Psychoanalysis and Ecology: The Unconscious and the Environment

Psychoanalysis and Ecology explores the mutual co-determination between individual traumatic stories and positive or negative environmental attitudes, shedding light on pathological defenses and the role of hope in a damaged world.

Format: Hardback
Length: 148 pages
Publication date: 01 April 2022
Publisher: Taylor & Francis Ltd

The IPA Climate Award has been awarded to Cosimo Schinaia and Psychoanalysis and Ecology for their groundbreaking work in understanding the complex relationship between human psychology and the environment. In their book, Cosimo Schinaia and Psychoanalysis and Ecology delve into the question of how our enormously modified environmental conditions determine our subjective mental changes and vice versa. The authors acknowledge the gravity of the environmental crisis, but also note the emotional difficulty in comprehending the present reality and its future consequences. Through their exploration of the collective imagination as permeating the individual one and vice versa, the authors investigate the mutual co-determination between the individual traumatic stories told and experienced in the consulting room and the positive or negative environmental attitudes exhibited by patients.

The pairing of clinical vignettes with dispatches from the collective imagination sheds light on the confused affective investments and anxieties that propel pathological defenses, such as negation, suppression, intellectualization, displacement, and disavowal. The final chapter concludes with notes on the role of hope in a damaged world and the importance of integrity within the psychoanalytic field and beyond.

This book is a valuable resource for psychoanalysts, psychotherapists, psychiatrists, anthropologists, environmentalists, and ecologists alike. It offers insights into the complex interplay between human psychology and the environment, and provides practical tools for addressing the challenges posed by climate change and other environmental crises. By exploring the relationship between the individual and the collective, Cosimo Schinaia and Psychoanalysis and Ecology offer a new perspective on the human experience and the urgent need for sustainable solutions.

Dimension: 234 x 156 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9781032114798