Claim. When two subjects (rather than a subject and object) interact, they repel each other; in natural law this repulsion stays latent and reinforces give-and-receive, but in human society it surfaces as conflict between leaders and ultimately as the struggle between good and evil.
Elaboration. The law of repulsion (C. Law of Repulsion) is Lee’s account of why conflict exists at all in a creation designed for harmony. Subject and subject (or object and object) of the same polarity repel — like positive/positive electricity in physics. In the natural world this repulsion is ‘originally latent and does not surface’; it serves to ‘strengthen or complement the proper give and receive action between subject and object.’ Natural order is not disturbed.
In fallen human society, repulsion does surface — as ‘conflict between two leaders.’ Lee’s paradigm case is revolution: an established leader and a new leader, each gathering followers (objects) through give-and-receive, thus amplifying their respective forces until they collide. Critically, one of the two camps is ‘closer to the direction of God’s dispensation’ (the good side) and the other ‘farther’ (the evil side). Subject-subject repulsion in fallen history is therefore fundamentally ‘a struggle between good and evil,’ and when the good side wins, ‘the direction of history is changed a little toward the direction of goodness.’
The doctrine has two important features: (a) good and evil are relative positions in providence, not absolute moral states (this is repeated in the law of separation); (b) repulsion can sometimes work properly even in fallen societies — peaceful national competition produces mutual cultural and economic development.
This sets up the later distinction between the ‘law of development’ (give-and-receive) and the ‘law of turning’ (repulsion + indemnity + separation): give-and-receive grows the cake; repulsion changes its direction. Critics from a counter perspective often press whether labeling one side ‘good’ and the other ‘evil’ after the fact (since closeness to providence is theologically interpreted) is anything other than the winners writing the metaphysics. Worth a thread on how this differs from Hegel’s master-slave dialectic, which Lee elsewhere rejects.
See also. history-is-good-vs-evil-not-class-struggle, law-of-correlativity-as-prerequisite-for-development, law-of-dominion-by-the-center-leaders-shape-history