Paul Rosenberg’s Interesting Application of the Psychological Concepts of Denial, Displacement, and Projection to the Politics of Recession — Do You Think His Analysis Makes Sense?

26 October 2011

On the psychology of a nation that is not dealing with its problems

Paul Rosenberg came up with a fun conceptual slant regarding why the nation has so ineffectively dealt with the recession we’re in:

For three long years since the financial crisis began, American politics has been dominated by the politics of projection, displacement and denial - three basic subconscious ego defence mechanisms that are tremendously powerful in defending the indefensible.

They are, in a sense, helpful and adaptive at an early stage, since ego survival is a precondition for everything else. But they can take on a life of their own, “protecting” the ego from things that must be dealt with in order to grow as it should.

The same is true when these mechanisms function socially, “defending” large groups of people - even whole civilisations - against facing up to their most important challenges, and preventing them from resolving conflicts that threaten to destroy them.

The rest of Rosenberg’s essay (somewhat disjointedly) applies his thesis to the politics of the recession. For example:

When people try to pretend that tens of millions are out of work because there is something wrong with each of them, individually, rather than with the economy as a whole, this . . . is an example of massive denial.

Displacing blame from Wall Street onto other, less powerful targets creates a powerful incentive to project, just like the man yelled at by his boss, who wants to kick his dog to relieve his frustrations. Ordinarily, he would not kick his dog, but under such duress, projecting his own dark thoughts onto his dog gives him permission to strike out.

Are there problems with Rosenburg’s thesis?

I’m not convinced that individual psychic mechanisms apply to cross-spectrum cultures.

On the other hand, I agree that denial, displacement, and projection might cumulatively be expressed by people who belong to the specific groups who did cause the trouble we’re in. Being threatened by the repressed knowledge that they are indeed the “bad guys,” they might lash back with shared psychological defenses.

But that leaves the groups of people who did not (at least actively) cause our troubles — basically the mass of “you” and “me.” What ego damage are we defending against?

An potential answer that supports Rosenberg’s thinking

The answer to the question — of why the mostly blameless population would share the same dysfunctional ego defenses that politicians and the socio-economic elite exhibit in regard to having created the recession — may lie in our shared illusions about Reality.

For example, can we agree that it is (at least potentially) threatening to recognize that our American System is flawed in ways that might prove fatal to the American Dream, which most of us share?

I suspect so.

Consequently, Rosenberg may be right in thinking that wrong-doers and de-regulators are now joined in manifesting their dysfunctional psychic defenses by millions of the rest of us. “Regular” people may well be intimidated by the fact that our leaders led us down the wrong roads with our full support.

Being unwilling to deal with the scary necessity of making difficult changes in our democratic institutions, and in the way this money-dominated system works, many of us now deny that change is required.

Rosenberg’s hope points to Occupy Wall Street

The main point to Rosenberg’s essay is that the Occupy Wall Street movement is doing more than anyone (or anything) else has to shatter our denials:

This is what Occupy Wall Street offers the chance to end: stop the displacement by placing the blame where it belongs, and the pressures driving projection will plummet.

Beyond that lies the possibility of taking on denial more generally, and developing an understanding, free from these defence mechanisms, about how to create a better, fairer sort of future.

Of course those who deserve that blame will not like this one bit.

The moral? — We do need to think about why we’re in this pickle

Fixing problems, when we don’t understand how we created them, is difficult.

Let me know what you think.

PeteFree.com

Paul Rosenberg’s Interesting Application of the Psychological Concepts of Denial, Displacement, and Projection to the Politics of Recession — Do You Think His Analysis Makes Sense?