French-Speaking Educational Sciences and the Contribution of Edgar Morin’s “Paradigm of Complexity”

• In Event: Getting to Bedrock: Diverse Perspectives on Emergence, Nonlinearity, and Relationality in Education

Abstract

The idea of complexity can be defined and understood according to heterogeneous interpretations referring to epistemologies and methodologies of research sometimes in opposition with each other. In Latin countries, the use of this notion has a specific history, both dependent and dissociated from theories usually associated in North America under the umbrella of Complexity Theory (Alhadeff-Jones, 2008). During the past 40 years, this evolution has been influenced, among others, by the contribution of the French thinker Edgar Morin. Considering his influence in French-speaking Educational sciences, the aim of my contribution is to question the way one conceives the use of theories associated with the concept of complexity in order to promote changes in educational practices and theories.

Located at the intersection of philosophy, physics, biology and human sciences, Morin’s paradigm of complexity (1977-2004/2008, 1990/2008) criticizes contemporary sciences and philosophies that compartmentalize and reduce the way we understand ourselves and the world around us, without critically reflecting on the limitations they introduce. In the contemporary context, most of us have access to a sum of knowledge (scientific or not) so abundant that a major challenge we face is to learn to identify not only what is relevant to know, but also how to organize heterogeneous explanations and interpretations so that they remain meaningful. As a learner, practitioner or researcher, dealing with complexity requires one to systematically challenge the way everyday situations and scientific problems are reduced. The recognition of complexity appears therefore at the roots of a new kind of scientific explanation, which perceive simplicity as a specific provisional phenomenon. If complication refers to the idea of an intricate situation waiting to be disentangled, complexity supposes rather the fundamental non-simplicity of studied phenomenon requiring the acknowledgment of researchers’ own uncertainty about the way they conceive it.

Considering research on learning and education through the paradigm of complexity requires therefore one to navigate between at least three intertwined levels. The first one is conceptual and theoretical. It involves reconsidering one’s understanding of learning and education based on a renewed vocabulary (including chaos, disorder, emergence, non-linearity, self-organization, systems, etc.) The second one is epistemological. It requires one to revisit the way one conceives scientific activity and the processes through which knowledge is produced through the inclusion of a set of assumptions legitimizing innovative logics and methodologies (e.g., complex causalities, dialogical principle, etc.) The third level requires researchers and practitioners to reflect more systematically on the personal and institutional dynamics shaping the way research is conducted and knowledge created, especially from an ethical perspective (Alhadeff-Jones, 2010).

References

Alhadeff-Jones, M. (2008). Three generations of complexity theories: Nuances and ambiguities. Educational Philosophy and Theory, 40, 1, 66-82.

Alhadeff-Jones, M. (2010). Challenging the limits of critique in education through Morin’s paradigm of complexity. Studies in Philosophy and Education, 29, 5, 477-490.

Morin, E. (1977–2004/2008). La Méthode. Paris: Seuil.

Morin, E. (1990/2008). On complexity. Cresskill, NJ: Hampton Press.

Author

• Michel Alhadeff-Jones, Teachers College, Columbia University