From Custodial Responsibility to Dominion Permission: The Exceptionalism Drift Model and Plain-Language Companion

This deposit contains a theoretical manuscript and companion summary introducing the Exceptionalism Drift Model, a diagnostic framework for analyzing how claims of asymmetrical capacity can be routed either toward reciprocal duty or toward permission, control, extraction, and classification. The primary manuscript, From_Custodial_Responsibility_to_Dominion_Permission_submission_ready.docx, develops the full scholarly argument. It reconstructs human exceptionalism as a branching moral-category lineage rather than a single doctrine or simple belief in superiority. The manuscript distinguishes custodial routing, in which asymmetry creates duties of restraint, repair, accountability, and correction, from dominion routing, in which asymmetry becomes rank, authorization, management, extraction, or intra-human hierarchy. It also defines the Exceptionalism Drift Functional as a diagnostic scoring rubric for examining when responsibility language changes operative function while retaining moral legitimacy. The companion text, When_Care_Becomes_Permission_final_companion.docx, presents the same core argument in plain-language form for wider readership. It is intended for readers who need the model’s operating logic without the full technical apparatus of the primary manuscript. The companion explains the central test: when power calls itself care, does it become more accountable to what it affects, or does it gain permission over it? Together, the files provide both a full theoretical-methodological paper and an accessible companion piece. The work contributes to environmental ethics, moral status debates, social ontology, colonial theory, conservation analysis, institutional critique, and governance studies by shifting the unit of analysis from the mere presence of exceptionalist belief to the function performed by asymmetry claims. The deposit includes: From_Custodial_Responsibility_to_Dominion_Permission_submission_ready.docx Primary manuscript. Full theoretical and methodological treatment of the Exceptionalism Drift Model, including literature positioning, conceptual definitions, coding variables, methodological design, illustrative applications, rival explanations, falsification conditions, limitations, and references. When_Care_Becomes_Permission_final_companion.docx Plain-language companion. Condensed explanation of the model for broader comprehension, emphasizing the practical diagnostic question of whether care language increases accountability or authorizes control. Keywords: human exceptionalism; stewardship; dominion; moral status; environmental ethics; social ontology; category drift; colonialism; conservation; institutional analysis; care and control; asymmetry; governance.