Philip Pettit on 'Liberty as Non-domination'

"Given that the fulfilment of the three original conditions (i.e., a person is said to dominate another to the extent that 1. they have the capacity to interfere 2. on an arbitrary basis 3. in certain choices that the other is in a position to make.) --their fulfilment in a noticeable degree--is generally going to be a matter of something approaching common knowledge, the domination to which the conditions bear testimony will have an important subjective and intersubjective significance. Domination is generally going to involve the awareness of control on the part of the powerful, the awareness of vulnerability on the part of the powerless, and the mutual awareness--indeed, common awareness among all the parties to the relationship--of this consciousness on each side. The powerless are not going to be able to look the powerful in the eye, conscious as each will be--and conscious as each will be of the other's consciousness--of this asymmetry. Both will share an awareness that the powerless can do nothing except by the leave of the powerful: that the powerless are at the mercy of the powerful and not on equal terms. The master-slave scenario will materialize, and th asymmetry between the two sides will be a communicative as an objective reality. Conscious of this problem, John Milton deplored 'the perpetual bowings and cringings of abject people' that he thought were inevitable in monarchies." Philip Petit, Republicanism A Theory of Freedom and Government, pp. 60-61.