Critical Psychology: Engaged Theory and Practice

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Critical PsychologyEngaged Theory and Practice

• Tod Sloan, Ph.D.
• Graduate School of Education and Counseling
• Lewis Clark College

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Agenda

• Overview of the history of critical psychology
• Critical psychology and the subdisciplines of
  scientific psychology
• Social contexts colonization of the lifeworld
• Methodological implications (action research,
  critical hermeneutics, social change)
• Trace implications for counseling and
  psychotherapy practice

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Critical Psychology

• Challenges technical control of the psyche
  (objectifying attitude)
• Corrects for the individualistic bias of
  scientific psychology
• Seeks understanding (through dialogue and
  interpretation) in relation to cultural, social,
  and political processes
• Fosters participation, emancipation, liberation,
  citizenship

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Ideological Constraints?

• Ideology means
• A system of ideas and practices that sustain
  social relations characterized by domination and
  oppression.
• For example sexism, consumerism, racism

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Critical Psychopathology

• Apart from biomedical and genetically-determined
  disorders, much human suffering is inherently the
  product of interpersonal and societal processes
• Typical suffering can be linked to isolation,
  marginalization, exploitation, discrimination,
  and oppression all social processes related to
  disruptions of the lifeworld
• Addresses ideological constraints on notions of
  identity and well-being

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Questions about Modern Society

• What makes modern society modern?
• What does modernization entail?
• How have humans been affected by societal
  modernity?
• -- J. Habermas, leading German social
  philosopher, has some answers.

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Social Contexts

• Modernity
• System and Lifeworld
• Colonization
• Decolonization

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Essential Concept SystemIncludes all action
related to physical survival through exploitation
and control of nature Characterized by
instrumental rationalityapplied to achieve goals
of the market and the state Aims at
effectiveness, efficiency, productivityExamples
Agriculture, manufacturing, advertising,
corrections, social work, modern medicine
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Essential Concept Lifeworld

• Sphere of symbolically-mediated communication
• -- Processes aim at interpersonal
  understanding-- Includes aesthetic, expressive
  and ethical concerns-- Space for debate,
  revision of tradition, consensus formation
• Examples
• Teens arguing with parents about ground
  rulesSharing feelings with a friend
• Reading a novel
• Town hall visioning sessions for citizens
• Nurse counseling a family about the long-term
  illness of a loved one

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System versus lifeworld

• Modernity arises as system is decoupled from
  lifeworld (due to urbanization,
  industrialization, bureaucracy, etc)
• Modernity begins when system interests begin to
  override the interests of the lifeworld
• Modernization tends to disrupt the social
  reproduction of the lifeworld

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Reproduction of the Lifeworld?

• Lifeworld is sustained by the transmission and
  regeneration of foundations for culture, social
  norms, and personal identity, i.e.,
  enculturation, social integration, and
  socialization all of which are complex symbolic
  and interactive processes.

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Healthy Reproduction of the Lifeworld

• Enculturation gtgt Transmission of cultural values,
  meanings, languages
• Social Integration gtgt Shared norms and effective
  sanctions for destructive deviance
• Socialization gtgt Sense of identity, individual
  purpose, and emotional well-being

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Disruption of lifeworld reproduction processes by
intrusion of systemic forces can lead to

• Cultural crisis of meaning and values
• Social anomie and crime
• Personal psychopathology, substance abuse,
  suicide, identity confusion, alienation

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A Primary Problem The Colonization of the
Lifeworld

• The System (government and business) respond to
  these psychosocial crises through instrumental
  programs that aim fix problems or change
  behavior but cannot directly reconstitute
  lifeworld processes associated with the crises.

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Examples of Lifeworld Colonization

• Lifestyle advertising subverts interest in
  cultural activities that are not idealized by
  media
• An old marginalized ethnic neighborhood leveled
  to make room for a freeway
• Financial cost-benefit analysis used to justify
  elimination of a humanities program

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Common Features of Colonization

• Subjective and interpersonal concerns of subjects
  are neglected or silenced
• Action in a given place is coordinated by
  interests alien to the participants
• Objectifying and dehumanizing attitude toward
  individuals or collectives

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Psychosocial Effects

• Erosion of community
• Competitive individualism
• Narcissism, anxiety, depression
• Privatization, isolation, loneliness
• Splitting of thought, feeling, and action --
  desymbolization

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What is the Role of Human Services in Response to
the Colonization of the Lifeworld?

• Why not
• Sustain the lifeworld against the systemic power-
  and control-seeking of the state and the
  corporation?

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Decolonization, anyone?

• Restoration of balance between system and
  lifeworld interests
• Aesthetic, ethical, and expressive forms of
  communication and action considered valid along
  with practical claims
• Critical self-reflection, dialogue, deep
  democracy are essential decolonizing practices
• Re-symbolization

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Implications for Critical Psychological Practice

• Understand and address the personal as a
  confluence of life-historical, sociocultural, and
  ideological processes
• Foster reflection and social engagement in the
  places where colonizing forces impinge most by
  inviting processes of de-ideologization and
  re-symbolization
• Devote significant effort to altering the
  institutional, sociocultural, and policy
  dimensions of sources of suffering, as informed
  by individual and group interventions

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What does critical counseling and psychotherapy
look like in practice?

• Traditional
• Feeling talk
• Self-oriented
• Narrow social field partner, work, family
• Advice
• Re-ideologizing

• Critical
• Reflection on activity
• Engagement-oriented
• Broad social field all direct interactions, plus
  social context
• Provoke curiosity
• De-ideologizing

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Traditional Counseling Model

• How have you been feeling? (think of a negative
  feeling)
• Tell me more about what is happening when you
  feel that way.
• How might you think differently in order not to
  feel that way so much?
• What will you do to change the way you feel?

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Example Critical Counseling Intake

• Tell me about a typical week in your life. What
  are you doing in relation to the people around
  you? (Explore several dimensions, e.g., family,
  work associates, groups, strangers, country)
• What has been especially meaningful about these
  relations with others?
• What sorts of roles do you take on? How are
  these working out? What are you contributing?
  What are you hoping for?
• Tell me about something that has been puzzling
  you about your engagement with the others in your
  world.

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Bottom Line Decolonization begins with
De-ideologization

• Critical Self-Reflection
• Intersubjectivity through Dialogue
• Fuller Participation
• Deep Democracy