Conflictwork 101: Neo-Conflict Theory and My Graduate Years
I would love some day to have a thoroughgoing and nuanced conversation on the nature and role of conflict. At age 47, in my masters degree (1998-2000) in Adult Education, at the Faculty of Education, UBC, I took it upon myself to deconstruct and reconstruct some major fault-line I was picking up in reading critical theory and critical pedagogy and the rise of criticality in the academy around everything. I loved these challenging and emancipatory projects (and critique) and saw them then (and now) as having great value for education; but something was still missing or “off” for me about where they were leading us. To give you a clue, what was missing I put into a theory of my own by the end of 1999 or so, and I called it the Domination-Conflict-Fear-Violence theory (or cycle)—DCFV theory for short.
Though that is jumping ahead a little of where I want to go in this Forum blog. I simply want to talk about conflict, its nature and role in society and education and well... stretch the notion as far as you want. By the end of my masters degree I had come up with a neo-conflict theory (or, ‘new’ corrective to conflict theory which is part of the critical theory schools). I was starting to use a term I had seen in Dr. Arnold Mindell’s fascinating project in Oregon, via process-psychology and shamanistic elements, etc., that he once called “conflictwork” and eventually more popularly labeled “worldwork.” He wanted to find new ways to help individuals and groups work through the unprocessed conflict in our world, unconsciously, preconsciously and consciously. Unprocessed conflict he, and many others and I would agree, leads to internal and external system distresses and violence, domination in excess—leading to a kind of deep toxicity that is destroying deep democracy and killing us in other ways (like racism, classism, sexism, wars). My DCFV theory was also pointing to this need to better manage conflict in this world, and it points to how we had better bring this theory and practices that go with it into the education systems, and the sooner the better. I won’t go on about Mindell’s work as you can look it up on the Internet for starters.
I introduce here an archival document I just found in my old files, where I talk about the context and ideas behind DCFV theory indirectly but more I am talking to an education colleague about neo-conflict theory as a graduate thesis project. That colleague is the esteemed international critical pedagogue, Peter McLaren, a friend and student of the late Brazilian critical pedagogue, Paulo Freire. I also add his response to my letter, both written in the last days of December, 1998, some 18 years ago. I have likely mentioned the support at times I have received via emails from Dr. McLaren since my grad school years, not the least of which was his most recent endorsement of my book (with Desh Subba) on philosophy of fearism (1).
So, let me turn to my exhaustive habit of writing academics I don’t really know but I have read their work and I want to have a dialogue about them. Not only do I want to learn from them, I want them to learn from me. As well, I test myself to attempt to connect with and interpret their work and because they are author, so I get to see if they come back and critique me for missing or twisting their ideas. It’s self-validating of my skills to read and interpret well, when they don’t come back and tell me I have made mistakes. This is my method of self-assessment and requires the conscious and repetitive vulnerability that makes up the stones of the path of fearlessness. Also, these letters are an embodied practice of writing/thinking that I require to work out—to exercise—to develop my thoughts. Sure, I admit, sometimes, when I re-read the letters I sent, it seems as if I am ‘talking to myself to hear my self.’ Is that such a bad thing to do, sometimes? Really, if you examine this letter below, like so many, I am sharing “my dreams” with what I think is possible, hoping that it might light a fire in others—and, if I’m really lucky they would want to collaborate with me to make these dreams come true.
I have sent thousands of these kinds of letters to academics and professionals etc. for as long as I can remember beginning in the early 1970s onward. About 10% of those I have sent get a response with the quality of McLaren’s below. About 80% never respond. You have to get used to that and burn brightly with lot of enthusiasm and belief in what you are doing in order to keep trying. You could also say, one has to have a lot of inner gumption (courage) to do this praxis with such discipline. I think it is this praxis that makes me a good researcher and educator. I encourage others to do likewise, whether you are a grad student or not. It is important we remember that academics are public servants, in some way, and they need to be “truthed” by all people in societies, not merely other academics. That’s another tangent I could go on and on about but won’t.
Note, Peter McLaren was not even mentioned by any of the instructors in my B. Ed. degree at UofC at the point where I made a career shift to become an educator. It’s too bad, as I missed coming to his work at that time and had to find it on my own many years later. Anyways, now to the lengthy dense letter I wrote McLaren, who was professor at UCLA at the time, (Dec. 28, 1998) just six months after I moved to Vancouver, BC and started my masters program. Probably, one late wintery cold night, down at the computer lab of the Ed Studies Department, I wrote:
Dear Peter [McLaren],
“Holy Fire! My brother Peter... great to have met some parts of you Peter, as I’ve read the article in Journal of Thought, “The Specters of Gramsci” and your intro piece in Macedo (Ed.), called “Traumatizing Capital...” and your more autobiographical sketch in Grant (Ed.). Wow! I’m touched, I’m inspired and very pleased to have read more about you and your work. These are excellent articles with a lot of richness that I could not do justice to critiquing meaningfully at this time. But they will no doubt be worthy of several readings as I work on my conceptual M.A. thesis this yr.
I want to begin by responding with a ‘brotherly’ sense of connection to your passion, commitment, vulnerability, and disappointments and frustrations working in the area of revolutionary praxis. I think I know so many of your experiences in myself. I’m 47 years old with many ‘battle scars’ and I can relate to your sketch in Grant (Ed.) a lot—this is a great contribution, and I would like to thank Grant for giving you and others a chance to share the theoretical weavings and the personal background behind them, of each author. I thought you handled Grant’s assignment very well, and the piece certainly shows your transdisciplinary bent and breadth and depth with a human touch. I’d like to give it to every beginning teacher in teacher colleges around the world.
Unfortunately, your language and intensity of concepts, all together, flowing across disciplines, is likely too much for most teachers and educators. I’ve been naive in listening to others in our dept. of educational studies talk about you or mention your name. The types of comments that come up are usually given with some tone of respect for you and your work but that both some students and some faculty “just can’t connect with McLaren.” I think now, I perhaps can understand why. I am not bothered by your challenging and prophetic-like inspiring writing. I have no problem with the Marxism either. I don’t feel you ramming anything down people’s throats, nor do I see you writing as an elitist by intent or pretentiously. I rather, see your brilliance, diverse and rich intellectual and experiential background as a synthesizer... and for most people who want “simplicity” alone, without a lot of diverse experience to draw on themselves, I can see they would get drowned quickly. I don’t find it easy reading either. But I also feel the ‘gems’ are in there worth digging and struggling for. I too am often accused of writing too “densely” for my audiences and my prophetic-passion often turns many off, as they think I’m rigidly fixed in my conceptions of the way the “world should be.” I know I’m flexible and open to critique and self-critique. I sense you are as well. I also believe you have found some pretty firm places to root your vision and thinking and they aren’t easily blown by the wind. I too have some deeply held universal-like notions about some things. A will tree bends in the wind, but it isn’t blown away by every wind of change (fettish or fad, as you often point out in your critical writing).
I too am really transdisciplinary and yet, I’ve not nearly assimilated the discourses of the academic world as you have for a few decades. I’ve been an organic intellectual alright, but not steeped in academic very much. So, now I’m doing this academic thing to see where next for me. I think all revolutionaries who “fail” a project tend to go into the cave to reflect and write their major tomes—don’t they? I’ve come off a long eight year popular liberation movement in Calgary, Alberta, which I founded and co-lead, and I’ve come down to a ‘hard-biting reality’ too, as the “community” disintegrated for the most part and I ran out of money completely. I’m in recovery I guess being shorted up by student loans again... I can share more about myself and background as a liberation leader/educator if you wish later. But at this point, I’m merely wanting to respond to your work and let you know I want to stay in touch and ask lots of questions and learn from you and challenge you—challenge your warrior and be challenged also... I love that warrior spirit in you that I hear in your writing and I too know the warrior (Sacred Warrior) and magician/shaman that is in me too. I believe I could offer you lots as well. I want to fight with you, always keeping oppression as that which has to be fought as distinct from the person (gosh, I guess, I’m a bit essentialist at times)—whatever form that takes. Let’s keep talking.
I’m with you in how you critique Habermas’s project and others, and yet how you seem to respect certain “roots” in the various projects, including modernity. I am interested in “Integration” (yes, a problematic term) of past and present, of differentiations (and dissociations) in developmental processes at all levels of consciousness... so, I appreciate your search for truth(s) which looks integrative to me not merely reactionary and extremist forms of thought that have little chance of integrating with larger and deeper levels of truths. I am developing a lot of thinking around the notions of “differentiation” and “dissociations” and how they are totally different critters in social phenomena—and conflictwork eventually has to deal with that distinction—a distinction that is rarely ever addressed in social theory, educational thinking etc. (at least from what I’ve read).
My M.A. and hopefully a Ph.D. to follow in adult education (EDST) is likely to be directed toward some deconstruction of “critical theory” (critical social theories)—and a reconstruction and neo-conflict theory (or at least some better theory and practices of conflictwork). I want to ask you a basic question right off the top: I have a sense that academia (if not the larger world of thinking) has emerged in the last few decades with a strong penchant for criticism and critique (and yes, I know it has always been a long tradition too)—but there seems to be a quantum growth via postmodernism and “critical theory” generally, where WE, WELL-EDUCATED PRIVILEGED FOLKS IN UNIVERSITIES, ARE EVER MORE CRITICAL (OF EVERYTHING) BUT ARE LESS AND LESS SKILLED AT HOW TO HANDLE CONFLICT PROCESS OF BEING SO CRITICAL. I’m suggesting our criticalness, worthy as it is, is perhaps outgrowing our skills and responsibility that we take for handling the conflict we bring up in others by being so critical. This is a start for my investigation into examining conflict theory (its historical roots) and the current hegemonic discourses regarding conflict, conflict resolution, etc. I have a sense that somewhere along the line of the last 20-30 yrs or so, “conflict theory” (knowing these are diverse theories in the “Conflict Tradition” as Randall Collins describes it) has diverged and differentiated into many “critical theories” and left some important roots behind (f not lost which are essential components of the Conflict Tradition—perhaps going back to Plato and prior)—perhaps, “critical” has almost completely dominated “conflict,” and more euphemistic terms like “contested” etc. get used for “conflict”? I’m concerned we are moving into a world of increasing conflict/violence/oppression and less and less tools theoretically to deal with conflict (imaginatively, as which I see is required in a strong and deep democracy). Does this make any sense to you at all? Do you think there is something worthy of pursuit with these initial insights (if not intuitions)? Or perhaps, I’m totally out in left field... excuse the pun.
I am well aware there is a rising interest in conflict resolution, management, mediation... and yet, I find these discourses and practices invariably typically rationalist-dominated with little imagination... my own experiences, (particularly with Arnold and Amy Mindell’s “Worldwork” and “deep democracy” processes) working with conflict processes in many settings, tells me there is little revolutionary praxis involved in conflict resolution, management, mediation that is coming out today—much of it which often carries quite conservative agendas politically. What I don’t see today, is a critical questioning of our conceptualizations of ‘conflict’ historically, sociopolitically (and especially as applied to educational settings)—albeit, [Henry] Giroux, yourself and others are promoting a conflict perspective (conflict theoretical base) for critical pedagogy.
[note: everything I just critiqued about ‘conflict’ in the above sentence, is exactly what I have been critiquing about conceptualization problems on the topic ‘fear’]
Oh ya... my vision/dream ... is to co-found and teach/lead a kind of Highlander North somewhere in the NW... I admire Myles Horton and his followers and their work. I would love to develop adult education processes for social movements of all kinds, where they could also come together across disciplines and areas of struggles—conflicts—and learn together, build theory, live the practices and improve the theory ongoing.
I also dream of developing Sacred Warriorship training for jr. and sr. high schools around the world... there have got to be better answers of how to deal with gangs and the oppressive ways schools deal with resistance etc. Of course, these are all lures... snooping...looking...listening... fishing...
These are a few thoughts anyway....
Look forward to hearing from you.
Sincerely,
Robert M. Fisher”
RESPONSE TO MY LETTER (above)
Dear Robert [Dec. 30, 1998, from Peter McLaren]:
“Just returned from hiking in Zion National Park in Utah, and then spending two days in Vegas—and never the twain shall meet. I wish I could do justice to your wonderful letter—you are a very passionate soul and your words are on fire. I, too, feel an affinity with your political project. Just before Myles Horton died, we spoke together in Big Sky Country, Montana. Although some of his Highlander teachers criticized me for my arcane language, Myles told a friend of mine something like this: Well, I don’t really have a philosophy that I put into words, but if I did it would share a lot in common with Peter. When I heard that, my heart felt a warm rush, because I had no idea of what Miles thought of our conversations during that time. However, I can understand the sentiments expressed by some of the students and professors you were mentioning re: my work. It seems as if people become connected strongly to the work, or else they are disturbed by it. I don’t think I sent you my Ed Theory article, but in the new issue of Ed Theory, I have an article and five international scholars respond to it. Patti Lather’s response is not kind. And it largely misreads what I am saying. Let me know if you get a chance to look at the Ed Theory. Thanks so much, Robert, for sharing with me your powerful and passionate vision. This year I turned fifty, and still feel that I can go a few more rounds. This summer I am going to teach a course at York University in Canada, and it will be good to get back to my native land for a few weeks.
un abrazo companero
Peter”
********
[btw, my M. A. thesis is available online at UBC, entitled: "Toward a 'Conflict' Pedagogy: A Critical Discourse Analysis of 'Conflict' in Conflict Management Education. Unpublished thesis. Vancouver, BC: The University of British Columbia]
End Notes
1. McLaren wrote an endorsement for the book Philosophy of Fearism: A First East-West Dialogue (Australia: Xlibris): He wrote, “This original work on becoming fearless through the philosophy of fearism is part of a larger philosophy of praxis that critical educators would do well to engage. Capitalism has saturated the structural unconscious of modern nation states, creating new species of fear so penetrating that they sometimes go unnoticed. This new work will help to challenge this fear and overcome it through the creation of a protagonistic agency powered by hope and struggle.” –Peter McLaren, Ph.D., Distinguished Professor in Critical Studies, University of Aukland, NZ, author of many books including Pedagogy of Insurrection.
Replies
I mention in the first post here about the problematic of "too" much criticality and not enough good conflictwork that necessarily goes together with that criticality--I meant that is not only an issue for the academy but everywhere in socieities--at least in the West. Now, there is a professor of English at the University of Calgary, Dr. Patrick Finn (just watched a video of his TedTalk YYC recently), he also is critical of too much criticality (sounds ironic doesn't it)--anyways, he is teaching a few special topics courses, and has written a book "Critical Condition: Replacing Critical Thinking with Creativity." I watched and listened and could only agree with him on 20% or so, and after that he really constructs a 'strawman' out of "critical thinking" and conflates it with abuses of (i.e., fear-based uses) criticism. Too bad he does that. He ends up with very simplistic dichotomies and no nuance and sense of integration of critical with creativity thinking and on and on... his offer is "loving thinking" (hhmmm sounds like he is using the old Love vs Fear binary doesn't it?; although he doesn't talk at all about fear in the talk, but maybe in his book)--anyways, worth listening to and worth finding alternatives to his approach which still carries heavy ideological authoritarianism, which I think he is completely unaware of... and it is likely his own "fear" carrying him down that road... and a fear that he picks up (rightfully so) in a lot of students in universities these days-- I agree it is a problem, just his way of solving it is a very narrow and unsatisfactory answer... he doesn't talk at all about conflict thinking and conflict management, etc. or good conflict education (and fear education, and the DCFV theory, etc.) which I say is what we have to promote to deal with all the differences and conflict and criticisms that are so inevitable. He seems to set up a "classroom" of "love and happiness" (and "creativity") but conflict is undermined... I really think that will never lead us to where we need to go... sorry guy, nice try but it needs revision.
To continue this thread of my (re-)investigating the nature and role of conflict (especially in education) I discovered this letter I had written to a well-known critical pedagogue (Freirean) leader in 1999 during my early grad studies years. It seems to follow, uncannily, the trajectory of my pursuits and sharing with Peter McLaren in the above letter (blog post)... so, here is my letter to Maocir Gadotti and his reply... all leaving me thinking very hard about the connection of these letters to the work I am doing with Four Arrows (Don Trent Jacobs) in deconstructing and reconstructing a Jacobsian critical pedagogy (or, my preference a Jacobsian conflict pedagogy) but that's a long project and story unfolding...
To: Maocir Gadotti [Director of the Instituto Paulo Freire, Sāo Paulo, Brazil]
Date: March 22, 1999
Hello and good day Maocir Gadotti. I am trusting you can read this in English, I wish I could speak [read] Spanish. My graduate [masters] research at The University of British Columbia, Canada (Adult Education) involves developing a conflict pedagogy... what I prefer to call a neo-conflict perspective/theory, which can apply to adult education theory and practice. I am concerned that “conflict” (social conflict in particular) is being left out of educational discourse and/or it is entrapped in a functionalist paradigm where “conflict management” discourse erases the dialectical and emancipatory power of working with conflict as a process in education. My research is attempting to analyze the discourse on social conflict that exists in the conflict management and adult education literature. I wish to critique that discourse from the perspective of a neo-conflict theory [and pedagogy] (which I am building from the Conflict Tradition in social theory/sociology since modernity in the W.).
I have read your book Pedagogy of Praxis: A Dialectical Philosophy of Education (1996) [Foreword, by Peter L. McLaren] and very much appreciate your work. I was particularly interested in your early writing with Paulo Freire on “pedagogy of conflict.” I was wonder if those early 1980s publications out of Brazil ever got translated into English. I’d love read them. I am also wondering if you or Paulo Freire ever developed a systematic analysis of “conflict” directly as to how it gets conceptualized in pedagogical or other discourses. I haven’t seen anything in Freire’s writing on “conflict” and conceptualizing it, and then prescribing how best to deal with it. Although, I know “conflict” was always there in his work. I just don’t see systematic theorizing, critical [discourse] analysis and offerings that could inform educators how to best utilize “conflict” in educative sites. My interest is “conflict as a critical site of learning.”
This interest is not [so much] about looking at what we can learn from conflict after the fact... but more, what kind of learning/teaching can take place in the midst of intense conflict in educative sites. I’m concerned that too many educators are following a discourse (consciously or unconsciously) that leads them to believe that “conflict” has to be controlled as a behavioral problem (i.e., “cooled off”) and then “real” learning and teaching can take place. I want to challenge that assumption and the use of power [i.e., fear] to control “outbursts” etc.
I trust this will give you an idea of my interest in developing a conflict pedagogy. I’d appreciate any responses and/or suggestions of others I may contact. If you have further questions I will gladly clarify anything further. Thank you in advance.
Sincerely,
Robert M. Fisher
Vancouver, BC
---------------
M. Gadotti REPLIED (May 6, 1999)
Dear M. Fischer [sic],
I am deeply regret[ful] for my delay in writing you back. I appreciate very much your e-mail, and the good references to my book "Pedagogy of Praxis."
I agree with you about the two [needed] assumptions of conflict in Pedagogy, sociological and psychological perspectives. I'm very interested in the conclusion of your research about this theme.
Paulo Freire and I tried to systematize some ideas about the [conflict pedagogy] theme in the book "Pedagogy: Dialogue and Conflict." [1] This book has been translated to Spanish added with a Latin American vision by Isabel Hernandez (Argentina) and in Italian with a European vision by Bartolomeo Bellanova (University of Bologna, Italy). Unfortunately, it's not translated to English. I'll send you a copy in Portuguese by mail. Perhaps you can add a North American vision of the theme and translate to English (?).
I hope our friend Carlos Alberto Torres, professor of UCLA (Los Angeles) [2] can help you with this task. Carlos' e-mail is <CATNOVA@aol.com>
Best regards, Um abraco. Gadotti
IPF- Instituto Paulo Freire
Homepage: <www.paulofreire.org>
End Notes
[1] This book I received from Gadotti all the way from Brazil, authored as Gadotti, M., Freire, P., and Guimaraes, S. (1995). Pedagoia: Dialogo e conflicto [4th ed.]. Sao Paulo, Brazil: Cortez Editora.
[2] I attempted a few emails to connect with Dr. Torres but had no luck in getting responses back. I dropped the project there in 1999.