Mimetic Theory: The Origin of Conflict

Mimetic Theory

Where do man’s desires come from?

Apart from the basic desire to survive (food, shelter, rest), what motivates people? Where did the desire for status, fame, honor, legacy, pride, vanity come from?

One thinker who conceived of a simple yet brilliant answer to this question was Rene Girard, a literary theorist who spent decades looking for a unifying theory in literature (to understand what truly motivated people).

Instead of focusing on what makes literary works stand apart, which is what literary theorists usually do, Girard wanted to find what they all have in common, because it is only the great writers that succeed in representing the mechanisms of human behavior faithfully, without distortion. The greater the writer, the less variable are the human systems of relationships, and the more truthful they are.

It is the feeling for the general in the potential writer, which selects material suitable to a work of art because of its generality. He only pays attention to others, however dull and tiresome, because in repeating what their kind say like parrots, they are for that very reason prophetic birds, spokesmen of a psychological law.”Proust, A Remembrance of Things Past

Mimetic Theory not only seeks to explain why human beings are motivated to do things other than survive, but why conflict arises in the first place, why scapegoating is a universal phenomenon and why there is a tendency for people who are closer together to fight more frequently.

Girard says that we borrow our desires from other people. We are not autonomous beings that select for ourselves our own authentic goals. Our desire for an object (prestige, popularity) is provoked by the desire of a model (someone we aspire to be like) for this object. The subject does not directly desire the object, he desires the desire of the model.

There is an indirect triangular relationship between the subject, object, and the model.

Through the object, one is drawn to the model, whom Girard calls the mediator: it is in fact the model who is sought. Girard calls desire “metaphysical” in the measure that, as soon as a desire is something more than a simple need or appetite, “all desire is a desire to be”,[8]it is an aspiration, the dream of a fullness attributed to the mediator.Wikipedia

Mimesis can either be positive or negative. You can either emulate model’s positive desires or negative desires.

If the model is a successful politician, you will emulate his desires, which is the recognition of his peers, fame or vanity. These are negative traits. Positive traits to be emulated can be diligence, self-sacrifice, and honor.

It is up to the subject to decide which traits are worth emulating. We speculate, and for good reason, that the less conscious the emulation, the less deliberate the process of carefully choosing to desire superior traits.

If you are interested in reading books about unmasking human nature, consider reading The Dichotomy of the Self, a book that explores the great psychoanalytic and philosophical ideas of our time, and what they can reveal to us about the nature of the self.

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