Chapter 5: Open Complementarity in Cultural Psychology

In his lecture, Jaan Vasiner stresses the notion of complementarity from the point of view of epistemological implications for the future of psychological science. He clearly argues that the use of the notion of complementarity is not a simple translation or reception from quantum mechanics to a different domain of knowledge. “The complementarity argument deals with our conditions for description and is therefore a statement of epistemology” (Favrholdt, 1999, p. XXIV). Valsiner’s notion of Inclusive Separation (Valsiner, 1987) aptly depicts how this complementary relation is made possible, overcoming the paradox of mutually excluded parts of a joint whole, and reaching to conceptualize a “dialectical leap” from the relationship between the two opposites. Further developing Bohr’s theorization, Valsiner (this volume) traces the intellectual plan for contemporary cultural psychology in applying the Principle of Complementarity to the complex case of an open system.