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The Symptoms of the Political Unconscious: Introduction to the Special Issue
Author(s) -
Rogers Juliet B.,
Zevnik Andreja
Publication year - 2017
Publication title -
political psychology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.419
H-Index - 95
eISSN - 1467-9221
pISSN - 0162-895X
DOI - 10.1111/pops.12438
Subject(s) - unconscious mind , politics , psychoanalytic theory , personal unconscious , psychoanalysis , brexit , resistance (ecology) , sociology , epistemology , aesthetics , law , psychology , political science , philosophy , ecology , european union , biology , business , economic policy
The political unconscious “speaks”; it displays itself in the symptoms of the political world, in the speech of policy, of decisions, of laws, of images, icons, and gestures, and in protest, resistance, and ordinary violences, and, insofar as it speaks, psychoanalysis can say something about it. In this article, we consider how psychoanalysis can speak to some of the symptoms of the political world as they emerge as a form of the political unconscious. We employ Lacanian psychoanalytic theory to elaborate the unconscious and discuss how some of the symptoms of this unconscious has emerged in the form of Brexit, Trump, and the rise of the right in Europe and the Antipodes. We then elaborate on the contributions to this special issue as well as mentioning how these contributions speak to these latest events.