Contrasting Systems: Partnership and Domination
The following is a simplified chart describing Riane Eisler’s two contrasting systems for organizing human relations--partnership and domination--combining materials from Eisler's The Power of Partnership and David Korten's The Great Turning (which uses Eisler’s work as the book's framework).
Underlying the many differences in societies, both cross-culturally and through history, are two basic cultural configurations: the domination system and the partnership system. Unlike conventional categories, the partnership and domination systems take into full account the most foundational human relations, without which none of us would be here: the relations between the female and male halves of humanity and between them and their daughters and sons.
The last three hundred years have produced a strong movement toward partnership. One tradition of domination after another has been challenged – from despotic kings to child abuse. However, most families and relationships lie somewhere between the dominator and partnership poles. We need to move along the spectrum in the partnership direction in order to heal and empower all our relationships.
The following is a simplified chart combining materials from Eisler's The Power of Partnership and David Korten's The Great Turning.
|
Partnership System |
Domination System |
|---|---|
|
Humans have many possibilities |
Humans are flawed and dangerous |
|
Difference is valued |
Difference is equated with superiority or inferiority |
|
Power is used to empower and nurture through hierarchies of actualization |
Power is used to control and destroy through hierarchies of domination |
|
Women and men are equally valued |
Men are dominant |
|
Men and women can be nonviolent, empathetic, and caring |
Masculinity is equated with control, conquest, and violence |
|
Competition means striving for excellence |
Competition means "dog eat dog" |
|
People cooperate for mutual benefit |
People cooperate to dominate others |
|
Economic structures are equitable |
Huge gaps between haves and have nots |
|
Nature is highly valued |
Nature is depleted and polluted |
|
Morality of sensitivity, caring, and respect |
Morality of insensitivity, control, and coercion |
