A vanishing mediator is a concept that exists to mediate between two opposing ideas, as a transition occurs between them. This mediating concept exists just long enough to facilitate such an interaction: at the point where one idea has been replaced by the other, the concept is no longer required and thus vanishes.
/ref> In terms of

Hegelian dialectics Dialectic ( grc-gre, διαλεκτική, ''dialektikḗ''; related to dialogue; german: Dialektik), also known as the dialectical method, is a discourse between two or more people holding different points of view about a subject but wishing ...

the conflict between the theoretical abstraction and its empirical negation (through trial and error) is resolved by a concretion of the two ideas, representing a theoretical abstraction taking into account the previous contradiction, whereupon the mediator vanishes. In terms of

psychoanalytic theory Psychoanalytic theory is the theory of personality organization and the dynamics of personality development that guides psychoanalysis, a clinical method for treating psychopathology. First laid out by Sigmund Freud in the late 19th century, psyc ...

, when someone is caught in a dilemma they experience

hysteria Hysteria is a term used colloquially to mean ungovernable emotional excess and can refer to a temporary state of mind or emotion. In the nineteenth century, hysteria was considered a diagnosable physical illness in women. It is assumed that ...

. A conceptual deadlock exists until the resulting hysteric breakdown precipitates some kind of resolution, therefore the Hysteria is a vanishing mediator in this case. In terms of

political history Political history is the narrative and survey of political events, ideas, movements, organs of government, voters, parties and leaders. It is closely related to other fields of history, including diplomatic history, constitutional history, social ...

, it refers to social movements, which operate in a particular way to influence politics, until they either are forgotten or change their purpose.Zizek and us.
/ref> Fredric Jameson introduced the term in a 1973 essay ("The Vanishing Mediator: Narrative Structure in Max Weber," in New German Critique 1 inter, 1973 52-89).

Alain Badiou Alain Badiou (; ; born 17 January 1937) is a French philosopher, formerly chair of Philosophy at the École normale supérieure (ENS) and founder of the faculty of Philosophy of the Université de Paris VIII with Gilles Deleuze, Michel Foucau ...

uses a similar, but more explicitly post-structuralist term (″terme évanouissant″ or ″vanishing term″) in ''Théorie du sujet''. Since, this concept has been adopted by Žižek in "For They Know Not What They Do: Enjoyment as a Political factor", where he uses it in a political sense, similar to Marx's Analysis of Revolution. Applications of this concept has been done in various fields, making it a viable framework in cultural studies, literature, and qualitative research among others ("Developing the Vanishing Mediator as Theoretical Framework: Synthesis and Application," all, 2019. One used application is provided, for instance, by Balibar in his argument of Europe as a vanishing mediator.

References

Dialectic Dispute resolution Ideological rivalry Political history Psychoanalytic terminology Social concepts {{philo-stub