section_path: Theories/Gene Sharp
section_name: Gene Sharp
paragraph_text: Gene Sharp
  
  Gene Sharp, an American professor of political science, believes that power ultimately depends on its bases. Thus, a political regime maintains power because people accept and obey its dictates, laws, and policies. Sharp cites the insight of Étienne de La Boétie.
  
  Sharp's key theme is that power is not monolithic; that is, it does not derive from some intrinsic quality of those who are in power. For Sharp, political power, the power of any state – regardless of its particular structural organization – ultimately derives from the subjects of the state. His fundamental belief is that any power structure relies upon the subjects' obedience to the orders of the ruler(s). If subjects do not obey, leaders have no power.
  
  His work is thought to have been influential in the overthrow of Slobodan Milošević, in the 2011 Arab Spring, and other nonviolent revolutions.