Conclusion
In the conclusion of this book, we return to summarize how certain worldview assumptions are embedded in conflict processes, and how certain conflict processes are embedded in worldviews. Also, we return to the assertion that the theory and practice of conflict processes need to be examined at the level of worldviews. We also make a case for why Western philosophy needs insights and practices from conflict processes, as expanded in the text.
Worldview Assumptions Embedded in Conflict Processes:
As mentioned in the Introduction, the Western analytic tradition believes that neutrality, or an unbiased approach to knowledge, can be gained through generalizations and abstractions that are based on reliable assumptions and empirical evidence. However, other cultural traditions base their knowledge on experiences that Western thought often does not acknowledge as valid. In short, Western analysts think they are unbiased and neutral. However, people from other traditions do not see them as unbiased and neutral. Therefore, I suggest that conflict analysts must navigate the space between the Western tradition and the other traditions. Otherwise, Western analysists lose credibility with other cultures, as well as their tendency to impose Western notions on non-Western people.
Conflict Processes Embedded in Western Worldviews:
In Western cultures, and in the non-Western countries dominated by Western thought, competitive and argumentative conflict processes have saturated the Western worldview. We form arguments with sufficient evidence and reasoning to defeat other arguments, just as lawyers fight with each other by creating the “best” argument to defeat the “best” argument of their opponents. Essentially, war is the metaphor for the Western conflict process, just as war is the device of colonialism, imperialism, and global capitalism.
Individualism and Self-Interest:
In my view, the most disconcerting assumptions in Western thinking about conflict processes are the following. First, Western thought is saturated by notions of individualism, where self-interest is assumed to be the primary concern of people. In more indigenous and Eastern societies that have escaped the domination of Western forms of thought, there is a balance between self-interest and other-interest. This occurs in societies where security comes from a balance of one’s trust for community members as well as self-trust; whereas in individualistic societies, self-trust and self-interest dominate in a highly competitive and other-suspicious social order.
Balance of Self-Trust and Other-Trust:
As an example of balance of community-trust and self-trust, I asked my students, in a small graduate seminar, which students grew up feeling secure in their neighborhoods? The only students in that seminar, who felt secure growing up, were the two Black students who grew up in communities where they knew everyone who lived around them, and where very few people moved away from those communities. One student grew up in a predominately Black community in Portland, Oregon. The other student grew up in an African village. From this, we can suppose that security and self-trust may emerge from secure communities, where one can trust that their neighbors will provide tangible support.
Community-Centric Over Identity-Centric:
Community-centric trust is different from identity-group trust, where the latter depends on ongoing inclusion in a specific identity group. Often identity groups require high levels of conformity that prevent individuals from asserting their uniqueness and differences. In contrast, physical communities flourish when everyone in that community is accepted for their uniqueness and difference. This kind of acceptance does not eliminate conflicts; rather constructive conflict is not equated with exclusion from the group. Healthy conflict process means avoiding conflict-denial, or passive exclusion from community. Embracing diversity and difference means dealing with difference and conflict in a positive, life-affirming, way.
Spectrums and Continua over Categories and Polarizations:
Second, Western thought has become intensely categorical and polarized. Rather than using generalizations as continua with subtle gradations, Western thought too often uses polarized categories that can be used for quick decisions for inclusion or exclusion. For example a person can be perceived as trustworthy or not trustworthy, responsible or irresponsible, smart or dumb, kind or mean, fun or too serious, interesting or boring. Within Western thought, we navigate our world on the basis of quick decisions on the basis of these polarized categories. It seems that our very survival depends on these quick decisions. Someone is familiar or strange; trustworthy or scary.
In neighborhoods, villages, or tribes, where mutual aid is a key to survival, everyone in that community can contribute to the group’s survival. Everyone can be understood on a spectrum of continuums, rather than polarized categories. Effective conflict processes that become socialized and institutionalized transform communities and their underlying worldviews.
Connection and the Common Good over Disconnection and Alienation:
Third, healthy people in healthy communities depend on strong feelings of connection, rather than disconnection and alienation. There are several ways that people can experience connection, but the precondition is that people need to develop authentic trust for one another. This is difficult in highly individualized and competitive cultures, such as the one that has evolved in mainstream American society. The connection that I am discussing is not identity group connection because identity-group connections are meant to affirm one’s identity, not affirm connection across difference. It is my view that healthy communities and healthy people are based on an affirmation of difference and diversity, not an affirmation of similarity. Ironically, embracing diversity achieves the common good better than legislating some unified identity.
View from Compassion and View from Judgment:
For me, the key to affirming difference and diversity comes from the compassion, not judgment. Though we need to make judgments in our lives, compassion opens up the possibility of connection across difference. I suggest that we find a balance between our views from judgment and our views from compassion. Of course, we must be critical of all of the influences in our culture that make the view from compassion difficult and even perilous.
From Compassion to Community to True Democracy:
As an example, the MeToo movement has dramatized the sad prevalence of sexual harassment and sexual abuse that occurs in all strata of our larger culture. How are the victims of these outrages supposed to have a view from compassion when such views may have kept victims in harm’s way? In any way that our larger culture has the potential to oppress of victimize us, we need to find a way to effectively transform that culture. Because collaborative conflict processes are the essence of democracy, any society that claims to be a democracy must institutionalize and socialize these processes or be deemed to be hypocritical to the name “democracy.” Engaging in a conflict process as equal participants encourages connection across difference, and generates ongoing healthy communities, which may be one of the first steps toward positive social transformation.
Democracy and Anarchy:
In my opinion, collaborative democracy leads to anarchic social transformation because the essence of democracy is collaboration amongst equal participants, and equal participants are created when power hierarchies are flattened to the degree that power is truly shared by citizens committed to the common good and mutual aid.
Why Western Philosophy Needs Insights and Practices from Conflict Processes:
As developed, above, Western philosophy needs to adjust its practices, just as conventional Western conflict processes need to adjust its practices in the following ways:
- Recognize its bias towards exclusionary individualism and self-interest.
- Reorganize its thinking toward a balance of self- and other-interest, changing its focus on what is good for us, collectively, not just a combination of ones self-interest with another’s self-interest.
- Normalize the differences between people, rather than overarching constructions of what we have in common.
- Adjust Western philosophical thinking to become more community-centric, rather than identity-centric.
- Recalibrate Western philosophical thinking away from polarized categories towards spectrums of continua.
- Reorient Western philosophy away from disconnection and alienation toward connection and the common good.
- Adopt more of the view from compassion, rather than the current over-reliance on the view from judgment.
- Flatten the hierarchy of Western philosophy by taking more seriously the philosophy of non-Western cultures.
- Transform the Western political philosophy analysis of anarchism by viewing it as a radically democratic and collaborative form of self-governance.
Topics for further philosophical consideration:
- Bias towards Exclusionary Individualism and Self-Interest
- Balance of Self- and Other-Interest
- Normalizing the Differences between People
- Becoming more Community-Centric
- Spectrums of Continua
- Connection and the Common Good
- View from Compassion/View from Judgment
- Flattening the Hierarchy between Western Philosophy and World Philosophies
- Anarchy: Radically Democratic and Collaborative Form of Self-Governance
