Abstract
This chapter argues that we have to rethink the limits of nationalism as we recognize the need for a global government to confront the global challenges of climate change, financial capitalism, tax avoidance, terrorism, migration, and international poverty. By returning to the Freudian concepts of free association and the neutrality of the analyst, I offer a model for global solidarity and universal human rights.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Notes
- 1.
Benjamin, J. (2015). Non-violence as respect for all suffering: Thoughts inspired by Eyad El Sarraj. Psychoanalysis, Culture & Society, 21(1), 7.
- 2.
Lacan, J., Miller, J.A., & Forrester, J. (1988). The seminar of Jacques Lacan. Book 2, The ego in Freud’s theory and in the technique of psychoanalysis, 1954–1955. New York: Norton, pp. 244–246.
- 3.
Lacan, J. (1977). The mirror stage as formative of the function of the I as revealed in psychoanalytic experience. In Ecrits: A selection. New York: Norton.
- 4.
Lacan articulates this notion that the analyst must represent the Symbolic Other in his early work. See Lacan, J., Miller, J.A., & Forrester, J. (1988). The seminar of Jacques Lacan. Book 2, The ego in Freud’s theory and in the technique of psychoanalysis, 1954–1955. New York: Norton, p. 324.
- 5.
Descartes, R., & Sutcliffe, F. (1968). Discourse on method and the meditations. London: Penguin UK, p. 1.
- 6.
Ibid., p. 6.
- 7.
Lacan, J. (1998). The four fundamental concepts of psycho-analysis (Vol. 11). New York: WW Norton & Company.
- 8.
Adorno, T. W., & Horkheimer, M. (1997). Dialectic of enlightenment (Vol. 15). London: Verso.
- 9.
Lacan, J. (1977). Direction and power of treatment. In Écrits: A selection (pp. 250–310).
- 10.
Lacan, The four fundamental, p. 276.
- 11.
Klein, N. (2015). This changes everything: Capitalism vs. the climate. New York: Simon and Schuster, p. 23.
- 12.
Anderson, B. (2006). Imagined communities: Reflections on the origin and spread of nationalism. London: Verso Books.
- 13.
Lacan, J. (1977). The mirror stage as formative of the function of the I as revealed in psychoanalytic experience. In Ecrits.
- 14.
Žižek, S. (1992). Looking awry: An introduction to Jacques Lacan through popular culture. Cambridge: MIT press, p. 162.
- 15.
Ibid.
- 16.
Ibid., p. 165.
- 17.
Ibid.
- 18.
Ibid.
- 19.
Lacan, The four fundamental, p. 46.
- 20.
For an extended critique of Zizek’s politics, see my Samuels, R. (2010). New media, cultural studies, and critical theory after postmodernism: Automodernity from Zizek to Laclau. New York: Palgrave, pp. 187–199.
- 21.
Žižek, S. (2009). The parallax view. Cambdridge: MIT press, pp. 29–30.
- 22.
Klein, This changes, p. 25.
- 23.
Horkheimer, Dialectic of enlightenment.
- 24.
Bleicher, J. (2014). The hermeneutic imagination (RLE Social Theory): Outline of a positive critique of scientism and sociology. New York: Routledge.
- 25.
Pinker, S. (2003). The blank slate: The modern denial of human nature. New York: Penguin.
- 26.
Lacan compares psychoanalysis to the free discovery of knowledge in opposition to academic discourse in his The Four Fundamental Concepts, p. 260.
- 27.
See Samuels, R. (2014). Between philosophy and psychoanalysis: Lacan’s reconstruction of Freud. New York: Routledge.
- 28.
Lacan, J., & Miller, J.A. (2013). The ethics of psychoanalysis 1959–1960: The seminar of Jacques Lacan. New York: Routledge.
- 29.
Klein, This changes, p. 39.
- 30.
Ibid., p 40.
- 31.
Ibid. p. 48.
- 32.
Ibid., p. 52.
- 33.
Bloom, P. (2014, 10 September). Against empathy. Boston Review., https://bostonreview.net/forum/paul-bloom-against-empathy. Accessed April 2016.
- 34.
Chodorow, N.J. (1989). Feminism and psychoanalytic theory. New Haven: Yale University Press.
- 35.
Laclau, E. (2012). Politics and ideology in Marxist theory. London: Verso.
- 36.
Klein, This changes, p. 61.
- 37.
Žižek, S. (1992). Looking awry: An introduction to Jacques Lacan through popular culture. Cambridge: MIT press.
- 38.
Laclau, E. (2005). On populist reason. London: Verso, pp. 232–239.
- 39.
Klein, This changes, p. 63.
- 40.
Ibid., 1 pp. 56–57.
- 41.
Martin, A. Empire files. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PV_PLCC6jeI. Accessed May 2016.
- 42.
Klein, This changes, p. 82.
- 43.
Ibid., p. 95.
- 44.
Ibid., p. 118.
- 45.
Mark Bracher (2009) critiques this extremism and binary logic of the Left in his Radical pedagogy: Identity, generativity, and social transformation. (New York: Macmillan).
- 46.
Klein, This changes, p. 170.
- 47.
Freud, S. (1963). The economic problem of masochism. In General psychology. New York: Collier Press.
- 48.
Freud, S. (1969). Beyond the pleasure principle. J. Strachey (Ed.). New York: Norton.
- 49.
Gutiérrez, N., (ed.). (2007). Women, ethnicity, and nationalisms in Latin America. New York: Ashgate Publishing, Ltd.
- 50.
Assembly, U.G. (1948). Universal declaration of human rights. UN General Assembly.
- 51.
Laclau, E. (2005). On populist reason. New York: Verso, pp. 69–71.
- 52.
Stiglitz, J.E. (2002). Globalization and its discontents. New York: Norton.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2016 The Author(s)
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Samuels, R. (2016). Global Solidarity and Global Government: The Universal Subject of Psychoanalysis and Democracy. In: Psychoanalyzing the Left and Right after Donald Trump. Critical Theory and Practice in Psychology and the Human Sciences. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-44808-4_5
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-44808-4_5
Published:
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-319-44807-7
Online ISBN: 978-3-319-44808-4
eBook Packages: Behavioral Science and PsychologyBehavioral Science and Psychology (R0)