By regenerative and restorative epistemology, we mean ways of thinking and knowing that are deeply rooted in the relational ontologies that structure our ways of doing, living, coexisting, and inhabiting, which can be observed in the Global South (particularly among indigenous peoples, Afro-descendants, and formerly colonized Africans) as well as in the global North (where there are many indigenous peoples who have also survived colonial and postcolonial disasters). This emerging epistemology (at the theoretical level), to which researchers from multiple disciplinary, geographical, cultural, and institutional backgrounds contribute consciously or unconsciously, differs from the current dominant epistemology in its complexity and openness. This is not a complex epistemology in the Morinian sense of the term (Morin, 1999; 2005; 2016), which aims to connect scientific and technical disciplines in order to produce comprehensive and global knowledge (versus fragmented knowledge), but rather a co-constructivist epistemology. Anchored in relational ontology (Escobar 2018; Damus, 2024) and complex thinking (the articulation of modes of thought), regenerative and restorative epistemology refers to cognitive processes that facilitate the repair of the present, past, and future, as well as the process of ontological, social, epistemic, political, economic, ecological, and planetary regeneration. 

Regenerative and restorative epistemology is not the prerogative of a group of scientific researchers who oppose the harmful effects of the dominant epistemological dualism. Rather, it is a set of tools for understanding oneself, others, nature, things, and metempirical issues that are available to a large number of scientists and non-scientists alike, and which are underpinned by ethical thinking, intention, and consciousness with a regenerative and restorative dimension. 

Regenerative and restorative epistemology opposes the dichotomy between the knowledgeable and the unknowledgeable, which is the cause of a form of testimonial or cognitive injustice characterized by the invisibility of the voices of the supposedly ignorant in abstract academic works, even though they are based on the substance of data collected from these people. This epistemology promotes cognitive justice by making visible the role of the “unknowledgeable” in the co-construction of knowledge and in the mobilization of this knowledge in the conscious and unconscious management of relationships with oneself, others, society, nature, and humanity.

Whether they belong to the natural sciences or the human sciences, all scientific and non-scientific disciplines (philosophy, religion, art, literature, theology, etc.) are invited to rethink their epistemological framework by giving it a regenerative and restorative dimension. The joint regeneration and repair of the individual, society, nature, and the planet will not happen unless a regenerative epistemological dialogue is established between “hard” scientists and social scientists, who work respectively with “material facts” and “facts of consciousness” to use two concepts coined by Piaget (1970). Regenerative and restorative science is a collective endeavor to which all peoples of the world and all scientific disciplines must contribute. It is not the prerogative of a single category of disciplines. On the contrary, it requires a regenerative epistemological alliance between the social sciences and the natural sciences, which will enable each of them to become aware of their epistemic, ontological, ethical, and practical limitations. Thanks to this alliance, the natural sciences and the social sciences will rediscover, respectively, their socio-cultural roots and the biological dimension of humankind (Fortin, 2000). The social, political, economic, and cultural relevance of regenerative and restorative epistemology lies in the fact that epistemological dualism, which underpins the research activities of “hard” scientists and social scientists who follow in their epistemological footsteps by considering the humanities as nomothetic sciences, is at the root of the negative implications affecting people, societies, nature, and the planet. The regenerative and restorative dimension of the various disciplines must be strengthened and promoted if we want to slow down the process of degeneration of these disciplines and of cultural, social, economic, religious, and political systems. 

References

Damus, Obrillant (2024). Regenerative and restorative pedagogy: The foundation of a new contract for cognitive justice. UNESCO/Prospects 54, 441–449. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11125-024-09683-y.

Escobar, Arturo (2018). Sentir-Penser avec la terre. Une écologie au-delà de l’Occident. Paris : Seuil.

Fortin, Robin (2000). Comprendre la complexité. Introduction à La Méthode d’Edgar Morin. Paris/Québec : L’Harmattan/ PUL.

Morin, Edgar (2016). Penser le global. Paris: Flammarion.

Morin, Edgar (2005). Introduction à la pensée complexe. Paris : Seuil.

Morin, Edgar (1999). Relier les connaissances: Le défi du XXI^e siècle. Paris :

Piaget, Jean (1970). Épistémologie des sciences de l’homme. Paris : Gallimard/UNESCO..