Foundations of the Ontology of Emerging Complexity/Complexity, Relation, Excess/II - Relational Tension as Ontological Principle

3.1.2 - Relational Tension as Ontological Principle

Before anything else, a distinction must be made: in the physical universe, there are countless forms of material organization that are not symbolic — from the formation of galaxies and solar systems through gravitational action to the configuration of magnetic fields. These structures result from fundamental forces and organize matter according to stable principles, but they do not operate through inscription or internal codified reorganization. Still, these non-symbolic organizations only become intelligible when they are included within a symbolic regime of inscription — that is, they can only be known and understood when integrated by a system capable of symbolizing that organization. The recognition of gravitational forces, for example, depends on the constitution of a symbolic regime that interprets, models, and reinscribes them.

The Ontology of Emerging Complexity acknowledges two distinct regimes of organization: on one hand, non-symbolic material organizations, such as those resulting from physical forces (gravity, electromagnetism, magnetic fields); on the other, symbolic relations, which emerge only when a portion of matter acquires the capacity to inscribe and reorganize functional differences. In this sense, the concept of “relation” is reserved — in the strong sense — for this second regime: not as a negation of previous forms of organization, but as the qualitative emergence of a new plane of symbolic consistency.

In this framework, relation is not a link between pre-given terms, nor a bridge that connects predefined substances. In the Ontology of Emerging Complexity, relation is not a connection between prior forms, but a critical zone of reorganization, where what is sometimes conceived as “fields” should be understood only as external material dispositions that acquire relational meaning only when symbolically reorganized. No field is presupposed as a prior structure or generative instance: what exists is a situated interaction between matter that symbolizes and matter that is symbolized, without any spatial or structural presupposition of an ontological field. What relates does not preexist the relation: it is local instability itself that reshapes each consistency so that it reorganizes — without plan, symmetry, or return.

When it comes to symbolic relation — as in the case where a portion of matter begins to function as the support for the inscription of another — the link is not established between stable entities, but between asymmetrical conditions of material organization. The symbolized already exists materially before the relation: it is its external configuration that makes symbolic inscription possible. The matter that symbolizes, however, does not preexist as a constituted structure — it is through the act of inscription that matter acquires symbolic function, reorganizing itself to perform this role. Symbolic inscription, then, always implies the creation of a new material structure in response to an external organization that precedes it. Symbolic relation emerges only when a system acquires the capacity to functionally inscribe that exteriority, reorganizing itself in response. Thus, symbolic inscription does not invent what is symbolized, but differentially organizes what is already materially present. This relation is always local, finite, and irreversible — it does not arise from transcendent logic or a universal representational regime. The symbol, in this context, is not a bridge between worlds, but a provisional reorganization of matter under a regime of functional difference.

This formulation opens two decisive philosophical dialogues. First, with the genetic phenomenology of Merleau-Ponty, particularly in Le visible et l’invisible (Merleau-Ponty, 1964, p. 138), where it is argued that the body is not a static given, but is constituted as a sensitive locus as it inscribes itself into relation with the visible. Likewise, in the Ontology of Emerging Complexity, the matter that symbolizes does not preexist as a structure, but constitutes itself as symbolic function through the act of inscription.

Secondly, with the critical epistemology of Michel Foucault, especially in L’Archéologie du savoir (Foucault, 1969, p. 132), where knowledge is not representation, but the symbolic reorganization of material data that only becomes legible through inscription. The Ontology of Complexity extends this epistemological gesture to the ontological level: what is symbolized is not constructed, but reorganized — and it is through this act that symbolic difference emerges, situated and functional.

Against the logic of networks, which presupposes discrete units and external connections, the Ontology of Complexity affirms that relation precedes individuation. A system does not exist first and then relate — it only exists to the extent that it modulates itself in the face of other instabilities. Here, relation is not an addition: it is a condition of existence.

This principle displaces classical metaphors of communication and exchange. In Glissant, relation is not connection, but tremor — a vibratory excess that destabilizes all identity (Glissant, 1990, p. 56). In Deleuze, relation is not an attribute of terms, but the very production of difference through immanent variation (Deleuze, 1968, p. 72). The Ontology of Complexity takes up these formulations and radicalizes them: relation does not merely affect what already exists — it composes existence through local symbolic reorganization, in response to a material difference that exceeds it. It is not a matter of unresolved tension in a general sense, but of operative emergence that establishes a situated link between matter and inscription.

From this, decisive implications arise for thinking about systems, knowledge, and politics. There is no relational equilibrium, only metastable persistence. What appears as coherence is a transitory effect of operative negotiation. Material systems — biological, technical, or symbolic — endure not by resolving difference, but by iterating their internal capacity to reformulate under tension.

The Ontology of Emerging Complexity thus replaces the paradigm of structural equilibrium with that of relational excess. What sustains a system is not its balance, but its ability to remain exposed to what exceeds it.

Seen in this light, complexity is not a form of integration, but a threshold of symbolic relation. The real is not sustained by closure, but by constant exposure to what exceeds it. Relation is the name for this operative exposure that does not collapse — that holds just long enough to reorganize itself again through the functional inscription of the material difference it receives.

🜂 Reading Colloquium – Pedagogical Framing  

(For students and readers in formation. This section does not replace the text — it accompanies it.)

1. Placement of the Text within the Architecture of the Work

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2. Philosophical Problem at Stake

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3. Core Thesis and Conceptual Reorganization

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4. Key Concepts and Their Articulation

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5. Implications for Readers and Pedagogical Pathways

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