Social Psychology of Relationships of Domination in Hegel, Nietzsche and Fanon

This paper explores the writings of G.W.F. Hegel, Friedrich Nietzsche and Frantz Fanon on the dynamics within relationships of domination and subordination. Although the three authors held quite different political perspectives, there are commonalities, as well as differences, in their discussions of this dynamic. All explore the subordinate as an object, the importance of the Other, and the effects on the minds of all involved in such relationships. Nietzsche and Fanon also discuss the role of ressentiment and the importance of physical coercion and repression in maintaining and then undermining domination. Hegel considers the labor of the subordinate significant. Despite their differing views of the processes by which an outcome is reached and the desirability of that outcome, the three writers concur that the destruction of the inequality is an inevitability.