THE ASYLUM : Disruptive Cognitive Operations and Inner Ecology

Abstract

Disruptive Cognitive Operations and Inner Ecology Action-Research Lessons Learned from a Dis|mis Administrative Incident This book is an action-research study of lessons learned from a dis|mis administrative incident. It uses the incident as a situated case through which to examine how administrative uncertainty, informational asymmetry, technological mediation, institutional inertia, and contested interpretation can affect cognition, expression, dignity, and public trust. The project is guided by the attached work’s progression from “Fundamental Rights At Risk” and “On Partiality” to “On Liberty of Thinking,” “On Inner Peace & Recensions,” “Introducing CogOps,” “On Cognitive Health,” and the case studies on judicial impartiality, private affiliations, oath conflict, and SIS–Schengen transparency. The table of contents therefore provides the project’s conceptual route: from rights and institutional balance, through cognition and inner life, towards administrative, technological, and governance risks. The research does not present the personal account as conclusive proof of intentional wrongdoing. Rather, it treats the incident as a source of lessons learned, research questions, provisional concepts, and methodological warnings. The purpose is to distinguish observed events from interpretation, allegation, metaphor, and hypothesis while asking how comparable vulnerabilities might arise in other administrative environments. From rights to cognition The first part of the research begins with fundamental rights and institutional impartiality. In the chapter “On Partiality,” the attached work states: “It is also relational: whenever you are judged, a relationship is involved.” This proposition provides an important starting point for action research. An administrative decision is not only a technical act; it occurs within a relationship involving a citizen, a public agent, an institution, a body of law, and a surrounding informational environment. A failure of communication, an absence of reasons, a delay, or an inability to challenge a decision can therefore produce effects extending beyond the immediate administrative matter. The same chapter gives a second guiding image: “We are all equal under gravity.” Here, the balance functions as a non-technical symbol of equality, impartiality, and the need to prevent power from becoming detached from rights. Within the proposed research, this image is translated into questions about procedural fairness, equal access to information, the visibility of relevant affiliations, and the ability of affected persons to participate meaningfully in decisions concerning them. Liberty of thinking The chapter “On Liberty of Thinking” provides the closest conceptual foundation for the study of inner ecology. It describes writing and symbolic expression as a means of creating distance from an overwhelming or difficult experience: “Being able to formulate, express, and work on things symbolically helps us create emotional distance.” This observation is central to the action-research design. Recension, writing, drawing, multilingual expression, and documentary reconstruction are not treated merely as literary devices. They are used as practical research instruments through which an individual experience can be reviewed, organised, questioned, and made accessible to others. The chapter also describes expression as a form of shelter: “It was therefore a genuine shelter to be able to express ourselves through this ‘way of the pencil.’” Adapted to a CERREV-oriented research programme, this becomes a question about the conditions under which citizens and public agents can formulate disagreement without escalation. The research therefore examines whether accessible forms of expression can reduce informational dissonance, support self-correction, and create a more reliable basis for institutional dialogue. Inner peace and recension The chapter “On Inner Peace & Recensions” defines the inner domain broadly, including: “our inner condition; our constitution; our state; our personal ecology; our psychology; our cognition.” This passage directly informs the use of inner ecology in the present research. Inner ecology refers to the personal and collective conditions in which attention, memory, language, emotion, embodiment, creativity, and judgement interact. It is not a medical diagnosis and does not presume decline. It is an analytical concept for studying how cognitive and relational environments may be supported or disrupted. The chapter further describes recension as a way to improve accessibility: “What was inaccessible at the beginning became an opening towards accessibility through recension.” This principle gives the action-research project a practical orientation. The researcher’s task is not only to describe an incident but also to make its relevant lessons more accessible to public agents, researchers, citizens, and communities. This requires plain language, transparent sourcing, multilingual sensitivity, and a clear separation between what is known, what is inferred, and what remains uncertain. Introducing CogOps The chapter “Introducing CogOps” extends the inquiry from individual cognition to informational and commercial environments. It identifies influence mechanisms such as reciprocity, commitment, social proof, authority, scarcity, and perceived value, and concludes with the practical instruction: “Learn to say no. Resist these logics. Use discernment.” For the proposed research, disruptive cognitive operations are therefore not limited to military or security contexts. The term is used more broadly and cautiously to describe processes that shape attention, interpretation, consent, judgement, or behaviour. These processes may be commercial, administrative, technological, social, cultural, or accidental. The research will examine how such operations can arise through: persuasive or emotionally charged communication; repeated narratives and social conformity; informational overload; inaccessible or opaque procedures; algorithmic or platform-based mediation; technological dependence and vendor lock-in; unequal access to language, documentation, or professional assistance; and the inability of institutions to reproduce or explain their own decisions. The term remains a research hypothesis rather than a conclusion about the incident. Its value lies in helping identify mechanisms that can be tested against documents, timelines, comparable cases, and institutional procedures. Cognitive health and technological mediation The chapter “On Cognitive Health” describes the risk that digital environments may maximise the use of: “our brains; time; attention; and emotional energy.” This concern links the personal incident to a broader study of technological mediation. Public administration increasingly depends on digital forms, search systems, databases, platforms, automated classification, and privately developed software. These tools can improve access and efficiency, but they can also introduce opacity, dependency, unequal usability, and new forms of cognitive load. The chapter “On Freedom of Consciousness & Intellectual Property” calls attention to the use of privately owned creative tools in public contexts and asks whether dependence on such tools can narrow independent creativity. It states: “Creative freedom requires room to experiment.” This idea can guide a CERREV research question concerning technological vulnerability: whether public agents and citizens retain sufficient control to inspect, adapt, replace, and contest the tools through which administrative reality is produced. Administrative inertia and lessons learned The chapter “On Liberty of Thinking” introduces the term ADMINERTIA for a convergence of responsibility, accountability, culpability, and institutional hesitation. It asks whether an administrative agent can say: “I will take responsibility. I will get it written—not right, not wrong—so that this administrative inertia can escape a martial dead end.” This passage gives the project a direct action-research objective: to identify where an administrative process becomes difficult to explain, reproduce, challenge, or correct. The research will therefore document not only outcomes but also: what information was available at each stage; which actors had decision-making authority; how explanations were communicated; where delays or ambiguities appeared; whether the affected person could respond; which technological systems mediated the process; and how responsibility was allocated or obscured. The lesson learned is not that every administrative failure is deliberate. It is that unreproducible administration creates vulnerability, especially when citizens cannot determine what happened, why it happened, or how to seek correction. CERREV research direction Under Professor Le Marchand’s direction, the programme may be situated within CERREV through the study of risk and vulnerability across interconnected levels: Level Research focus Individual Inner ecology, attention, expression, dignity, and cognitive autonomy. Relational Communication between citizens, public agents, institutions, and communities. Administrative Inertia, partiality, procedural opacity, resource constraints, and accountability. Technological Digital tools, platforms, generative systems, data infrastructures, and mediation. Societal Trust, polarisation, legitimacy, cultural difference, and peaceful disagreement. The central research question can therefore be formulated as follows: How can action-research lessons learned from a dis|mis administrative incident contribute to the study of disruptive cognitive operations and inner ecology within CERREV’s fields of risk and vulnerability research? Subsidiary questions are: How do administrative uncertainty and informational velocity affect the int