Social theorist Max Weber describes power as having a coercive element and authority as having a noncoercive one. You can do what I ask of you because you have to do what I have the power to make you ...

That first year, I didn't understand the difference between power and authority. Now I know that power, according to James C. Hunter's book The Servant, is "the ability to force or coerce someone ...

“We need to distinguish between power and authority. You can have power and exercise it and have absolutely no authority,” she added.