[einhverfr]

Just to make one clarification:

Obviously the household exists in a context regarding dealings with other households in a traditional culture so intrahousehold dynamics are important. Again, I said I saw modern feminism and women's suffrage arising as a response to changes in the interhousehold space brought on by industrialization.

This being said matriarchy and patriarchy are almost always a question of intra-household dynamics. The question is, whether women effectively hold the keys to power or whether women are isolated from eachother, unable to effectively organize and make their agendas compelling. A strong matriarchy/patriarchy in the household is a good indication of women being able to do this (again one sees this in Greek material despite the fact that the society was formally patriarchal with formal privileges associated with men only, see the drama of Lysistrata for a dramatic account, but also look at Faraone's works cited above).

The family is also generally a state in miniature. What goes on with the family is a mirror of state power structures (see Elaine Combs-Schilling, "Etching Patriarchal Rule" for some brief discussion of this, but also see "Mass Psychology of Fascism" by Wilhelm Reich for a psychologist's view). So intra-household dynamics are the among the best indications of political power structures in the whole of society.

In short, whoever has power at home, has power everywhere.