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Relationships
Power Dynamics in Relationships Between Men
A Personal Perspective: Men create relationships based on hierarchies and power.
Posted July 22, 2022 Reviewed by Lybi Ma
My father, a formidable wrestler and boxer, told me more than once, “Guys size each other up the moment they meet.” My experience as a male, and as a clinician working with men's issues, has convinced me that this is true. The sizing up may not happen consciously; but on some level, men as well as boys predict the outcome of a hypothetical fight between them. Male stalk-eyed flies do something similar, growing long eye stalks. Rather than fight, they compare themselves face-to-face. The fly with the longest stalks wins the right to mate; the loser scuttles away.
Human males size up qualities besides physical prowess—intelligence and competence come to mind—but those comparisons take more time. Females size each other up, too, but I’ll save that subject for another time. Suffice it to say that humans, like all great apes, evolved to be hyper-aware of hierarchies. Best hitter, fastest runner, best student, most popular—the ranking starts young, and—police chief, pop star, billionaire, president—never stops.
3 Types of Male Friendships
Through my therapy work with clients, I found it illuminating to divide male friendships into three types:
- leader, hanger-on
- leader, sidekick
- two equals
The leader–hanger-on relationship requires a leader willing to tolerate a “friend” of much lower status, and a hanger-on willing to accept that lower status. Examples may be found in the entourages of major stars—Michael Jackson or Mike Tyson.
The leader–sidekick relationship requires that a smaller but still significant power imbalance be accepted as right and fair by both parties. Don Quixote and Sancho Panza are a classic example. Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson are another. Though part of his entourage, Elvis’s “Memphis Mafia" may have had leader–sidekick relationships with Elvis, since they had known him before he was “The King.”
The two equals relationship is the ideal of friendship in the United States. Like the other two kinds, it may be quite stable. But just as among lions or chimpanzees, there may be attempted coups.
Attempts to Change Status Relationships
This is true of the other types of friendship, too. The hanger-on may try to lift his status to sidekick, equal, or even leader. The sidekick may try to raise himself to equal or leader. Either of the equals may try to move up to be leader. These attempts always involve conflict—physical, psychological, or both—and risk rupturing the friendship.
In my experience, interactions between males involve complex power assessments and negotiations, usually unacknowledged. One of my best boyhood friends stood 6 foot, 6 inches and weighed more than 200 pounds as a junior in high school. It was apparent to anyone who saw us together that I would have no chance in a fist fight with him. Yet, we stayed friends because of an unspoken pact that he would never use his physical advantage against me, and I would never provoke him to do so.
My friend accepted me as an equal, but this was not charity. In addition to our having many common interests, I had abilities that he valued, including some in which I outshone him, and which I downplayed as he downplayed his physical advantage. In 10 years of friendship, we remained equals and never had a falling out.
A major plot point in my novel Ursula Lake involves a power struggle between long-time friends. When their pact of equality is broken, the results are shattering.
Many of the most famous conflicts in literature involve attempts to change established dynamics of power. Iago, Othello’s third-in-command, wants to be second-in-command or even Othello’s equal. Macbeth aspires to King Duncan’s throne. Lucifer, in Paradise Lost, challenges God.
One reason that police officers tend to hang out with other officers may be that it is difficult for a civilian to feel equal to someone who can put him in jail. Rock stars, theoretical physicists, and famous film directors pal around with their own kind at least partly to avoid awkward power imbalances.
Outside the realm of friendship, too, conflicts between males often revolve around power. Some ultra-competitive males refuse to acknowledge anyone’s superiority. This can lead to big problems. Most men, though, will bow to superior ability. Few young quarterbacks would balk at taking directions from Tom Brady.
Being bossed by someone “sized up,” accurately or not, as inferior, is harder to accept. Being bossed by an incompetent—see the Dilbert comic strip—can be intolerable. Conversely, a boss who feels inferior may overcompensate by being arbitrary, overbearing, and punitive, trying to cut subordinates down to size.
A man I know punched his incompetent, bullying boss—satisfying, maybe, in the moment, but hardly a good career move. Men bossed by people they see as incompetent may become depressed. A country that feels its leaders aren’t fit to lead may also become depressed, individually and collectively.
None of this negates the idea that “all men are created equal.” That is a philosophical-moral-religious ideal. In even the most ostensibly egalitarian real-world situations, however, it frequently turns out that, as George Orwell wrote in Animal Farm, "Some animals are more equal than others.”
Wishing this weren’t the case doesn’t make it less so. By recognizing the existence of hierarchies, understanding the power dynamics that underlie them, and recognizing one’s own position and part in them, men—and women, too—can navigate them more successfully, with less stress, less confusion, and much less potential for violence.
