Machtreflexivität und Sexualität – Zur Polymorphie des Begehrens
DOI: 10.61387/S.2026.12.4
Autoren
Tobias Wieland
Abstract
Sexuality is embedded in multiple mechanisms of exclusion, raising fundamental questions about the relationship between desire, power, and self-determination. How can power in sexuality be approached in a conscious and reflexive manner? Is desire conceivable beyond, or in resistance to, social conditioning? And how is sexual self-determination possible within social formations permeated by political and normative power? This article proposes the concept of power reflexivity as a theoretical framework for addressing these questions. Power is not understood solely as top-down domination but as a relational, dynamic, and self-reflective process that operates within erotic relations themselves. Building on this paradigm, the article examines the implications of power reflexivity for sexual ethics in the context of neosexuality and asks what contribution a critical theory of the erotic can make to contemporary debates on sexuality. Focusing on the theoretical and representational dimensions of erotic violence and power games, the analysis neither advocates domination nor violence, nor does it seek to aestheticize domination. Instead, it investigates how historical and psychological structures of domination persist within erotic practices and how these tensions may become sites of ethical reflection and aesthetic transformation.
Keywords
Power reflexivity, BDSM / Kink, Polymorphous Sexuality, Decolonizing the erotic, Queer feminist theory
Metadaten
Veröffentlicht in: Sexuologie. Zeitschrift für Sexualmedizin, Sexualtherapie und Sexualwissenschaft. Band 33, Heft 1-2 (2026), Seiten 15-22