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Making the Psychological Political – Challenges for Community Psychology

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Making the Psychological Political – Challenges for Community Psychology Making the psychological political – challenges for community psychology Mark Burton, Carolyn Kagan and Paul Duckett Research Institute for Health and Social Change, Manchester Metropolitan University Abstract Community psychology deals with the life of groups of people in context and is therefore inevitably concerned with their struggles, successes, projects and dreams. Sooner or later, because these contexts are constructed economically, politically and historically, engagement with the political is inevitable as all social groups encounter social and economic interests that differ from their own. On a global scale these conflicts include competition for resources, the dynamics of profit maximisation, and the use of violence to maintain and extend economic and political domination. In Britain community orientated psychologists have become increasingly aware of these political questions and at least some are more ready than in the past to commit to political engagement both at the local level and on national and international questions. Some of these developments will be traced, exploring some of the following questions:- What are the connections with other attempts to develop a politically engaged psychology? What are the prospects for such engagement and how best can community psychologists contribute to wider struggles and campaigns? Why is this engagement increasing now? What constraints are there to such action and do community psychologists self-constrain their political effectiveness? What does this mean for the definition and focus of community and other related psychologies? In exploring these questions it will be assumed that while professional ideology and practice has a historical specificity there is a universality of human needs and that this entails the transformation of community psychology in response to new challenges from global capital. Key words: psychology, politics, alternatives, organising, community psychology, activism Introduction affect communities worldwide and that have impacted on the work of community psychologists in Community Psychology’s main business is concerned from the UK to Latin America, from Australasia to with the life of groups of people in context, with their Palestine: struggles, dreams, projects, successes and setbacks, in a variety of collaborative roles. Sooner or later this • A social housing provider sells housing to a means an engagement with the political since groups property developer to develop private encounter political and economic interests different housing. from their own. That is to say conflict is intrinsic to • A government ban on hunting foxes human life and to that of people in context, a context threatens the livelihood of groups of rural that is constructed economically, politically and workers. historically. Community Psychology then is • Government subsidy for public transport is inevitably political – unless it seeks escapism in other reduced, isolating poor families. pursuits. • A transnational corporation transfers To give some focus to the argument it will be worth production to a location with cheaper labour providing some examples of conflict situations that Global Journal of Community Psychology Practice Volume 3, Issue 4 December 2012 or less regulation, removing employment • Opposition to war and the involvement of and impoverishing a community. psychologists in the war apparatus. With State support a transnational corporation • Work with marginalised groups, using an displaces a farming community in order to extract explicit political analysis – e.g. asylum and minerals from the underlying earth. racism. • Work on minority and human rights. A health centre and its primary care and preventative • Work with communities that are being or services is closed following the introduction of user have been dispossessed. co-payments imposed by the World Bank. However, this engagement with a more politicised set People are displaced to make way for a prestige of issues is new territory for many community project in a capital city. psychologists (although not all, Burton, 2004; Burton Such conflicts have a number of root causes: & Kagan, 2005). I shall use the experience of some members of the • Competition for resources network of community psychologists in the UK to • Profit maximisation highlight some critical dimensions of this • Deficits in democracy and in the unaccustomed engagement with the political. Three representation of marginalised interests recent initiatives from the UK that highlight this The use of violence to maintain and extend • relative inexperience will be reviewed. economic and political hegemony. • The continuing consequences (economic, 1) The Birmingham manifesto behavioural, cultural, economic, political) of This Statement was produced by a group that met in previous historical impacts of these factors. Birmingham in April 2007. At the Great Yarmouth At its worst, the liberal-philanthropic paradigm that Community Psychology Conference in September includes much of community psychology can act as a 2006 it had been proposed that there should be an mask for some of this. To the extent that its interim event, before the 2006 September 2007 aspirations and practice are ameliorative rather than conference in York. This event should aim to produce transformative, it can defuse social movements rather practical, meaningful outcomes and address relevant than fortify them. NGOs, where community issues such as “war” or “the environment”. Before psychologists and similar workers frequently work, the event, consultation took place with the members are often part of Capital’s strategic toolkit (Petras & of the UK community psychology listserve. These Veltmeyer, 2005). Participation, so often emphasised consultations were also facilitated by the West by Community Psychology can be no more than co- Midlands Community and Critical Psychology optation sapping autonomous organising (Cooke & Interest Group which organized the meeting. This Kothari, 2001; Kagan, 2006; Kagan, Castile, & process clarified the topics to be addressed at the Stewart, 2005). event and the manner in which the day was to be organised. However, there is a tendency in Community Psychology (whether or not it claims that title) that The topics identified were “War and torture” and increasingly seeks to face up to the political “globalisation”. Speakers were identified to provide saturation of community and community action, and orientating statements on these, after which there are signs of an increasing willingness to commit participants had the opportunity to work in groups to political engagement both at local level and on towards practical outcomes to address the issues national and international questions. The rest of this raised by the presentations and the subsequent article explores some aspects of these developments. discussions. Some examples and issues: The day was remarkable for the consensus that was readily established within a broadly Marxian • It needs to be made clear that this increasing orientation to understanding the wider global context politicisation is not entirely new, but we will as it impinges on people and communities and on the look at the recent growth of interest in construction of psychology itself. political engagement in its present context. Some of these recent examples include: The manifesto takes the form of four linked • Opposition to the psychologisation and statements on the priority areas of: medicalisation of misery. Global Journal of Community Psychology Practice, http://www.gjcpp.org/ Page 2 Global Journal of Community Psychology Practice Volume 3, Issue 4 December 2012 • War and Imperialism effects of poverty and inequality and the proactive • Sites of counter-system resistance deployment, with allies, of this transformed • Action on global warming/environment psychology to end poverty and societal inequality and • Public services/Privatisation of the National the exploitation, exclusion, oppression, distress and Health Service. illness which result from them.” The manifesto (available at …on behalf of the UK community psychology http://www.compsy.org.uk/TheBirminghamManifest network o.pdf) was circulated to the network of UK However, having produced this, the network didn’t community psychologists, but there was little seem to either know what to do with it, or to have the immediate reaction. Nevertheless a workshop based organisational capacity to take it into a relevant on it at the York conference in September 2007 was public arena. The point was made that doing this well attended and led to a more specific statement on would be best linked to a relevant news story, but poverty. when subsequently the Labour government faced an 2) The York Statement on Poverty internal revolt as a result of removing he first, low, band of income tax, leaving many on low incomes This statement was produced at the annual UK less well off, we community psychologists were Community Psychology conference in a large nowhere to be seen or heard. Similarly a possible workshop session (about 30 people) organised by submission to a Scottish parliament enquiry into child some of those who had produced the Birmingham poverty was identified as a possible opportunity for manifesto. The specific focus on poverty was intervention but again nobody was able to commit the influenced by the presence at the conference of a necessary time and effort to this and the deadline keynote speaker Richard Wilkinson (an passed. To be fair, the York statement was more a
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