The nature of conflict: Ontological paradox and existential effort of acceptance

Within our own existential situation, the effort of acceptance of the fundamental ontological paradox opens a paradoxical possibility for our whole Being, for the entirety of our own belonging to Being and for wholeness as fulfilment. Nevertheless, as has been shown, acceptance of the paradox comes only through tremendous effort. The state of acceptance may also be noticed to be very difficult to stay in; due to our nature, we fall out of our own place of “being-seized” by Being. However, the productivity of this state is obvious; hence, the will to return to this state also appears to be natural. If any actual ethics are possible for man, then it turns out to be an ethics of effort of acceptance, which here coincides with ontology. Good -- and the entirety of Being as Good -- may be opened due to the effort of acceptance of all and being in agreement with everything. We appear to be able to come into such a state of the own by means of fine tuning of oneself in an attempt to accept everything as a substitute for “taking action” Consequently, by marking time for a while and restraining ourselves from immediate activism within the situation of conflict, it appears that the conflict of any scale consists in our own stabbing by the non-acceptance of the state of affairs, including our own position. Nevertheless, if we scrutinise this fact attentively, it may be noticed that, prior to any decision taken by ourselves, our own position as the one-and-only good has already been provided within Being itself. However, this also means that we lack a guarantee of

having good and justice on our side without an effort; on the contrary, as Kierkegaard repeatedly claims, “we are always in the wrong” [69, p. 595-609]. In order to understand productively, it proves to be sufficient to practice the fine tuning of oneself to the vision of the fact that we are provided with everything necessary, even despite the lack of knowledge about good and evil, justice and injustice, truth and falsity. We discover the absence of incompleteness and, ultimately, non-being in the world; other modes, states and ways of being are likely to exist and all of them appear to be existent within Being in such a way as is necessary. In this context, one of the variations of the fusion of ethics and ontology may have been represented in the Leibnizian idea of this actual universe as the most perfect among all possible ones [70].

As can be seen from the above, while, on the face of it, the existential effort of acceptance seems to change nothing in any “outer” state of affairs; paradoxically, it actually changes everything, turning “minus” into “plus” in our “inner” dimension. We remain in the same place anyway, since the effort aimed at taking us out of this place is impossible and hence unproductive. Nevertheless, through the acceptance of everything in its entirety including the duality of “good” and “bad,” “I” and “Other” “light” and “dark” etc., we return to the own, including the acceptance of this own as inevitable. What do we need this for? Only through the own, only finding oneself within the own place and only with the courageous acceptance of the own finitude, limitedness and paradoxical nature, we become able to produce sense, to understand, to be attentive to everything around us -- and to act. Consequently, the fine-tuning of oneself in terms of the harmonisation of self-state turns out to be what is ultimately common to humanity, i.e. what makes a person who he or she actually is. Then, may we dream about the elimination of all conflicts? Unfortunately, no, since the paradox, which includes the mode of conflict, seems to be inevitable for the human nature. Conflicts will continue to take place independently of our effort of acceptance; nevertheless, in the present work, I have attempted to develop an approach towards an understanding of the fundamental nature of conflict in the light of this effort. This approach consists in the practicing of an actual existential-phenomenological work with and on oneself, which I have tried to demonstrate within this research. These methodological results are in agreement with those achieved by such Russian phenomenolo- gists as M. Bakhtin, M. Mamardashvili, V. Bibikhin and E. Bakeeva, whose tradition I carry on in an attitude of hope and respect.

Conclusion

In the present paper, I have followed a serious -- and even, as may be argued, rather overambitious -- aim that consists in arriving at an understanding of the fundamental nature of conflict. However, whether successful or not, philosophical research following such an aim should be continued. The search for a unified grounding of the phenomenon of conflict may provide insights both into new aspects of “outer” conflict, which may be valuable for science, as well as into an understanding of “inner” conflict for the individual person who experiences this phenomenon within their own existential situation. In light of the designated perspectives, a variation of the existential-phenomenological approach has been applied as a special work with the ontological paradox. Faced within the state of existential experience in its diverse variants, the paradox of Being is experienced as unbearable; hence, it is frequently “born out” in the form of conflict, engendering latent or patently hostile attitudes towards the Other. In this research, I have developed a methodology of adaptation to the phenomenon of conflict infixed into the human condition; this methodology makes it possible to work with the situation of an “inner war" refraining its bearing inside-to-out and a productive “recycling” energy of unsolved and actually nonsolvable conflict into understanding the sense of the ontological paradox. In this way, harmonisation of self-state takes place in order to fine-tune oneself to the actual vision of the situation through and beyond schemes and illusions; in turn, this proves to be helpful in creating forces resistant to the destructive nature of conflict. Despite the introduced techniques for dealing with a conflict situation, this methodology cannot be understood as universal in the sense of its inability to be applied “mechanically.” Harmonisation of selfstate must -- and only may -- be embodied by means of participative experiencing. This means that its reproduction appears to be possible only by means of being embodied each time anew, “from scratch” and in the unique way in any single case. Nevertheless, within the form of each concrete act, the following “steps” may be distinguished as follows. First, an encounter with the ontological paradox should occur in any of its content-burdened variants. Then an effort should be undertaken in order to accept the seized situation in its entirety and wholeness and, hence, in its inevitably paradoxical nature. As the following step, a rigorous phenomenological investigation of the paradox should take place, aimed at an understanding of the sense of what the experiencing one is dealing with. Finally, harmonisation of self-state should be practiced by means of adaptation to the paradox and its simultaneous fitting in the function of an “instrument” for purifying one's own vision. Therefore, work with the self-state proved to be a work on fitting; it consists in the dynamics of fine tuning oneself to the productive vision of how everything is, which shows the “exit” as a path, or as the “lighting of Being” [71, p. 89]. Undoubtedly, this methodology has its own disadvantages and limitations and requires further elucidation. This paradoxical methodology is also sure to be unsuited to a theoretical approach to problem solving aimed at revealing the development of trends of diverse conflicts; fortunately, numerous contemporary scientists are engaged exactly in the production of these kinds of theories. In terms of the author's interest, future research will focus on further elaborating the methodology for dealing with the ontological paradox presented in this article. This “inner” work is expected to be productive in diverse situations due to its methodological potential, which may be embodied as a means of harmonisation of self-state and a way of fine tuning actual understanding in the face of the dispersing and destructive tendencies of contemporaneity.

Acknowledgements. The author thanks Dr. Popova for valuable advice and assistance in improving the structure, language and style of this article. The author also thanks Mr. Beavitt for proofreading and comments, which helped to improve the manuscript.

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Природа конфликта: онтологический парадокс и экзистенциальное усилие принятия. Е.В. Биричева

Российская Федерация, 620219, Екатеринбург, ул. С. Ковалевской, 16

В статье исследуется фундаментальная природа конфликта в русле экзистенциально-феноменологического подхода. Несмотря на то что проводилось огромное количество исследований, посвященных феномену конфликта, внимания его взаимосвязи с онтологическим парадоксом не уделялось. В данном контексте осуществляется попытка определить единое основание для понимания природы конфликта посредством переосмысления специфического положения человека в бытии. Это становится возможным благодаря разворачиванию комплексной экзистенциально-феноменологической методологии, состоящей в описании опыта участного переживания парадоксальной природы конфликта. Очевидно, что в конфликте происходит столкновение противоположностей, несовозможностей, противоречащих друг другу сторон. Однако где берут начало и где располагаются эти противоположности -- в «социальном измерении» между людьми или же фундаментальная парадоксальность укоренена в каждом? В ходе поиска ответов на подобные вопросы показывается, что равно непродуктивны как игнорирование (избегание) осмысления такой ситуации, так и спешка срочного разрешения конфликта, искусственный выбор одной из противоположностей парадокса в качестве ценностно более значимой. Возможным решением представляется работа с онтологическим па-радоксом в плане его феноменологического тщательного разбора и экзистенциального усилия принятия принципиальной никогда-до-конца-неразрешимости конфликта. Тем не менее последнее показывает парадоксальный путь продуктивного имения дела с человеческой конфликтностью, позволяющий глубоко понять ее природу в категориях конечности, полноты, «внутренней войны», собственного состояния и усилия приятия. Данный подход может быть в дальнейшем применен как в философских, так и в научных исследованиях на основе представленных категорий. Например, значительный интерес составляет исследование таких феноменов, как кризис, привычка, изменение, инновация и т. д., в свете настройки собственного состояния и усилия принятия.

Ключевые слова: конфликт, природа конфликта, экзистенциально-феноменологический подход, онтологический парадокс, усилие принятия.

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