Patricia Hill Collins matrix of domination is concerned with the pattern of intersecting systems of oppression orchestrated by the most elite organizations in society. According to Collins, the systems of oppression are organized through four interwoven domains of power; structural, disciplinary, hegemonic, and interpersonal (Patricia Hill Collins: Intersecting Oppressions, n.d.). The structural domain entails power and authority. In this domain the power players have ownership and control of the land, laws, religion, and the economy. All over the world, people are forced to operate in a system of unequal distribution of power, wealth, and health. Structural power undermines the physical and psychological well-being of the people, through poverty, illness, premature death, environmental destruction, and repression (Haviland, 2010, p. xx). The disciplinary domain is the home of oppression, consisting of policy-making. The group over policy-making controls human behavior. This group hides oppression by acting as people of rationality, efficiency, and equal treatment (Patricia Hill Collins: Intersecting Oppressions, n.d.). Disciplinary power create a digressive practice of knowledge and behavior that defines what is normal, acceptable, deviant, etc. (Foucault, n.d.). The hegemonic domain of power refers to the ability of an elite group of people to hold …show more content…
This domain is made up of the personal relationships we maintain and the different interactions in our daily lives. Interpersonal power dominance is achieved when the people internalize the ideology of inferiority, and by experiencing interpersonal disrespect from members of the dominant group ("Four "I's" of Oppression," n.d.). If someone has been told that they were stupid, worthless, and abnormal; and have been treated this way all of their lives, then it is expected that they would come to believe it to be