Limit and Possibility of Double-Bind Theory : Communication and Conflict in Communication

Okano Ichiro

Gregory Bateson's notion of 'double bind' is well-known but it seems to have been regarded largely as a malicious factor in communication which causes dysfunction of human mental process. In this paper, I try to think of it in relation to symbiotic and antagonistic aspects of communication. As a system theorist, Bateson placed emphasis not only on feedback loop but also on the hierarchical structure of mental activity of living things, which he called 'logical types' following Bertrand Russell's terminology. He argued that double bind is a distortion of the structure of logical types and that its long and severe duration may cause schizophrenia. Bateson seems to have thought that double bind could be 'overcome' by getting up to the higher level of logical types. We must be aware, however, that distortion of the hierarchical system is much common in everyday life. Furthermore, we cannot escape from the primordial double bind which occurs between subjective and objective aspects of alterity. In the era of global communication, we tend to think that cultural deference, whether religious or ethnic, is the cause of misunderstanding and conflict. But what we think of as common cultural context can be just a delusion. We should remember that double bind is always behind us and generating the basic condition of our communication.

Limit and Possibility of Double-Bind Theory : Communication and Conflict in Communication

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