
I think you could argue that Kennedy is the most influential person in America but I’m not sure he’s more powerful than any other supreme court justice, This illustrates the difference between the two concepts. All of them have the POWER to vote in unpredictable ways, but Kennedy’s willingness to use his power in that way means he actually changed the course of history. Some of the others on the supreme court are largely just place holders; extremely powerful, but not influential, because had they not existed, some other cookie cutter liberal/conservative would have been selected by their respective presidents.
The difference between power and influence is key to my upcoming list of the 100 most influential living humans.
I would say the most powerful person on the supreme court is whoever is the youngest/healthiest because they have the power to influence decisions for decades to come. Old members of the supreme court have used up their power, and in some cases, turned it into a legacy of influence.
Is it exclusive? I.E. does each person polled in each country only “worship” one individual-or a set number? That could cause some individuals if in conflict with other admitted ones to underperforming, etc.
i KNOW who they are, but “i’ll never tell”.
whoever peepee (along with 99+% of people) thinks/imagines they are, those 10 are…
IRRELEVANT.
all of these people (including oprah) are…
what’s the word?
the cap of a “whitecap”…
mere FROTH.
which is NOT to say that any other living people (which peepee or her ilk can think of) are more influential…
i forget who it was…
a brit and gentile…
he said (to paraphrase)…
“the MOST terrifying thing about the world is that no one and no group is in control.”
what does that mean?
inter alia…
those who believe in “conspiracy theories” aren’t only stupid…
they’re pussies…
wimps…
mental weaklings…
etc.
It was Alan Moore who said that. I LOVE Alan Moore; I had a huge collection of his swamp thing comics as a kid. Very dark adult themes and great art work.
Even the most powerful person in the world has only about 2% of the world’s power, so no one is in charge.
But there are people who share similar goals for similar reasons & a lot of them are smart & powerful, and even if they never actually conspire, & there’s no command & control, they will achieve their agenda, as you know.
“I LOVE Alan Moore”
Huu Mona
videla is right, of course. whatever peepee thinks she understands about his statements is but a pale shadow thereof.
Vox has some of their idiot employees take a secret service agents’ logic exam. 4 girls take the test. One black girl in the group, has arguable the largest head but gets the lowest score. Might want to think about recasting your big head = high IQ, at least when it comes to blacks.
1) the correlation between head size and IQ is small (about 0.23), but even small correlations have big effects at the extremes
2) that black girl might just have big hair
”2) that black girl might just have big hair”
Oprah did this test*
Isn’t it .35?
With less than 1.00 correlations-its essentially regression…crashing down at extremes..?
Isn’t it .35?
The within race, within country, within-sex correlation between IQ and brain size seems to be about 0.35 (roughly speaking), but since head size is just a crude proxy for brain size, the head-size IQ correlation is about 0.24 (roughly speaking)
With less than 1.00 correlations-its essentially regression…crashing down at extremes..?
Yes, but if you start with a high enough extreme, regressing even 75% to the mean still leaves you comfortably above average, as you know.
leftoids and rightoids
😉
Billy Graham (6.1% of 22.6% is 1.38%)
This is obv. wrong. The Protestant church does not have a hierarchical structure.
PP
Good post but I knew Oprah was going to be in it.
The Swedish store had a right to do what they did. It’s their business.