Governance and Susceptibility in Conflict Resolution: Possibilities Beyond Control

Abstract

Governmentality analysis offers a nuanced critique of informal western conflict resolution by arguing that recently emerged ‘alternatives’ to adversarial court processes both govern subjects and help to constitute rather than challenge formal regulation. However, this analysis neglects possibilities for transforming governance from within conflict resolution that are suggested by Foucault’s contention that there are no relations of power without resistances. To explore this lacuna, I theorize and explore the affective and interpersonal nature of governance in mediation through auto-ethnographic reflection upon mediation practice, and Levinas’s insights about the relatedness of selves. The article argues that two qualitatively different mediator capacities - technical ability and susceptibility - operate in concert to effect liberal governance. Occasionally though, difficulties and failures in mediation practice bring these capacities into tension and reveal the limits of governance. By considering these limits in mediation with Aboriginal Australian people, I argue that the susceptibility of mediator selves contains prospects for mitigating and transforming the very operations of power occurring through conflict resolution. This suggests options for expanded critical thinking about power relations operating through informal processes, and for cultivating a susceptible sensibility to mitigate liberal governance and more ethically respond to difference through conflict resolution.