Tolstoy in the Epilogue to War and Peace analyses historians' concepts of force (as causing the movement of people) and power (of a ruler). By contrasting historians' theories with the actual events of the late eighteenth - early nineteenth centuries, Tolstoy (who, incidentally, often made use of physical analogies showing an excellent understanding of mechanics) arrived at definitions for power and force.
1. Power is a relation of a certain person to other persons, in which that person takes the less direct share in an act, the more he expresses opinions, theories, and justifications of the combined action [1].
An example of this definition can be seen in the power of the chair of a Course Accreditation Committee. Such a person expresses opinions, theories and justifications for subject material, contact hours, assessment, date of prescribed texts, prerequisites, objectives and etc. Yet his share in the act (of subject presentation) is minimal. Contact hours are determined by time table clashes and the arbitrary inclusion of holidays, the students do not buy the text (in fact, the more recent the text the less likely that they will obtain a secondhand copy), subject content is determined by the availability of equipment, the quality of prerequisites is determined in other places (eg at VCE level) and only the students (possibly) know for what objective they are attending the course.
2. The movement of peoples is not produced by the exercise of power: nor by intellectual activity (in generating "ideas", by the writing of books, making speeches etc), nor even by a combination of the two, as historians have supposed; but by the activity of all the men taking part in the event, who are always combined in such a way that those who take most direct part in the action take the smallest share in the responsibility for it, and vice versa [1].
Education deals with the movement of students from one level to another. The authorities exercise power by making rules for assessment etc and the "idea" that education is "a good thing" is promoted universally. Yet it is the students that move (by passing) or stay (by failing) - they have the most direct part in the action. However, it is the Head of Department (who possibly did not lecture to a single first year student) who takes the responsibility for the first year pass rate. It is the Vice Chancellor who graduates the students (that is, takes responsibility for their movement to the outside world) even though this might be one of the few occasions that the Vice Chancellor is on campus.
[1] Translation: Constance Garnett.