Partnership Studies 6: Rethinking Power, Relationships, and Society

Author(s): Scott Douglas Jacobsen

Publication (Outlet/Website): The Good Men Project

Publication Date (yyyy/mm/dd): 2025/09/14

 Riane Eisler, an Austrian-born American systems scientist, futurist, and human rights advocate, is renowned for her influential work on cultural transformation and gender equity. Best known for “The Chalice and the Blade,” she introduced the partnership versus dominator models of social organization. She received the Humanist Pioneer Award, and in conversation with Scott Douglas Jacobsen, Eisler emphasized the urgent need for humanists to focus on values-based systems and the transformative power of caring economics. Drawing on neuroscience and history, she argues that peace begins at home and calls for a shift in worldview to build more equitable, sustainable, and compassionate societies rooted in connection rather than control. The three books of hers of note that could be highlighted are The Chalice and the Blade—now in its 57th U.S. printing with 30 foreign editions, The Real Wealth of Nations, and Nurturing Our Humanity: How Domination and Partnership Shape Our Brains, Lives, and Future (Oxford University Press, 2019). 

In this interview with Scott Douglas Jacobsen, Riane Eisler explains her partnership–domination framework, illustrating how deeply internalized domination influences relationships with oneself, family, community, and society. Parenting and education are key sites where values of domination or partnership are transmitted, influencing brain development and shaping cultural norms. Eisler highlights how rigid gender roles sustain domination systems and contrasts destructive “power over” models with partnership’s nurturing power. She links these dynamics to international relations, economics, spirituality, and technology, warning that domination systems drive humanity toward an evolutionary dead end. Eisler advocates for partnership values of empathy, care, and equity as essential for global survival.

Scott Douglas Jacobsen: In partnership studies, how do we define “relationship”—to the self, to others, and to societies at large?

Riane Eisler: I approach this question through the framework of the partnership–domination social scale, because all of us have internalized, to varying degrees, a domination voice. In the United States, this is particularly evident. Parenting today reflects this dynamic: for some, it has shifted toward experimentation with partnership-based models, while for others, it has reverted to domination-based approaches. Neuroscience reveals that what children observe and experience in their earliest years has a significant impact on the architecture of their developing brains. These early experiences shape how individuals think, feel, act, and even how they participate in civic life.

Not everyone is affected in the same way—it depends on the range and quality of experiences available to them. In my book The Power of Partnership: Seven Relationships That Will Change Your Life (2002), I outlined real-life examples of these dynamics. That book has since had its rights returned to me, and I am now revising it with significant updates. Much of its content remains relevant, but neuroscience has advanced considerably since its publication, and my later works have drawn heavily on these new findings.

For instance, my 2019 book Nurturing Our Humanity: How Domination and Partnership Shape Our Brains, Lives, and Future, co-authored with anthropologist Douglas P. Fry, expands on these foundations with updated evidence from neuroscience, anthropology, and social science. In revising The Power of Partnership, I am adding an eighth relationship: our relationship with technology. This reflects the contemporary reality in which artificial intelligence and other technologies have become central to human life. These technologies can either sustain life—though domination systems often twist them to serve the interests of in-groups at the expense of out-groups—or they can be profoundly destructive, as with nuclear weapons. It is essential to recognize that AI, for example, depends entirely on how it is programmed: for partnership or for domination.

When we consider how relationships are ranked, we must recognize how plural identities and rigid categories are used to create systems of hierarchy and exclusion. In domination systems, fear is often mistaken for respect. This begins in families, where many internalize voices that tell them they are not good enough, pushing them to compare themselves to others. These voices consistently speak in terms of gendered stereotypes. Men are assigned one rigid role, women another, with no allowance for those in between—even though people who do not fit neatly into these categories have existed throughout human history. Such rigid stereotypes are essential to domination systems, as rigid gender stereotypes are needed to  rank male and “masculine” over female and “feminine.”

Jacobsen: You mentioned the internalized domination voice earlier. Many people today are struggling with the question: how can I silence or overcome that voice—whether it comes through gender stereotypes or other pervasive cultural forms?

Eisler: Yes, that domination voice is deeply ingrained. Gender stereotypes, for instance, are omnipresent, and they are tied to the pervasive binary assumption of only two forms in humanity: male and female. We are hosting a summit called ‘Peace Begins at Home,’ which addresses these issues, particularly the violence that often begins in households where control and violence are key, and then ripples outward into other social institutions.

Take education as an example. It used to be customary to punish students physically if they “misbehaved” or failed to conform, and in some states, corporal punishment remains legal. Similarly, child marriage has not been outlawed in many U.S. states. These are serious concerns.

It is worth noting that the United States signed the Convention on the Rights of the Child over 30 years ago, yet it remains the only UN member state that has not ratified it. Even Somalia, the penultimate country to ratify, did so over a decade ago. This failure reflects poorly on the United States. That said, not every nation that has signed the Convention fully complies with its requirements; in some cases, the act of signing is viewed as a mere formality.

Jacobsen: So, how do people relate to themselves within domination psychology as opposed to partnership psychology? 

Eisler: Historically, Freud emphasized the importance of adapting to the prevailing system. In contrast, today there has been a shift toward what we call emotional literacy: the recognition of our immense human capacities for empathy, for caring for others, and for caring for ourselves.

In my work on education, one of the many failures of our system is that it does not teach about relationships. It does not teach us to care for ourselves, care for others, or care for our natural environment—our Mother Earth. This neglect reflects what domination systems value: in-group versus out-group thinking, conquest, and exploitation.

Domination begins with gender. In domination-based households, children are taught rigid gender stereotypes. They are taught to rank male and “masculine” above female and “feminine,” equating difference with superiority and inferiority, with dominating and being dominated, with serving and being served. To the extent that we internalize these messages, all of our relationships—starting with our relationship to ourselves—are colored by them.

That is why, in The Power of Partnership, I begin with the relationship to the self, before addressing intimate and family relationships, community, and work relationships. All of these are shaped by whether we lean toward partnership or domination.

Psychology, I would say, has moved significantly toward the partnership side, though not wholly. For example, some still classify LGBTQ people as abnormal, but the American Psychological Association does not. This is a significant step forward. The APA has also taken a strong stand against spanking, recognizing it as violent discipline.

Jacobsen: You have described how domination psychology affects relationships with oneself, one’s family, and one’s community. How does this extend outward—to nations, international relations, and even spirituality?

Eisler: According to UN agencies such as UNESCO and UNICEF, two-thirds of children globally still live in unsafe households, households where violent discipline is normalized. This reality underscores the importance of the partnership framework. The Power of Partnership was honoured as the best self-help book of the year when it was published. However, it goes beyond traditional self-help books by addressing relationships not only with oneself and one’s family or our work relations, but also with larger structures such as our nations.

Our relationship with our nation is indeed a relationship. In democracies, for instance, we participate in voting. However, today, with the marketing of ideas and the marketing of overconsumption having become an art form, our relationship with our nation is complex. If you live in an authoritarian state, fear is marketed, and fear keeps people in line. However, when societies move toward partnership, people learn that fear and respect are not the same.

This also extends to international relations, where in-group versus out-group thinking is characteristic of domination systems. We see this reflected in cultural narratives, such as the idea of original sin or the notion of “selfish genes.” I do not have an issue with genetic studies of nonhuman animals. However, when applied to humans, the selfish gene framework falls short of capturing reality. Take the Nordic nations—Finland, Sweden, and Norway—as examples. They devote a far larger share of their GDP to helping people across the globe, people with whom they have no genetic ties. 

Indeed, we are more likely to help those close to us, but this does not mean selfish genes define us. In fact, scientific evidence increasingly points to interconnection. 

Consider the Nobel Prize in Physics awarded for work on quantum entanglement, which demonstrates interconnection at the subatomic level. However, the broader public is rarely given a framework that links such findings with anthropological and genetic evidence showing that all humans are interconnected and trace their ancestry back to a common origin in prehistory. Instead, we are bombarded with disconnected data that lacks integration.

From international relations, we move to our relationship with nature, our Mother Earth. Partnership relations foster harmony, while domination systems promote exploitation. Think of the economic theories of Karl Marx and Adam Smith. Both assumed that nature exists to be exploited. Neither socialist nor capitalist frameworks incorporated a principle of caring for the Earth.

Care—for  self, for others, for nature—is not rewarded in our current economic system. Instead, the guiding principle is caveat emptor—”let the buyer beware.” This mindset reinforces domination structures, widening the gap between those at the top and those at the bottom. At the same time, spiritual discourses often emphasize interconnection, which aligns much more closely with the partnership model.

Jacobsen: You hinted earlier at the role of spirituality and religion. How does this connect to partnership and domination?

Eisler: When it comes to spiritual relations, at the core of most world religions, you do find what I would call the “feminine teachings”—values of caring, of love, of reciprocity, of doing unto others as you would have them do unto you.

However, these teachings are often overlaid with domination teachings: women are inferior, Eve or Pandora is blamed for humanity’s ills, and people of colour are deemed inferior. It becomes a constant in-group versus out-group narrative, reinforced by the idealization of violence. Consider Jehovah, often portrayed as a violent and jealous deity—very much a God of War. Over time, particularly during the Jewish diaspora of the past two millennia, understandings of this deity evolved. However, the larger point is that caring has been consistently devalued and unrewarded in many religious and cultural traditions.

Jacobsen: Can we make the argument that the type of deity someone believes in reflects the kind of society they value?

Eisler: To some extent, yes. If you believe in a punitive, fear-inducing deity—what people call a “God-fearing” God—you are more likely to support authoritarian social systems. Those systems equate difference with hierarchy: dominating versus being dominated.

Jacobsen: How do fear and force differ from explanation and modelling in shaping behaviour?

Eisler: That is a vital question. Fear and force are profoundly different from explanation and modelling. If a child grows up in a household where the so-called “feminine” tasks of caregiving—such as housekeeping, cooking, and caring for others’ health and well-being—are treated as inferior, they internalize that hierarchy.

However, if a child grows up in a household where parents practice partnership parenting, the lessons are very different. When men diaper and feed babies, spend more time caring for children, and are not framed as the ultimate disciplinarians who “lay down the law” when they get home, children learn about partnership instead of domination.

The good news is that in many regions of the world, younger generations are increasingly embracing this partnership model of parenting.

Jacobsen: What about conflict resolution?

Eisler: Conflict resolution is essential, but too often it has not been examined deeply enough. For example, according to the Gottmans’ research on relationships, when people resort to eye-rolling, they are entering dangerous territory—moving into contempt. Contempt undermines any attempt at conflict resolution.

Part of the problem is that in domination-oriented cultures, peace itself is devalued as “feminine.” A peaceful overture may be dismissed as a sign of weakness. That makes genuine conflict resolution difficult. I do not pretend to have all the answers, but I do know that what is modelled in the home has a powerful influence. Families deal with conflict constantly, but the question is: how is it resolved?

Traditionally, in domination households, it was often the father—though sometimes the mother as well—who imposed discipline by force.  We must remember, this is not about men versus women. Women, too, are conditioned to act as agents of the domination system, both in their parenting and in accepting subordinate roles. The critical issue is whether conflict is resolved through fear and force, or through dialogue, dignity, and care.

In partnership-oriented homes, conflict resolution involves sitting down together, discussing issues, and finding solutions that meet everyone’s needs—so long as those needs do not involve harming or annihilating others. Children who see this modeled learn constructive approaches that they carry into adulthood.

Jacobsen: So you are saying the patterns we observe in families echo outward, even geopolitically and professionally?

Eisler: If children grow up with models of conflict resolution that emphasize privacy, dignity, respect, consideration, and care, they internalize those values. However, in domination systems, whether in households or on the world stage, one often sees the opposite: bitter words, smear campaigns, grandiosity, and arrogance. These are consistent through-lines of domination.

The encouraging news is that people can change. I recall the story of a deeply anti-Semitic man who suffered from a debilitating disease. A Jewish rabbi and his wife befriended him. Through their kindness, he eventually converted to Judaism.

Jacobsen: Which branch—Conservative, Orthodox, or Reform?

Eisler: [Laughing] Who knows? I honestly do not. However, it would be interesting to know. Likely not Orthodox, since traditional training in that branch tends to treat outsiders, including anti-Semites, as enemies. Still, the transformation itself is the key point: even those steeped in domination thinking can change when they encounter genuine partnership values modelled in action.

I would imagine that man’s conversion was either to Conservative or Reform Judaism, since those branches tend to be more partnership-oriented. The key point is that the rabbi and his wife refused to see him as “the other.”

Jacobsen: If you look at autocratic leaders, theocratic leaders, or those who aspire to both, these leaders want power indefinitely. Their systems are static and centralized. However, in a partnership model, power is shared more fluidly. There is negotiation, turn-taking, and adaptation based on the needs of individuals, communities, and society as a whole. What happens when people firmly embedded in domination systems—leaders and their followers—see partnership alternatives?

Eisler: That is the challenge. In authoritarian regimes, people are taught by religion, family, and peers not to deviate. Leaders who want power see only two possibilities: either you dominate or you are dominated. Their followers are taught the same. Anything that looks like seeking peace or compromise is immediately dismissed as weakness—and, as we have said before, often labelled “feminine.”

Jacobsen: Then what does partnership governance look like in practice?

Eisler: We are still in the process of figuring that out. One thing we can say for sure is that it is not an authoritarian regime. Interestingly, the European system of coalition building illustrates this more clearly than the American two-party system. In Europe, governments must collaborate to form coalitions, negotiate, and reach compromises. In the United States, by contrast, the system is structured as a win–lose competition, with Democrats or Republicans competing for all-or-nothing victories.

Our culture reflects this “win–lose” mentality everywhere. We even embed it into our language: we speak of “winners” and “losers” not only in the literal sense of outcomes in sports, but as moral judgments about people. “Loser” becomes an epithet, a way of demeaning others. That is a direct reflection of domination values.

Jacobsen: You mentioned earlier the intersection of religion and governance. Some people interpret their religion as justifying the accumulation of wealth and power. How does this connect to domination systems?

Eisler: Many people do interpret their religions that way. For example, some teach that material wealth is a sign of divine reward, despite Christianity’s teachings to the contrary. 

Jacobsen: Jesus said, “It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the Kingdom of God.” He also distinguished between religious and political authority with “Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and unto God the things that are God’s.”

Eisler: But religions often contain contradictory messages that allow them to coexist with authoritarian regimes. One way rulers have resolved this tension historically is by creating state religions. A clear example is Constantine, who converted to Christianity in the fourth century. From that point forward, Christianity transformed from the religion of the persecuted into the religion of the persecutors, integrated into imperial power. (Though historians debate the details—such as the timing of his conversion and certain dark stories associated with him—the fact remains that Christianity became an instrument of empire.)

Jacobsen: How does language play into all this—how does communication shape relationships?

Eisler: Language is one of the deepest carriers of domination systems. Most of the languages we speak today are descended from the Indo-European languages, and they reflect hierarchical and gendered structures. In Romance languages—French, Spanish, Italian—the male plural subsumes the female. If you have a group of men and women, the masculine plural is used.

English is less rigid in this regard, and it has been changing. Words like “mankind” are being increasingly replaced by more inclusive terms, such as “humanity.” Singular “they” is also gaining ground. Interestingly, Finnish never developed gendered pronouns in the first place; it uses a single pronoun for all people. That is not a change but an original feature of the language.

Jacobsen: Is there any language we can genuinely call partnership-oriented?

Eisler: Not fully—not that I know of. The weight of cultural inheritance is substantial. Perhaps there are Indigenous or lesser-studied languages that embody partnership more, but I would not claim expertise in those areas. I sometimes think it would be an outstanding doctoral dissertation to use AI to systematically analyze languages, examining what hidden structures persist and how they reinforce domination or support partnership.

What we do know is that language reflects and reinforces internal models of reality. It is our internal representational system externalized. When our languages embed inaccurate or hierarchical models, they perpetuate domination. This is not accidental—it is a fundamental aspect of how domination systems sustain themselves.

Jacobsen: Are there any parts of domination systems that can actually be helpful in relationships?

Eisler: I cannot think of any. What is often confused here is the distinction between domination and necessary forms of hierarchy. People sometimes mistake a completely flat organization for a partnership system. However, true partnership does not mean the absence of structure. Every complex society requires leaders, teachers, managers, and, of course, parents. The real question is how power is understood and exercised.

In my work, I often contrast two symbols: the chalice and the blade. In domination systems, the blade represents power as power over—the power to dominate, to take life. Ultimately, that power is backed up by fear of death, whether through starvation, execution, inquisitions, or other forms of violence. However, there is also a different kind of power, symbolized by the chalice. This is the power to give, to nurture, to illuminate life. It is the kind of power we must reclaim, particularly through models such as servant leadership. Much of modern management theory is already moving in this direction: leaders are seen not as controllers or enforcers but as guides and sources of inspiration.

This is the power appropriate to partnership systems. Unfortunately, another problem we face is the widespread conflation of equity with sameness. Partnership systems do not demand sameness; they value difference. That includes the differences between female, male, and those whose identities fall between or beyond these categories. The rigidity of “masculine” and “feminine” stereotypes is itself a feature of domination systems. Of course, there are standards in partnership systems: human rights and responsibilities standards.

Another point I emphasize is that, at our current level of technological development, domination systems are driving us toward an evolutionary dead end. Technologies of communication and transportation have made us globally interconnected. However, at the same time, technologies of destruction—nuclear weapons and the slower destruction of nature through environmental exploitation—threaten our survival. The domination worldview, rooted in conquest and exploitation, is unable to address these challenges. Only a partnership worldview can.

Consider the example of a religious fanatic, such as Iran’s Ayatollah. If he genuinely believes that martyrdom will send him to heaven, attended by virgins who will fulfill his every wish, why would he hesitate to use nuclear weapons? That is the danger of combining domination systems with advanced technologies of destruction. It is precisely why we must move toward partnership quickly, before these systems lead us to catastrophe.

Jacobsen: Thank you, Riane. I will see you next week.

Eisler: Take care of yourself. 

Jacobsen: [Laughing] I will try. Goodbye.

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