The psychologization of humanitarian aid

Skimming the battlefield and the disaster zone

Bibliographic Data

ID12220729
AuthorsJan De Vos (0000-0002-9659-504X, Ghent University, corresponding author)
Year2011
Volume24
Issue3
Pages103-122
Publication date2011-03-14
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueHistory of the Human Sciences (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0952-6951 • E-ISSN: 1461-720X
PublisherSAGE Publishing (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1177/0952695111398572
PMID21954504
OpenAlexW2143675117
LanguageEN
Citations received8
References cited21

Humanitarian aid's psycho-therapeutic turn in the 1990s was mirrored by the increasing emotionalization and subjectivation of fund-raising campaigns. In order to grasp the depth of this interconnectedness, this article argues that in both cases what we see is the post-Fordist production paradigm at work; namely, as Hardt and Negri put it, the direct production of subjectivity and social relations. To explore this, the therapeutic and mental health approach in humanitarian aid is juxtaposed with the more general phenomenon of psychologization. This allows us to see that the psychologized production of subjectivity has a problematic waste-product as it reduces the human to 'Homo sacer', to use Giorgi Agamben's term. Drawing out a double matrix of a de-psychologizing psychologization connected to a politicizing de-politicization, it will further become possible to understand psycho-therapeutic humanitarianism as a case of how, in these times of globalization, psychology, subjectivity and money are all interrelated

Battlefield · Economics · Economy · Environmental ethics · Epistemology · Fordism · Globalization · Humanitarian aid · Political science · Sociology · Subjectivity · Global Peace and Security Dynamics · Global Security and Public Health · Historical and Contemporary Political Dynamics · History · Law · Philosophy

Tools

Open DOISci-HubOpen Access