Exploring the Framework of Consent and Negotiation in the BDSM Community for Broader Application within Corporate Environments

Abstract

While men and women across the globe were immersing themselves in the world of BDSM through the Fifty Shades of Grey trilogy, we failed to create a conversation about the most important aspect of the kink community – the idea of explicit consent. The established communication and negotiated consent frameworks of the BDSM community function to encompass all aspects of interaction and are not solely limited to those interactions that occur only in a sexual nature (Holt, 2015; Nielsen, 2010). While academic literature covers consent and negotiation as the fundamental framework of the BDSM community, very few pieces explore the intricacy of the negotiation process and the resulting product of absolute consent (Downing, 2013). Even more so, the literature completely fails to ask in what ways this dynamic and complex framework might be adapted for broader application outside of the kink community. Under the current normality of corporate environments, it is possible to argue that a traditional employee is unknowingly and unwillingly engaged in a D/s relationship with their employer. Using the established communication tools from the BDSM community, corporations could implement consent dynamics to disrupt the traditional power dynamics (Holt, 2015; Nielsen, 2010). This dissertation explores the possible applications of extending the consent and negotiation framework of the BDSM community to a corporate environment. Negotiation inside of corporations could lead to business environments being seen as safe space versus places of oppression (Embrick, 2011).