This book is perhaps the first systematic treatment of politics from the perspective of cultural psychology. Politics is a complex that psychology usually fails to understand— as it assumes a position in society that attempts to be free of politics itself. Politics is associated both with an everyday practice, and the dynamics of globalization; with the way group conflicts, ideologies, social representations and identities, are lived and co-constructed by social actors. The authors of the book address these issues through their research grounded in different parts of the world, on democracy and political order, the social representation of power, gender studies, the use of metaphors and symbolic power in political discourse, social identities and methodological questions. The book will be used by social and political psychologists but is also of interest to the other social sciences: political scientists, sociologists, anthropologists, educationalists, and it is at a level where sophisticated lay public would be able to appreciate its coverage. Its use in upperlevel college teaching is possible, and expected at graduate/postgraduate levels.

Relationships of culture and political psychology shape a wide range of important contemporary political issues. The distinguished contributors to this book make use of diverse theories of psychology, informed by a broadly comparable understanding of the nature of culture. The book is an important landmark in developing the field of political psychology, developing insights from psychological anthropologists, political scientists and crosscultural psychologists. Critical contemporary social, political and cultural issues of ethnic and crosscultural conflict around the world are crying out for theories making use of the powerful lens of culture along with other refractory frameworks.

Over the centuries all of the great philosophers made psychology central to understanding social life. Indeed, the ancient Greeks thought it impossible to conceive of political life without insight into the human soul. Yet insuffficient professional legitimization attaches to the central importance of modern depth psychology in understanding politics. Cultural Foundations of Political Psychology explores the linkages between psychology and politics, focusing on how rival conceptions of the good life and unspoken moral purposes in the social sciences have led to sectarian intolerance. Roazen has always approached the history of psychoanalysis with the conviction that ethical issues are implicit in every clinical encounter. Thus, his opening chapter on Erich Fromm's exclusion from the International Psychoanalytic Association touches on a host of political matters, including collaboration as opposed to resistance to Nazi tyranny. Roazen also brings a public/private perspective to such well-known episodes as the Hiss/Chambers case, the circumstances of Virginia Woolf's madness and suicide, and the matter of CIA funding of the monthly Encounter. He deals with the reaction to psychoanalysis on the part of three major philosophers--Althusser, Wittgenstein, and Buber--and looks at the link between psychology and politics in the work of such political theorists as Machiavelli, Rousseau, Burke, Tocqueville, Berlin, and Arendt. A chapter grappling with Vietnam and the Cold War illustrates how political psychology should be concerned with questions of an ethical or "ought" character. In examining the social and psychological bases for political theorizing, Roazen shows how both psychology and politics must change and redefine their methodologies as a result of their interaction. Roazen concludes with a chapter on how political psychology must deal with issues posed by changing conceptions of femininity. This volume is a pioneering exploration of the intersection of psychology and politics.

"Macro... explains how macro cultural factors--social institutions, cultural artifacts, and cultural concepts--are the cornerstones of society and how they form the origins and characteristics of psychological phenomena. This theory is used to explain the diversity of psychological phenomena such as emotions, self, intelligence, sexuality, memory, reasoning, perception, developmental processes, and mental illness. Ratner draws upon Lev Vygotsky's sociocultural psychology, Urie Bronfenbrenner's ecological psychology, as well as work in sociology, anthropology, history, and geography. He also explores the political implications and assumptions of psychological theories regarding social policy and reform. The theory outlined here addresses current theoretical and political issues, such as agency, realism, objectivity, subjectivism, structuralism, postmodernism, and multiculturalism..."--Jacket.

Psychological insight is the creed of our time. A quiet academic discipline two generations ago, psychology has become a voice of great cultural authority, informing everything from family structure to government policy. How has this fledgling science become the source of contemporary America's most potent ideology? In this groundbreaking book—the first to fully explore the political and cultural significance of psychology in post-World War II America—Ellen Herman tells the story of Americans' love affair with the behavioral sciences. It began during wartime. The atmosphere of crisis sustained from the 1940s through the Cold War gave psychological "experts" an opportunity to prove their social theories and behavioral techniques. Psychologists, sociologists, and anthropologists carved a niche within government and began shaping military, foreign, and domestic policy. Herman examines this marriage of politics and psychology, which continued through the tumultuous 1960s. Psychological professionals' influence also spread among the general public. Drawn by promises of mental health and happiness, people turned to these experts for enlightenment. Their opinions validated postwar social movements from civil rights to feminism and became the basis of a new world view. Fascinating and long overdue, this book illuminates one of the dominant forces in American society. This title is part of UC Press's Voices Revived program, which commemorates University of California Press's mission to seek out and cultivate the brightest minds and give them voice, reach, and impact. Drawing on a backlist dating to 1893, Voices Revived makes high-quality, peer-reviewed scholarship accessible once again using print-on-demand technology. This title was originally published in 1995.

It is a commonly held assumption among cultural, social, and political psychologists that imagining the future of societies we live in has the potential to change how we think and act in the world. However little research has been devoted to whether this effect exists in collective imaginations, of social groups, communities and nations, for instance. This book explores the part that imagination and creativity play in the construction of collective futures, and the diversity of outlets in which these are presented, from fiction and cultural symbols to science and technology. The authors discuss this effect in social phenomena such as in intergroup conflict and social change, and focus on several cases studies to illustrate how the imagination of collective futures can guide social and political action. This book brings together theoretical and empirical contributions from cultural, social, and political psychology to offer insight into our constant (re)imagination of the societies in which we live.

In this 2002 volume, political psychologists take a hard look at political psychology. They pose and then address, the kinds of tough questions that those outside the field would be inclined to ask and those inside should be able to answer satisfactorily. Not everyone will agree with the answers the authors provide and in some cases, the best an author can do is offer well-grounded speculations. Nonetheless, the chapters raise questions that will lead to an improved political psychology and will generate further discussion and research in the field. The individual chapters are organised around four themes. Part I tries to define political psychology and provides an overview of the field. Part II raises questions about theory and empirical methods in political psychology. Part III contains arguments ranging from the position that the field is too heavily psychological to the view that it is not psychological enough. Part IV considers how political psychologists might best connect individual-level mental processes to aggregate outcomes.