Relational constructivism

Relational constructivism can be perceived as a relational consequence of radical constructivism. In contrary to social constructivism, it picks up the epistemological threads and maintains the radical constructivist idea that humans cannot overcome their limited conditions of reception (i.e. self-referentially operating cognition). Therefore, humans are not able to come to objective conclusions about the world.

In spite of the subjectivity of human constructions of reality, relational constructivism focusses on the relational conditions applying to human perceptional processes. According to Björn Kraus:

It is substantial for relational constructivism that it basically originates from an epistemological point of view, thus from the subject and its construction processes. Coming from this perspective it then focusses on the (not only social, but also material) relations under which these cognitive construction processes are performed. Consequently, it's not only about social construction processes, but about cognitive construction processes performed under certain relational conditions.[1]: 35 

  1. ^ Kraus, Björn (2017). "Plädoyer für den Relationalen Konstruktivismus und eine Relationale Soziale Arbeit". Forum Sozial (in German) (1): 29–35. Retrieved 10 February 2020.