The Place of Disorder and the Transformation of Social Conflict

This contribution deals with the transformation of social conflict in complex and globalised societies in order to better grasp landscape conflicts as a specific manifestation of a more general phenomenon. A ‘neo-pragmatist’ perspective is adopted that focuses on pluralistic worldviews and the recognition of contingency, and is normatively oriented towards open and democratic negotiation processes. The chosen approach links conflict and solidarity: how are the dynamics of conflict and social bonds building transformed? The challenge is precisely to be able to empirically grasp how new social bonds are generated, which may be more or less exclusive or inclusive, which may lead to mutual recognition and dialogue between the actors involved, which conflicts are potentially productive of change that bring new subjectivities and interests into play to be incorporated into social change, not tearing apart but rather consolidating solidarities, and which other conflicts are socially disruptive. The discussion is divided into three parts: the first discusses the approaches we have inherited from classical sociology to answer new questions about the production of conflict. The second focuses on the transformations of conflict as a social relation and the epistemological challenges it poses for understanding social change. The third on the choice of using the concept of clashing scales and lateral oscillation among the many possible tools to answer questions about the production of social conflict. This concept in my view is promising when applied to the link of mutual implication between scale conflicts and scale solidarity.