The Power of the Powerless
E575242
The Power of the Powerless is a seminal political essay by Václav Havel that analyzes life under communist totalitarianism and argues for the transformative power of individual moral resistance.
All labels observed (2)
| Label | Occurrences |
|---|---|
| The Power of the Powerless canonical | 2 |
| power of the powerless | 1 |
How this entity was disambiguated
This entity first appeared as the object of triple T6193123 — resolving that mention is where its identity was fixed. The disambiguator weighed these candidate entities and picked the highlighted one (or “None”, minting a new entity). This is how homonymy is resolved: the same surface form can point to different entities.
NED1
Entity disambiguation (via context triple)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: The Power of the Powerless Context triple: [Václav Havel, notableWork, The Power of the Powerless]
-
A.
All Power to the People
All Power to the People is a revolutionary slogan associated with the Black Panther Party that expresses a demand for community control, racial justice, and liberation from oppressive power structures.
-
B.
What I Saw at the Revolution
"What I Saw at the Revolution" is a political memoir by speechwriter and columnist Peggy Noonan recounting her experiences working in the Reagan and George H. W. Bush administrations and reflecting on American conservatism in the 1980s.
-
C.
Beat the Whites with the Red Wedge
Beat the Whites with the Red Wedge is a 1919 Soviet propaganda poster by El Lissitzky, celebrated as a landmark of Russian avant-garde design and Constructivist political art.
-
D.
The Inevitable Revolution
The Inevitable Revolution is a political work by Lebanese Druze leader and thinker Kamal Jumblatt that outlines his revolutionary, socialist, and humanist vision for transforming Arab and Lebanese society.
-
E.
The Idea of Freedom
The Idea of Freedom is a philosophical work by Mortimer Adler that systematically explores the nature, varieties, and implications of human freedom in moral, political, and metaphysical contexts.
- F. None of above. chosen
- G. Unsure - the case is ambiguous/there is not enough information to decide.
NED2
Entity disambiguation (via description)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: The Power of the Powerless Target entity description: The Power of the Powerless is a seminal political essay by Václav Havel that analyzes life under communist totalitarianism and argues for the transformative power of individual moral resistance.
-
A.
All Power to the People
All Power to the People is a revolutionary slogan associated with the Black Panther Party that expresses a demand for community control, racial justice, and liberation from oppressive power structures.
-
B.
What I Saw at the Revolution
"What I Saw at the Revolution" is a political memoir by speechwriter and columnist Peggy Noonan recounting her experiences working in the Reagan and George H. W. Bush administrations and reflecting on American conservatism in the 1980s.
-
C.
Beat the Whites with the Red Wedge
Beat the Whites with the Red Wedge is a 1919 Soviet propaganda poster by El Lissitzky, celebrated as a landmark of Russian avant-garde design and Constructivist political art.
-
D.
The Inevitable Revolution
The Inevitable Revolution is a political work by Lebanese Druze leader and thinker Kamal Jumblatt that outlines his revolutionary, socialist, and humanist vision for transforming Arab and Lebanese society.
-
E.
The Idea of Freedom
The Idea of Freedom is a philosophical work by Mortimer Adler that systematically explores the nature, varieties, and implications of human freedom in moral, political, and metaphysical contexts.
- F. None of above. chosen
Statements (45)
| Predicate | Object |
|---|---|
| instanceOf | political essay ⓘ |
| addresses |
moral dimension of politics
ⓘ
relationship between individual and state ⓘ role of ordinary citizens in sustaining totalitarianism ⓘ |
| advocates |
individual moral responsibility
ⓘ
living in truth ⓘ nonviolent resistance ⓘ |
| author | Václav Havel ⓘ |
| circulation |
samizdat
ⓘ
underground publications ⓘ |
| countryOfOrigin | Czechoslovakia ⓘ |
| describes |
everyday complicity in authoritarian regimes
ⓘ
mechanisms of ideological control ⓘ post-totalitarian system ⓘ |
| form | essay collection framework ⓘ |
| genre |
dissident literature
ⓘ
political philosophy ⓘ |
| hasReception |
influential in political theory and human rights discourse
ⓘ
widely regarded as seminal work on totalitarianism ⓘ |
| historicalContext |
Cold War
ⓘ
communist rule in Czechoslovakia ⓘ |
| influenced |
Velvet Revolution
ⓘ
linked to:
Velvet Revolution in Czechoslovakia
democratic opposition in Eastern Europe ⓘ |
| influencedBy | Charter 77 experience ⓘ |
| keyConcept |
ideology as a veil
ⓘ
living in truth ⓘ living within the lie ⓘ parallel polis ⓘ power of the powerless ⓘ
linked to:
The Power of the Powerless
|
| mainSubject |
dissent
ⓘ
individual moral resistance ⓘ life under communist totalitarianism ⓘ power and powerlessness ⓘ |
| movement |
Charter 77
ⓘ
linked to:
Charter 77 movement
Czechoslovak dissident movement ⓘ |
| notableFigureInText | the greengrocer ⓘ |
| originalLanguage | Czech ⓘ |
| partOf | Central and Eastern European dissident canon ⓘ |
| publicationYear | 1978 ⓘ |
| theme |
authenticity versus conformity
ⓘ
ethics under oppression ⓘ limits of ideological systems ⓘ |
| translatedInto |
English
ⓘ
multiple languages ⓘ |
| writtenIn | late 1970s ⓘ |
How these facts were elicited
The pipeline generated the facts above by prompting gpt-5.1 with this entity's name + description and the instruction below.
Instruction
You are a knowledge base construction expert. Given a subject entity and a description of it, return factual statements that you know for the subject as a JSON list of dictionaries(triples), where keys must be "subject", "predicate" and "object". The number of facts may be very high, between 25 to 50 or more, for very popular subjects. For less popular subjects, the number of facts can be very low, like 5 or 10. # Requirements - If you don't know the subject at all, return an empty list. - If the subject is not a named entity, return an empty list. - Include at least one triple where predicate is "instanceOf". - Do not get too wordy. - Separate several objects into multiple triples with one object.
Input
Subject: The Power of the Powerless Description of subject: The Power of the Powerless is a seminal political essay by Václav Havel that analyzes life under communist totalitarianism and argues for the transformative power of individual moral resistance.
Referenced by (3)
Full triples — surface form annotated when it differs from this entity's canonical label.
linked to: The Power of the Powerless