Power in Medical Education

Abstract

The previous four chapters on identity, this chapter on power and the following three on location, together provide a rigorous theoretical framework yet a practical primer for a new literacy in patient-centered medical education—a way of doing medical education that requires talking about it, in depth and at length, with an extended vocabulary. In this chapter, we set out a typology of power, addressing the kinds of power that have both relevance and meaningfulness for medical education. The central question we address is: why do we do what we do in medical education in one way rather than another way? In other words, what is a legitimate practice for a medical educator to engage in at any one time and in any one location and how are such practices appropriately resisted if they are seen to be deficient, or inappropriate?