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Creating Organizational Value through Dialogical Leadership pp 7–42Cite as

Dialogical Self Theory

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Notes

  1. 1.

    The concept Dialogical Self was coined in Hermans et al. 1992; Hermans and Kempen 1993.

  2. 2.

    Hermans and Hermans-Konopka 2010; Hermans 2013.

  3. 3.

    Hermans and Konopka 2010, 173. See also: Hermans and Gieser 2012.

  4. 4.

    Before Hermans created the Dialogical Self Theory, he designed the Valuation Theory and the Self-Confrontation Method from 1974. The most accurate summary of this theory and methodology is written by Hermans and Hermans-Jansen 1995. Self-Narratives. The Construction of Meaning in Psychotherapy. The spirit of this work (combining idiographic and nomothetic approaches within the narrative paradigm) prepared the concept of Dialogical Self. In practice we observed clients verbalizing their self-narratives from multiple perspectives and positions, sometimes opposed, sometimes complementary.

  5. 5.

    Published as Van Loon 1996. Symbols in Self-Narrative. Interpreting by means of Self- Confrontation Method [book in Dutch].

  6. 6.

    What exactly is meant here? Is there an essence assumed? No, the expressions ‘close to yourself’ or ‘far from yourself’ refer to how we relate to where we are in that moment of place and time, it is by definition contextual. ‘I with my friend’ refers to a different meaning of closeness than ‘I during a lecture for psychologists’. For authenticity the same applies: it is relational, contextual, and internally and externally, dialogical. It is so difficult to express this accurately, as the daily use of expressions such as self have ‘container’-connotations (true self, deeper self, etcetera). Hermans in his book Democratic Self (2017, in press, n.p.) uses the word ‘elusive process’ to characterize self. “The metaphoric use of society works as ‘glasses’ that offer a sometimes surprising perspective that will allow to go deeper into the workings of this elusive process that we try to demarcate by the simple word ‘self.’”.

  7. 7.

    In his book Celebrating the other (2008), Edward Sampson suggests that we sustain our self-esteem through “self-celebratory monologues”, stories about how good we are and how successful. To sustain these stories, we need other people who are less than good. We thus construct worlds in which others are irrational, unthinking, and sinful and so on. He spoke of these monological and self-celebratory constructions as being oriented around the notion of a singular and rational self, who is able to know the other as the other really (or probably) is, who can speak for and about others (followers, women, other ethnic groups). (Hosking 2011, 456). “Conventional wisdom tells us that each of us is like a small container, designed to prevent our “inner essence” from leaking out. We believe that in order to be a proper container, each individual must become a coherent, integrated, singular entity, whose clear-cut boundaries define its limits and separate it from similarly bounded entities” (Sampson 2008, 17).

  8. 8.

    Inspired by a video of Hubert Hermans http://www.dialogical-self.nl/.

  9. 9.

    I have described this case in an article in a Dutch magazine Speling, titled Symbols as a way for personal integration ( Van Loon 1990), 13–18.

  10. 10.

    Hermans and Konopka 2010, 7.

  11. 11.

    Hermans and Konopka 2010, 8.

  12. 12.

    Exposition at Bonnefanten Museum in Maastricht, the Netherlands, 2016.

  13. 13.

    Gallagher 2009.

  14. 14.

    Hermans and Gieser 2012, 2.

  15. 15.

    Gergen 2009; Gergen et al. 2001.

  16. 16.

    ‘Bound self’ or ‘bounded identity’ implies being separated from other selves.

  17. 17.

    Gergen 2009, xv.

  18. 18.

    Siegel 2017, 18.

  19. 19.

    Gergen 2009, 110.

  20. 20.

    Sampson 2008, 21.

  21. 21.

    Siegel (2017) frames this ‘embodied language’ (21).

  22. 22.

    Gergen 2009, xxvi.

  23. 23.

    Sampson 2008, 24.

  24. 24.

    See also Kohlrieser et al. 2012.

  25. 25.

    Gergen 2009, 32.

  26. 26.

    Gergen 2009, 33.

  27. 27.

    Gergen 2009, 34.

  28. 28.

    Gergen 2009, 49.

  29. 29.

    Cf. reticular causality Libbrecht 2007, 96.

  30. 30.

    Gergen 2009, 54. He uses the term ‘confluence’.

  31. 31.

    Shotter 2010, 3.

  32. 32.

    Krishnamurti (1895–1986) was a speaker and writer on philosophical and spiritual subjects. Many of his lectures are about the self and developing the mind Bohm 1996, 47.

  33. 33.

    Hermans and Konopka 2010, 9.

  34. 34.

    Hermans and Konopka 2010, 9.

  35. 35.

    Raggatt 2012, 31.

  36. 36.

    Hermans and Konopka 2010.

  37. 37.

    Raggatt 2012, 31. Innovation is here meant in the sense of ‘renewal’.

  38. 38.

    Raggatt 2012, 31.

  39. 39.

    Physics and Philosophy: The Revolution in Modern Science (1958). Lectures delivered at University of St. Andrews, Scotland, Winter 1955–56.

  40. 40.

    Libbrecht 2007.

  41. 41.

    Libbrecht 2007, 93.

  42. 42.

    Siegel 2017, 31. Siegel, too, comes to the conclusion that energy and information flow is the central element of a system that is the origin of the self (and the mind). He gives a nice example of how energy as information works. I am writing this fragment here in my book, and my energy was transformed in my nervous system, activated my fingers to type these words to send meaning to you, the reader of this text. In the flow change is involved, between you and me, change in location, and, change in time. (56).

  43. 43.

    Libbrecht 2007, 94.

  44. 44.

    Libbrecht 2007, 94.

  45. 45.

    Libbrecht 2007, 95.

  46. 46.

    Libbrecht 2007, 95.

  47. 47.

    Libbrecht 2007, 96.

  48. 48.

    Siegel 2017, 33.

  49. 49.

    Libbrecht 2007, 98. See also Hickman 2016. Hickman brings the concepts of effective and ethical leadership together in her view on good leadership.

  50. 50.

    Siegel 2017, 33: “On the level of neuroscience, no one understands how neural firing might create the subjectively felt experience of a thought, memory or emotion. We just don’t know.” Brain scientists use the term neural representation to indicate a pattern of neural firing that stands for something other than itself.

  51. 51.

    Libbrecht 2007, 99.

  52. 52.

    Libbrecht 2007, 101.

  53. 53.

    Libbrecht 2007, 74.

  54. 54.

    Libbrecht 2007, 101.

  55. 55.

    Ricard refers to an ethical component in mindfulness. To be fully aware of what goes on in and outside of us and to understand what is the nature of our perceptions opens the ethical dimension “to discern whether or not it is beneficial to maintain this or that particular state of mind or to continue to pursue whatever we are doing at the present moment.” (Ricard 2011, 67). In the act of slowing down in time and space, an ethical dimension of our being might emerge spontaneously. What we actively need to do is: slowing down.

  56. 56.

    See also: Jaworsky 2012.

  57. 57.

    Morioka 2012, 398.

  58. 58.

    Morioka 2012, 398.

  59. 59.

    Morioka 2008, 105.

  60. 60.

    Morioka 2015, 81.

  61. 61.

    Heifetz et al. 2009, 267.

  62. 62.

    Gallagher 2009, 492; Gallagher 2012.

  63. 63.

    Siegel 2017, 319.

  64. 64.

    Hermans et al. 1992. See also: Lakoff and Johnson 1999. See also Siegel 2017: “…our mental activities, such as emotions, thoughts, and memories, are directly shaped by, if not outright created by, our body’s whole state….and that our relationships with others, the social environment in which we live, directly influence our mental life.” (10–11). Siegel’s concluding remark and starting point for the rest of his book is that the mind (the self) can be seen as relational and embodied. The contribution of Siegel’s research is that he integrates brain research in his approach (which is out of scope for this book).

  65. 65.

    By being present and asking a question (Presence) you cannot ‘undo’ your relational act as if it is an objective one (Absence). Ctrl-alt-delete doesn’t exist in human interaction. You can forget. You can forgive. You can’t delete.

  66. 66.

    Gergen 2009, 237.

  67. 67.

    Hermans and Hermans-Jansen 1995, 14–72.

  68. 68.

    General well-being is measured with the following formula: Q = P/P + Nx100. P = sum of positive feelings; N = sum of negative feelings; Q = general positive quality. The higher, the more positive. To give you a sense of reference, my general well-being at this period in time (1987) scored 60.

  69. 69.

    A correlation (r) represents the extent of correspondence between the affective modality of two valuations, the profiles for any two rows in the affect matrix (for details: see Hermans and Hermans-Jansen 1995, 43).

  70. 70.

    Hermans et al. 1992.

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  1. School of Humanities, Dialogical Leadership, Tilburg University, AB Tilburg, The Netherlands

    Rens van Loon

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van Loon, R. (2017). Dialogical Self Theory. In: Creating Organizational Value through Dialogical Leadership . Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-58889-6_2

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