The system of power has a map. Let's decode it.
In my previous article on the mechanics of domination, I laid the foundation of how and why a system of power and dominance is built and sustained. Patricia Hill Collins takes that further. The matrix of domination maps the structure of power itself, that is, the domains it moves through and the levels where it operates, and shows us why dismantling it requires working on all fronts at once.
The matrix, explained
The intricacy of the matrix is that its architects deploy both systemic and interpersonal forms of oppression, that is, institutions and individuals, policy and behavior, law and language. They are all reinforcing the same hierarchy.
Deploying the matrix (where the matrix operates)
People experience the matrix of domination on three levels, which is why it's so difficult to escape. It begins in the most intimate place: your own biography. How you were raised, what you were told about yourself, what you learned to want and fear. It moves outward to your community: the cultural norms, the collective memory, the stories your group tells about who it is. And then it reaches the level of institutions: the law, the school, the workplace, the state. Each level reinforces the others. But Patricia Hill Collins identifies something crucial at the community level, called subjugated knowledge. The culture of resistance that oppressed groups develop in the spaces they control. That is, their music, language, spiritual practices and ways of knowing that exist outside the dominant narrative.
Dominant groups understand the power of this. Which is why they fight to replace it. Control what a group knows about itself, and you simplify everything else. You no longer need control at every level. The matrix becomes self-maintaining.
The domains of power (how the matrix operates)
Collins talks about four domains which explain how the matrix of domination works.
The structural domain are the laws, policies and institutional rules that organize inequality formally. These structures don't name inequality explicitly but they act as mechanisms of systemic exclusion.
The disciplinary domain monitors, manages and corrects subordinate groups. It's in policing, medical protocols, school systems. This domain is about measuring everyone against a benchmark, then penalizing them for deviating as if it's personal failure rather than structural design.
The hegemonic domain refers to the cultural ideas, images and ideologies that makes the hierarchy feel natural. Beauty standards. Definitions of intelligence. Ideas about who is articulate, who is professional, who is credible, who is dangerous. By the time a subordinate group internalizes these ideas as self-knowledge, the work of domination is already done.
The interpersonal domain is governed by daily interactions. The micro-aggressions, the assumptions, the silences, the rooms you are not invited into. Interpersonal oppression is often dismissed as individual rudeness or unconscious bias. But it is neither random nor personal. It is the structural, disciplinary, and hegemonic domains expressing themselves through human behavior.
The matrix is effective because these domains operate simultaneously, thereby reinforcing each other. It makes it that much harder to challenge and dismantle. And this is where the three levels matter. The domains tell us how power operates. The levels tell us where resistance is possible. Personal biography is where you refuse the story the hegemonic domain wrote about you. Community is where subjugated knowledge lives, that is, the culture, language, and collective memory that dominant groups cannot fully control. And institutions are where structural and disciplinary power can be formally challenged, through policy, law and organized resistance.
The matrix operates on all three levels through all four domains at once. Which is why dismantling it requires working at every level simultaneously.
What resistance looks like
At a personal level, resistance is refusing to internalize dominant group definitions of your worth, intelligence, beauty and capacity. Leverage therapy, community and counter-narratives. Basically, anything that interrupts the hegemonic domain’s work inside you.
At a community level, resistance is protecting and amplifying subjugated knowledge. The music, language, spiritual practices, cultural memory that dominant groups cannot fully control. Building collective spaces where your group's ways of knowing are centered, not marginalized.
At an institutional level, resistance is using legal and policy frameworks that exist. Anti-discrimination law, equal pay legislation, reproductive rights protections, and so on. You should organize politically. Challenge disciplinary systems like hiring criteria, school discipline and policing, through formal channels. Know what the law protects and where it fails.
What's next
You cannot dismantle what you cannot name. This series is the naming.