Only on the basis of relatively complex assumptions about a power-code does power begin to 'flow', i.e. to take the form of a process which transmits reduced complexity from one decision to another. The liquidity of power is the effect of its being a suitable code – just as with money. The impression of 'flow' arises because events (here, actions) take place sequentially, their selectivity being related to one another by means of a code in the sense that selections presuppose or complete one another reciprocally.

XREF: Parallels Luhmann's own treatment of money as a generalized symbolic medium; structural coupling between power and money as media.

Niklas Luhmann, Trust and Power, loc. 633