I’ve never believed that Nietzsche’s will to power was meant to be something that belongs solely to individuals, nor that it takes the form of domination. Groups of people have a will to power, as much as the individuals who constitute groups, as do the psychic subdivisions within an individual psyche. And this will to power can manifest and resolve itself in myriad ways, sometimes through coercion, but often through alliance.

Nietzsche was a reductionist — reducing all human and even natural actions to the universal animating force of the will to power — but this force was understood to undergo rich transformations and sublimations in its journey from inorganic to organic to social life, and it is crucial to note both that Nietzsche did stratify and rank these transformations, noted their changes in character as they elevated in rank.