Interdisciplinary Approach to Studying Mediation Processes

Abstract

Section introduction. This journal issue presents a third collection of articles from participants of Section 4, “Problems of Mediation and Dialogue,” at the All-Russian Scientific Conference “Individualization and Collectivism in Contemporary Russian Society,” held at the Institute of Sociology of the Federal Center of Theoretical and Applied Sociology of the Russian Academy of Sciences (Moscow, May 24, 2024). The first and second collections appeared in issues 2 and 3, respectively, of the Russian Journal of Philosophical Sciences (Vol. 67). The present works address the challenge posed during the section meeting: to contribute to the study of mediatory processes antecedent to dialogue and to the scholarly elaboration of the preconditions and foundations for dialogue among subjects whose interests are divergent, overlapping, or fully aligned. Naturally, by focusing on the relationship between Self and Other, we operate within the non-classical Self–Other framework, extending the mediatory analyses of M. Foucault, Z. Bauman, A. Giddens, B. Latour, and N. Luhmann, and drawing inspiration from Confucius's concept of the Middle Way. We term our research approach “mediatory thinking,” an inquiry into the interpolar middle ground, or mediation itself. In attempting to articulate the social content of this middle ground, we draw upon recent advancements across diverse disciplines, including economics, sociology, political science, theology, philosophy, and the field of artificial intelligence.