Sociopolititcal Concepts and Film Analysis Flashcards

These flashcards cover key vocabulary from political film analysis and sociopolitical theory, including power structures, bureaucracy, media influence, imperialism, surveillance, and resistance.

Coercive power

the ability to make someone do something they wouldn’t otherwise do relying on the threat of punishment/force/neg consequences. City of God depicts coercive actors trying to create order from disorder by suppressing rivals, controlling territory, enforcing rules, & making punishment more predictable

State of nature

disorganized violence, “natural state of humanity” according to Hobbes: constant war against all where life is solitary, poor, nasty, & short. early in City of God, the favela is in a state of nature, marked by multiple armed actors, opportunistic violence, unstable hierarchy, and constant insecurity

Monopoly of violence

security requires a monopolization of coercion (violence) bc it reduces the number of violence producers. in City of God, Lil Zé attempts to become the dominant violent producer aso the favela moves from coercive competition to coercive hierarchy

Tilly’s “war makes states, and states make war”

describes the fact that organizing violence (war) allows states to do warmaking (eliminate ext. rivals), statemaking (eliminate int. rivals), protection (defend allies & clients), and extraction (gather resources for the 1st 3)

produces armies, tax systems, bureaucracies, courts over time & becomes a self-reinforcing cycle

in City of God: as he consolidates violence and force, Lil Zé is able to engage in these as he attempts to form a de facto shadow state ruled by criminal governance

Criminal governance

localized territorial control; partial/contested control of coercion; informal enforcement structures; extraction through extortion; illicit markets; narrower, less stable enforcement capacity; authority concentrated in specific communities or markets

this is the kind of control lil zé and his gang are establishing over the favela

Little Zé

main antagonist of the film, who rises through the favela’s drug trade until he is at the top of the proverbial food chain & he + his gang can eliminate all their competition, amass wealth, and expand their criminal empire

in the film, his rise follows the logic of state building: he identifies rivals, attacks competing territories, eliminates or absorbs competitors, centralizes force, and becomes the dominant violence producer

Duopoly of violence

since criminal order often exists in the state’s shadow, it often exists as a “duopoly” of violence where the criminal order and the state both nominally have their own control of violence

Established criminal governance often corresponds to: weak/selective state presence, police corruption & predation, & uneven legal enforcement

in City of God: this is the position Lil Zé’s gang exists in, and the state they exist alongside is notably only shown being corrupt and taking bribes from gangsters

Bureaucracy

a structured system typically part of a government for organizing authority, knowledge, and decision making @ scale

in Ikiru: this describes the public works dept

Bureaucratic power

as an independent source of power, bureaucratic power is structural, procedural, and often invisible

Shapes what problems exist + who is heard, structures what is possible, and normalizes delay, deflection, and inaction

in Ikiru: we see this power being executed by public works as they give the womens’ group the run around because those are the rules/they need to speak to ppl with the right expertise but nothing ever gets done until someone decides it is possible (Watanabe)

Discretion and technical expertise

Discretion: when officials use expertise to interpret and apply rules

Technical expertise: specialized knowledge creates dependence

in Ikiru: discretion + tech expertise are used by public works to shape outcomes as they decide the womens’ cause doesn’t count as a problem and thus their case does not move forward -> they are not heard -> technical expertise means they cannot proceed without the go-ahead from each sub-department -> they are delayed at every turn -> their desired outcome is not possible

Agenda control

the power to decide which issues get discussed and which are excluded

bureaucracies reflect political power in this way + coercion

in Ikiru: the bureaucracies of the local govt hold the power to decide if an issue moves forward in the department

The “Wake Scene”

scene following Watanabe’s death, with his colleagues & family “mourning” him

Shows how bureaucracy protects itself

After Watanabe’s death: Colleagues briefly recognize the system’s failures, retreat into excuses and routine, and the institution absorbs the challenge w/o changing

Bureaucratic indifference

the neutrality that is supposed to make bureaucracy effective is also part of what can make it domineering

in Ikiru: neutrality becomes indifference to the concerns being brought forward by the women even though it concerns their health & the health of their young children

Economic power

The power to structure the conditions of choice: what choices people have + how they act

creates opportunities and constraints in ways that reproduce over time

in Parasite: manifests as dependence, humiliation, & blocked mobility

the Parks have economic power over the Kims because the Kims are more reliant on them for stability and livelihood, whereas the Parks could replace them easily (as they did their prior help who had been around longer)

Poverty trap

inequality constrains behavior and mobility by limiting security, bargaining power, and viable options

the Kims are stuck in a poverty trap: their choices are shaped by insecurity, scarcity, and dependence, survival requires improvisation, deception, and risk, and a lack of economic power narrows what is possible for them

e.g. ki-jung and ki-woo are both smart enough to attend university, but cannot afford the tuition + opportunity cost to their family of not working -> stuck in low-paying jobs and having to forge documents for a better paying one -> security remains precarious, mobility is basically nonexisten

Eviction

a cause of poverty (when rent consumes most of a household’s income, even a small shock can → crisis ) + consequence of it (eviction resulting from not being able to pay rent)

in Parasite: while the Kims are never formally evicted, since they need housing more than their landlord needs a tenant, they have no choice but to live in an unsafe banjiha

Informal settlements

Areas developed w/o legal land tenure, planning, or permits

Precarious structures, lack of basic services, and high vulnerability to disaster

in Parasite: pattern is the same as the one that creates the banjihas like the one the Kims live in

Economic inequality shapes where people live -> housing inequality shapes exposure to danger + instability -> Instability spills into work, health, schooling, and dignity → limiting choices and amplifying risk

Parasite is a metaphor for how economic power turns inequality into dependence, vulnerability, and constrained possibility

Wealth vs Income inequality

Share of wealth held by the 100 richest people in the US is equivalent to that held by the bottom 50% (approx. 67mil households)

In 2023, CEOs were paid 290x as much as a typical worker; consistent with broader trends in income & wealth inequality

in Parasite: Mr. Park is a wealthy executive who can afford to be the sole breadwinner of his family; every member of the Kim family meanwhile is reliant on low-paid piecework

Media power

The ability to control what people see, how they interpret it, and what they think matters

in Wag the Dog: media power is a tool easily manipulated by political and entertainment elites to manufacture reality and manipulate public perception. power is exerted by whoever controls the narrative, not whoever tells the truth

Agenda-setting

assigns urgency across issues since public attention is scarce, shaping how we evaluate leaders, institutions, and governance. primary function is to tell people what to think about

in Wag the Dog: to distract from a presidential sex scandal, a spin doctor & hollywood producer manufacture a crisis to divert attention and control public perception

Framing

organizes how an event is understood, judged, + acted upon by selecting which details stand out, identify cause + responsibility, cue moral judgment, suggest appropriate responses, + influence the public story of an event

in Wag the Dog: war is framed in universal symbols of sympathy and crisis (fleeing girl, burning village, a kitten) + heroic narrative around a stranded soldier

Amplification

repeating stories to raise visibility & salience

in Wag the Dog: visual spectacles (e.g. Kirsten Dunst’s character playing a refugee holding a cat as if they’ve fled a bombing) -> media broadcasts constantly -> crisis is amplified

Propaganda

the deliberate use of selective, emotionally charged communication to shape how people think, feel, and act in ways that serve a particular cause, agenda, or authority

in Wag the Dog: “fleeing girl” video, fake martyr left behind enemy lines played by Woody Harrelson after the war “ends” to maintain public attention

Verification lag

the gap between circulation & confirmation

in Wag the Dog: goal of the spin is to run out the clock until election day; Albania crisis only has to last until ballots are cast

verification lag is exploited since, at the time, it would’ve been too costly and time-consuming to send investigative journalists to rural Albania for factchecking

Fake news

falsified news, usually political; spreads extremely quickly, esp on social media

in Wag the Dog: the entire Albania plot

Wag the Dog strategy

creating a diversion from a damaging issue by creating/exaggerating an unrelated event, often through military action

in the film: Hoffman & De Niro’s characters fabricate the Albania war to distract voters from the sex scandal before the election

The “Albania frame”

Turn a scandal into a nat’l security story → create an external enemy → personalize crisis through a sympathetic victim → wrap the story in patriotism & heroic rescue → give the public a ready-made narrative to follow → Albania “crisis”

Imperial power

a system that arranges people, territories, + labor into hierarchies of control

in Burn!: in the beginning of the film Queimada is under direct colonial rule from Portugal -> shift to economic imperialism by the British via a puppet govt loyal to British interests

Atlantic Slave Trade

Forcible transfer of enslaved people from Africa to the Americas between the 16th and 19th centuries

in Burn!: after wiping out the natives, colonizers (Portuguese, where the AST started) used the slave trade to import kidnapped African slave

Triangular trade

Europeans ship consumer goods (esp. textiles) to Africa to purchase slaves → people are shipped to the New World to labor in commodity production → commodities are shipped to europe to fuel industrial production

in Burn!: AST formed the second leg of the ”Triangular Trade”

Sugar and colonial power

Sugar epitomized colonial power

Required capital investment; land control; cheap (enslaved/indebted) labor; strict timing; brutal coercion; mills, ports, ships, & markets

in Burn!: sugar is the organizing principle of imperial power; Queimada is structured around on it, economy only produces sugar so the island cannot feed itself + dependent on the global market + colonial merchants for basic survival needs -> shift from overt state colonialism to neo-imperialism w/ Antilles Royal Sugar Company

Barbados Slave Code of 1661

Passed by colonial Parliament defining Africans as “heathens” and “brutes” not fit to be governed by the same laws as Christians; law’s purpose was to "protect them [slaves] as we do men's other goods and Chattels”

gave total power over enslaved and allowed for any punishment deemed necessary

in Burn!: Catholic church on Queimada is complicit in the slave trade; Portuguese have no regard for their subjects as human

Formal independence vs substantive emancipation

formal independence: asks “who holds office,” can preserve extraction when local rulers protect foreign capital and plantation interests

substantive emancipation: asks “who controls land, labor, wealth, and coercive power?”, threatens entire extractive order, prompted by revolution

In Burn!: formal independence = British puppet government, substantive emancipation = Jose Dolores

Markets as imperial power

Market power replaced legal slavery by making domination appear voluntary

Post-slavery, empire increasingly ruled through wage dependency; export-crop economies; foreign ownership + investment; debt & contracts; and unequal trade relationships

in Burn!: the shift from overt state colonialism by the Portuguese to corporate neo-imperialism by the British, who install a puppet govt friendly to their economic interests and seize complete economic control of the island

Export-crop economies

one way empires ruled post-slavery

in Burn!: Queimada was transformed into effectively a factory for producing raw sugar, and even after the Portuguese are deposed, the local govt installed is composed of wealthy landowners who ensure the flow of sugar to the British monopoly remains intac

Coolie labor

Over 500,000 indentured laborers, usually from India or China, brought to the British West Indies to drive down wages for freed Afro-Caribbean populations.

Walker as imperial technician

he’s there to shift the island from Portuguese colonial control to British commercial influence

Gender power

The social + political structures that assign people different levels of authority, vulnerability, freedom, and value based on their gender

in Mad Max: bodily capability + identity → determine value and reward

Masculinity → associated w/ violence, sacrifice, machinery, glory

Femininity → associated w/ fertility, beauty, milk

Patriarchy

Patriarchy = political architecture, a structure of political organization that pervades all levels of society

in Mad Max: throughout the world, men have authority over women, but men are also ranked within themselves as who is strong, worthy of Joe’s validation, etc

The Citadel as patriarchal state

patriarchy organizes survival, authority, labor, violence, and the future of the community

Joe (the father figure/“big man”) rules through his control of substances that sustain life: Water rationing, milk as commodity, blood to support war

Gender determines people’s values and roles, reproduce, nourish, fight, bleed, sacrifice, rule

“we are not things”

assertion of Immortan Joe’s wives that they are more than incubators or nutritional resources, but people deserving of freedom and autonomy

War Boys

central product of the patriarchal regime, sick young men given a story that makes suffering meaningful: they can become warriors and die gloriously; features assoc. w/ masculinity

how patriarchal power recruits subordinated men: transform obedience into honor and make death a masculine achievement (e.g. military service

Surveillance power

Surveillance generates power by watching people and by making them 1) behave as if they are being watched, 2) wonder who to trust, and 3) into an administratively readable datapoint

in The Lives of Others: the Stasi runs a vast network of informants and surveillance mechanisms that allow it to exert control over human behavior

Panoptic logic

based on the idea of a panopticon, a prison design where a guard can see prisoners @ all times but they don’t know when they’re being watched

logic sequence: You may be visible → you can’t know when → behave as if observation is constant

in The Lives of Others: Uncertainty of when/if the Stasi are listening means surveillance becomes self-policing

Zersetzung

Psychological warfare/covert repression technique used by the Stasi in the 70s & 80s

Goal: to gradually destroy target’s mental health, self-confidence, and social standing so they’d lose the ability/will to resist the state

used social sabotage, professional ruin, psych warfare, erosion of trust, and gaslighting

in The Lives of Others: manipulation of personal relationships in Dreyman & Christa-Marie’s relationships

destroyed Jerska’s life and socially isolated him via blacklisting

COINTELPRO

CIA counterintelligence program

used Infiltration, disinformation + forged comms, public discrediting, legal/bureaucratic harassment to prevent movements from gaining public legitimacy and delegitimize public dissidents

example of the informant problem also present in The Lives of Others: Surveillance relies on informants to justify/rationalize surveillance + interrogation

HUAC and the Hollywood Ten

HUAC: House Un-American Activities Committee

Hollywood Ten: Group of screenwriters, directors, & producers questioned by HUAC in 1947: “are you now or have you ever been a member of the Communist Party?”

All refused to answer/name names under First Amendment grounds → all blacklisted like Jerska

legibility and classification

Files make people legible to institutions

Classification frames individuals, enables action, + creates a record

In the film: Stasi file is the key object that translates life into usable info

Chicago Strategic Subject List

A controversial predictive policing program used from 2013 to 2020 to assign violence-risk scores to individuals.

Surveillance capitalism

human experience → raw material for prediction and profit

unlike under the Stasi, Goal is less about monitoring and more about influence

Tesla case

Tesla Sentry Mode records the car’s surroundings but owners may experience that monitoring as reassurance/control

complicates the Stasi model since modern surveillance isn’t always experienced as repression

Charismatic leadership

A quality that allows someone to attract, influence, and inspire others; project energy in a way that makes people feel heard, understood, and comfortable; make followers believe a charismatic leader is uniquely able to speak for them

Rhodes has significant influence over his listeners that he developed by making them (specifically their frustrations and resentments) feel heard and understood

celebrity vs popularity vs charisma

Celebrity: people recognize you.

Popularity: people like you.

Charisma: people treat you as exceptional and believe you can voice their grievances, embody their hopes, or lead them through crisis

Rhodes had all 3

Populism

a moral story about politics where the people are pure, honest, and ignored; the elite are corrupt, fake, and self-serving; and the leader purports to express what the people already know

Rhodes presented himself as the authentic “common man”, bypassed institutions through direct media connection, converted resentment into moral superiority, mocked intellectuals and professionals, treated manners as dishonest, expertise as arrogance, and resentment as wisdom

Charisma as bond; populism as script

Charisma: “He understands me”

Populism: “He speaks for us against them”

Rhodes became politically powerful when his fans begin to treat him as the voice of a morally superior people against corrupt elites

Vitajex

a fictional worthless supplement rebranded by Rhodes as an energy/libido booster

Vitajex sells things that correspond to Rhodes’s image: vitality, masculinity, rebellion, belonging

Pappy O’Daniel

historical precursor of charismatic leadership, Flour salesman and radio promoter in Fort Worth

like Rhodes, Built a popular radio program around music, homespun talk, religion, and advertising

Resentment politics

political strategy channeling collective anger into political movement by uniting individualsa gainst a perceived outgroup (e.g. elites) who are positioned as the cause of the ingroup’s problems

Rhodes’ appeal is that he offers recognition, revenge, entertainment, humiliation of enemies, permission to distrust elites

His core political message is not about materially improving lives, but humiliating people

Resistance power

The ability of subordinated people to make domination harder, costlier, less legitimate, or less stable

the strike that is the focus of the documentary

Weapons of the weak

disruption, solidarity, moral framing, and visibility

all used by Harlan County strikers to remain steadfast in their cause

Solidarity infrastructure

social infrastructure to build and maintain resistance from below

built through union meetings, families, kitchens, songs, shared memory, & the repeated act of showing up together

Women as strategic actors

Women in Harlan County are key players in the resistance movement

sustained the strike, expanded participation, confronted strikebreakers, shamed hesitation, preserved morale, and framed the struggle as family survival

participation turned a workplace conflict into a community struggle

Moral framing

framing of the strike as more than a contract dispute, making it politically powerful

strike is about safety, black lung, dignity, democratic voice, family survival, and the right to not be sacrificed for profit

Bloody Harlan

what Harlan became known as after 1931 failed strike that was met w/ deputized forces and private security

name stuck because labor organizing repeatedly met armed repression + it preserved a tradition of resistance

battle of evarts

Armed confrontation near Evarts between striking miners and company-linked gunmen, killing 4 men

Battle became the defining symbol of the Harlan County labor war

“Which Side Are You On?”

A song written to support miners that became a legacy of the Battle of Evarts, demanding a choice between the union and company 'thugs'.