“The conception of war that emerged from World War II – a “minds race” in which the quality of “mental material” could determine eventual victory or defeat – was tailor made for the Cold War era. So too, experts believed, was their knowledge of the psychology of revolutionary upheaval.” (P307, Herman, 1995) Wartime success placed behavioural scientists for key Cold War duty as tacticians. Dealing with WWII issues like understanding the enemy and managing domestic and international public opinion were seen as promising territory for American national security decision-makers waging the Cold War. Psychology aspired to predict and control during the Cold War and experts advised on the conception of Third World insurgency. An expert’s report uncovered by Herman shows America’s goals and also reinforces the individual-mass parallel as developing countries are compared to adolescents lacking in direction. The American role is to help them grow, see, and discover themselves, preferably as loyal to the stern Father figure of the U.S. (P151, Herman, 1995)
WWII and the Cold war brought psychology to power. The ideas and terms that were brought to the fore were used to frame and understand subsequent political and social life “by publicising the pertinence of emotion, the virtues of insight, and the unavoidability of subjectivity in the conduct of private and public affairs. These feats earned experts high status and permanently transformed the way war, racial conflict, gender equality, and the responsibilities and possibilities of democratic self government were understood.” (P305, Herman, 1995) Psychological expert’s aspirations of broadening psychology’s reach and influence and enlarging the responsibilities of government were happening and the belief that psychology might expose universal laws of human behaviour had caught their imagination. (PP309-10, Herman, 1995) In the name of mental health, relevant insights and practices were brought in and because mental health became a prerequisite to social welfare and economic prosperity, and not merely a state of individual well-being, almost no area of U.S. life remained out of the clinicians reach. (P311, Herman, 1995) The extensive penetration by psychologists gave a whole new depth to their analysis and their commitment to individual mental health treatment of society as a patient. (P313, Herman, 1995)
“As cultures change, so do modal types of personality that are their bearers. The kind of man I see emerging as our culture fades into the next resembles the kind once called “spiritual” - because such a man desires to preserve the inherited morality freed from it’s hard external crust of institutional discipline.” (P2, Rieff, 1966) Rieff’s ‘therapeutic’ is a man of leisure, released by technology from the regimental discipline of work so as to secure his sense of well being. (p236, Rieff , 1966) He carefully counts his satisfactions and dissatisfactions, avoiding unprofitable commitments. From his immediate ancestor, economic man, he has constituted his own careful economy of the inner life. (Rieff, http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/air/air-vo116no4-2002.html) Rieff saw the triumph of the therapeutic as a “profound effort to end the tyranny of primary group moral passion (operating first through the family) as the inner dynamic of social order. Crowded more and more together, we are learning to live more distantly from one another, in strategically varied and numerous contacts rather than the aggressive warmth of family and a few friends.” (P243, Rieff, 1966) This is a man who sees nothing beyond an intensely private sense of well being to be generated in the living of life itself. This announces a fundamental change in focus for our culture towards a human condition about which there will be nothing to say about hope or despair. (P261, Rieff, 1966) Rieff worries that such an internalisation of the self could drive it away from the realisation that comes from communal action and that tensions of remission or release could be driven deeper bringing communication of ideals under suspicion. (PP4-5, Rieff, 1966)
In 1979, Christopher Lasch echoes this emptiness in commenting that “People today hunger not for personal salvation…but for the feeling, the momentary illusion of personal well-being, health and psychic security.” (P33, Lasch, 1979) A futility of solutions has appeared with a feeling that society has no future, so it makes sense to live for the moment. The media and the ‘cult of celebrity’ encourage sanctioned ‘impulse gratification’ and it becomes more difficult to accept the banality of everyday life. (P21, Lasch, 1979) “The narcissist’s pseudo-insight into his own condition, usually expressed in psychiatric clichés serves him as a means of deflecting criticism and disclaiming responsibility for his own actions”, Lasch terms this the ‘Void Within’ as life is no longer reflected in his own mind, shoring up a faltering sense of self. (PP19-21, Lasch, 1979) The trouble with the consciousness movement is it’s provision of self-defeating solutions; “Arising out of a pervasive dissatisfaction with the quality of personal relations, it advises people not to make too large an investment in love and friendship, to avoid excessive dependence on others and to live in the moment – the very conditions that created the crisis of personal relations in the first place.” (P27, Lasch, 1979)
Kirby Farrell describes post-traumatic mood as part of post-traumatic culture. With the mood a straightforward response to recent history, the catastrophes of mid century; the great depression and WWII. This combined with the new obsessive awareness has left people shaken and it shows in their thinking about the world; a collective experience of historical shock. (PP2-5, Farrell, 1998) From the beginning, the idea of trauma neurosis has been combined with concerns of compensation both legal and therapeutic and in this sense, trauma is a radical form of terror management. (P7, Farrell, 1998) But self-enhancement in the twentieth century has made traumas such as poverty, failure and death harder to handle. Combined with the amplifying nature of the mass media means neuroses can spread dramatically. “One factor that makes this period so traumatic is that since WWII people have expected that their lives…would steadily improve.” (P29, Farrell, 1998) Without improvement or recompense there is increased disillusionment with a therapeutic society that fails to empathise or assist in this trauma.
The evidence up to this point leads to a world in a post-traumatic age, but what are the characteristics of this and how are they evident? James L. Nolan Jnr. sets out five characteristics of a therapeutic ethos that refer to a widespread system of cultural understanding. ‘The Emancipated Self’ is the first, with the therapeutic ethos establishing the self as the ultimate object of allegiance. Where the self was surrendered, denied and sacrificed, now it is esteemed actualised and affirmed. As Rieff said, the self has now moved to a central place in U.S. culture. ( PP3-5, Nolan Jnr., 1998) This is a reshaping of our techniques for managing our emotions. Our very sense of ourselves has been revolutionised and we have become intensely subjective beings. Human subjectivity has become a key element in military power for discipline and efficiency and has carried into most areas of organisational life. It is the birth of a new form of expertise, an expertise of subjectivity.” (PP2-3, Rose, 1999) The shift in British drug control exemplifies this. Furedi notes that “whereas responsibility was measured formerly by our level of self-control, it is now assessed by our level of self awareness” (P218, Furedi in Nolan Jnr., 2002) Lord Mackay proclamation that people may need help in reflection illustrates this shift towards the subjective. The drug laws have contained an expansion of mandatory counselling – “we’ll help you whether you like it or not”- this has blurred the line between therapeutic intervention and policing. (P230, Furedi in Nolan Jnr., 2002) In prisons for a range of crimes from drugs to sexual offences prisoners are expected to engage in counselling programmes (as a condition for early release). “Whereas traditional custodial regimes were satisfied with detaining the prisoner’s body, the therapeutic regime seeks to control his soul to.” (Fitzpatrick, http:www.spiked-online.co.uk/Articles/00000006DB36.htm)
The second characteristic is the ‘The Emotivist Ethic’ with the emphasis on emotions and the subjective “I feel, therefore I am” motto. (P7, Nolan Jnr., 1999) This is particularly obvious in the language used by governments and those in the public eye. Bill Clinton asking for forgiveness or Tony Blair’s perfected art of emotional politics, emphasising how much he “feels” and “cares” and promising to “reach out” and “share.” In response to the Omagh bombings in August 1998 was given with a pained expression. He furrowed his brow and stammered, “ I am very full of emotion, I just kept thinking last night of those poor murdered people.” It was Paul Goodman of the Daily Telegraph who wrote, “To draw attention to one’s own feelings publicly, while others lie murdered or are dying or suffering, is grotesque self indulgence,” adding that Blair was “focussing attention not on them but on him, him, him.” (P226, Goodman98 in Furedi in Nolan Jnr, 2002) But this expected today and those who do not disclose their feelings are treated with great suspicion, like the Royal family after Diana’s death. Self-esteem is the motivation for much in this new ethic with social problems from teenage pregnancy to family breakdown attributed to low self-esteem. (Fitzpatrick, http:www.spiked-online.co.uk/Articles/00000006DB36.htm) Anthony Giddens relates productivity to self-esteem in “Beyond Left and Right” when he says, “A productive life is one well lived, but it is also one where an individual is able to relate to other as an independent being, having a developed sense of self-esteem.” (P180, Giddens,1994) A problem arises when emphasis is placed on the emotions when in the past problems were illuminated through socioeconomic or philosophical analysis. A report in the Guardian on the British education system emphasised the emotional damage suffered by poor children, rather than their social conditions or the failure of the education system. Is it that society is far more comfortable dealing with poverty as a mental health problem than as a social issue?
The third characteristic is ‘A New Priestly Class’ where the traditional moral elite has been replaced by psychiatrists and psychologist. MacIntrye notes that mental health is the new salvation and our new priests depend on the redefinition of human behaviour in pathological rather than moralistic categories. (PP8-9, Nolan Jnr, 1998) Fourthly, is ‘The Pathologization of Human Behaviour.’ In early U.S. society, it was the individual that was the problem rather than alcohol but as alcohol became disengaged from community regulation it became perceived as a social ill. This has spread to other areas as Gross has observed that in modern parlance, we are all to some extent sick. The DSM III-R describes an Avoidant Personality Disorder; in the past they would have been called shy. Perhaps it’s not the behaviours that have changed, but the cultural understanding of them. But it’s not a problem, Ritalin for children and the adult equivalent; Prozac, can cure most ills. (PP10-13, Nolan Jnr., 1998) But this pathologization and the use of counselling to deal with the issues raised are always the best route. Recent research suggests that counselling or debriefing after distressing experiences may lead to worse outcomes by undermining people’s own coping strategies. (Deahl in Fitzpatrick, -online.co.uk/Articles/00000006DB36.htm) Young raises the possibility that “for at least some individuals who have been given a diagnosis of PTSD, a focus on the traumatic event in question is actually the result and not the cause of other psychiatric symptoms, such as depression and anxiety.” (P205, Young in Bracken , 2002) There can also the problem of trauma as a western concept constructed on western values and being used in an alien context. This can cause disruption and confusion of traditional modes of dealing with trauma as well as providing large over-estimates of those who need treating. (Summerfield, Pupavac)
The fifth characteristic is ‘Victimisation’ where individuals and groups understand themselves as victims of oppressive social environments or abusive pasts. Pre-modern orders saw pain, suffering and injury as part of life’s formative process. This is no longer the case particularly in the U.S. where there is an increasing inclination to blame someone or something else. (PP15-17, Nolan Jnr., 1998) Again, Bill Clinton’s public admittance to counselling as an example, but at another level the massive increase in minor litigation as people sue those who have supposedly determined their victimhood. In the U.K., an increasing number of “Where there’s blame, there’s a claim” adverts provide evidence of the increase in the language of victimhood. Nolan quotes some extreme examples like the victimised patron who sued his hairdresser for depriving him of his ‘right to enjoy life’ This shows how individuals can invoke this language, indicating a greater visibility and availability of it. (P17, Nolan Jnr, 1998) Victimisation, the emotivist ethic, and the pathologization of human disorder also creates the assumption of universal vulnerability. Furedi notes that “the very act of universalising vulnerability helps provide a focus for shared experience in times when the individual’s place in the world has become increasingly uncertain. Collective outpouring of grief such as after Diana’s death or the murders in Soham provide the foundation for those unique instances of solidarity that make an impact on people’s lives. “Emotionalism not only allows for collective sharing, it also endows those who have suffered with moral status and a sense of identity. It is a form of identity that appears to suit the individuated temper of our times.” (P226, Furedi in Nolan Jnr, 2002) These characteristics combine to form a system of meaning that’s right for the times; “the therapeutic ethos – with the victim pathologies of the emotivist self interpreted for us by the priestly practitioners of the therapeutic vocations – offers itself as a replacement to traditional moral codes and symbols, worn out by the effects of modernisation.” (p18, Nolan Jnr., 1998)
It is evident that the therapeutic ethos has certainly infused itself well into the major institutions of the American state but there is a concomitant presence of utilitarian and therapeutic rationales for justifying state programmes. (P280, Nolan Jnr., 1998) An example of this conflation exists in civil case law, where psychologists and economists have an objective system of monetary value for ‘loss of enjoyment of life.’ There is also the case of tort and state workers’ compensation reform where the driving force against the awards for emotional and other intangible injuries was economics. (PP283-4, Nolan Jnr, 1998) The utilitarian aims to control and recreate our natural world, and the therapeutic aims to control and recreate our inner psyches so both provide the equipment to create and recreate ourselves. So although the therapeutic and utilitarian ideals on the surface may appear contradictory, in actuality they jointly endorse the belief in human limitless and represent the major languages of legitimisation used by the state to justify itself in a contemporary context. (PP285-6, Nolan Jnr., 1998)
This age is markedly one with post-traumatic or therapeutic values and characteristics but there has not been a complete break from a previous order. The state and other societal institutions are still fundamentally modern and still function within structural parameters established by the process of modernity. However the source of legitimisation has changed. There is still evidence of utilitarian ideals guiding decision making, but it is the therapeutic language and beliefs, which is increasingly the legitimisation and justification. (PP307-308, Nolan Jnr, 1998)
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Nolan Jnr., James, The Therapeutic State: Justifying Government at the Century’s End. (New York University Press, 1998)
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Farrell, Kirby, Post-Traumatic Culture: Injury and Interpretation in the Nineties. (John Hopkins University Press, 1998)
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Lasch, Christopher, The Culture of Narcissism: American Life in an Age of Diminished Expectation. (W.W.Norton, 1978)
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Rose, Nikolas, Governing the Soul: Shaping of the Private Self. (London Free Assc. Books, 1999)
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