A fight to the death for recognition leaves the 'winner' dependent on the loser

In a life-and-death struggle for recognition, one party submits to keep living and becomes the "slave," while the other becomes "master." But the master's sense of worth now depends on being recognized by someone he considers beneath him, while the slave, through real work on the world, develops a truer kind of self-consciousness. Hegel used this parable to argue recognition can never be one-directional.

— G.W.F. Hegel, Phenomenology of Spirit — "Lordship and Bondage," 1807
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