Democracy
& Nature
The International journal of Inclusive Democracy
Vol. 6, No. 3 (November 2000)
Directionality Theory: Neo-Organicism and
Dialectical Complexity
GLENN ALBRECHT
Abstract:
In this paper I
shall examine the evolution of directionality theory expressed as organicist,
dialectical approaches to the nature of reality and conclude with an assessment
of its newly expressed form, that of complexity theory. In the history of ideas
before complexity theory, Hegelian philosophy came closest to providing a
systematic, organicist and evolutionary approach to the comprehension of life as
a complex adaptive system moving in a particular direction and of knowledge as a
conceptual complement of the achievements of self-organised physical and
biological evolution. In the work of Murray Bookchin, we find a Neo-Hegelian
iteration of the directionality thesis expressed as the theory of dialectical
naturalism. Beyond Bookchin, in the last few decades we have seen the emergence
of new ways of understanding complex systems. Complexity theorists have provided
novel insights into the way complex systems evolve and produce increasing states
of complexity and diversity. I shall argue that these new insights provide
important links to the directionality tradition of Aristotle and Hegel. However,
the elements of chance and uncertainty within complexity theory are at odds with
the more deterministic aspects of dialectical naturalism. The tensions between
these two perspectives shall be resolved through the synthesis of dialectical
complexity.
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