The Political Self ─ Understanding the Social Context for Mental Illness

This book explores how the social and economic contexts in which we live profoundly affect our mental health and wellbeing, and how modern neuroscientific and psychodynamic research can in turn contribute to and enrich our understanding of these wider social and political contexts. It therefore looks both inside and outside--indeed one of the main themes of The Political Self is that the conceptually discrete categories of "inner" and "outer" in reality constantly interact, shape, and inform each other. Severing these two worlds, it suggests, has led both to a devitalized and dissociated form of politics, and to a disengaged and disempowering form of therapy and analysis.

With contributions by: Joel Bakan, John Beveridge, Nick Duffell, Sue Gerhardt, Dave Grossman, James Hillman, Joel Kovel, Iain McGilchrist, Jonathan Rowson, David Smail, Nick Totton, and Michael Ventura.