Panel on Philosophical Considerations in Psychoanalysis:
Psychoanalysis, Culture, and the Legacy of Individualism:
Thinking and Practicing Socioculturally

Psychoanalysts have traditionally played down the role of cultural forces in human experience. Yet culture in its many forms is always present in the therapeutic setting and is the background against which all experience unfolds. Each of us is born into and emerges within cultural contexts of shared beliefs, values and practices. Our cultural contexts determine the language we use to describe ourselves and affect how we exist in the world.

The Western emphasis on individuality is no exception. The belief that each person is unique, that the individual forms the focus of investigation, that behaviors and symptoms are universal in nature, reflects dominant American cultural values. The notion of the autonomous, self-determining individual has a long history in western philosophy and forms the basis for models of self-understanding and action. Cultural myths of individual self-fulfillment and self-awareness abound, and are captured by such metaphors as the "American Dream." The impact of these myths on the practice of psychotherapy, cannot be underestimated. Individualism - the belief that we are, at the deepest level, self-contained, autonomous individuals - is a powerful moral vision.

The difficulty is that culture forms a web of normative beliefs and moral prescriptions about human nature that are rarely, if ever, spelled out. The transmission of individualism is tacit, occurring outside of our everyday awareness. As members of society, we are deeply committed to our cultural perspective on what is worthy in living because it has shaped our very identities as individuals. When we are not aware that our perspective is only one possible way of interacting in the world, we are limited by the horizon of our moral vision, and the Other's outlook and behavior can appear distorted and mistaken, if not pathological.

To be sure, there has been a strong reaction against the ideology of individualism in contemporary and post-Cartesian forms of psychoanalysis: relational, interpersonal and intersubjective analysts all reject the notion of the isolated individual. Yet psychoanalytic practice does not exist in a cultural vacuum.

The values of autonomy, instrumental reason, and the valorization of the individual continue to impact society as a whole and determine the contexts within which we live and practice therapy. Indeed, many of the goals of therapy are derived from the beliefs, assumptions and traditions associated with individualism. These views are implicit in traditional theories of development and often form the basis of the personal narratives that emerge in therapeutic dialogue, with important consequences.

Self-understanding that is guided by the values of individualism does not account for our sociocultural contexts. Indeed, the preoccupation with the individual and the inner self neglects our embeddedness in a community of shared values. When the social world is devalued, social problems also lose their relation to political action. Most importantly, when cultural contexts are overlooked, we are unable to perceive the way in which self-understanding, gender, race, and ethnicity are all culturally defined and limited.

Historically, psychoanalysis functioned in a monocultural manner and was largely limited to middle and upper middle class white Euro-Americans. Such values of self-fulfillment, autonomy, and individualism enshrined in this segment of the population had much to do with how the goals and objectives of clinical work have been defined over time. The exclusive focus on the patient's inner experience was carried out at a cost: the neglect of the social and cultural world. The privileging of inner life, of depth and soul, often lead to a devaluing of social, cultural, and political realms. To the extent that the social and cultural world came to bear on a psychoanalytic treatment, it was understood and interpreted as a projection of the patient's internal desires, needs, or wishes.

The problem today is that a culture of psychoanalysis and psychotherapy that emphasizes a focus on the so-called inner self may do little to restore a sense of wider purpose within a community of shared values. The participants of any therapeutic relationship never exist as an isolated unit. Therapist and patient alike are always situated in a specific time and place and their self-understanding is itself is a product of their culture and values.

As a set of values, individualism rests on the not-so-hidden pillars of patriarchy, power and prejudice. Indeed, the individualist paradigm is strongly gendered because it is grounded in the values of a patriarchal society that privileges thinking, separation, and autonomy over affectivity and relationships. Within individualist oriented societies, power has traditionally resided in the hands of white men, leaving women and ethnic minorities disempowered.

It is precisely the belief in the values of universality and equality that lead us to associate culture with diversity and the otherness of minority groups. By contrast, members of the majority group tend to think of themselves as cultureless. Portrayals of culture belonging to the dominant group are either superficial or altogether overlooked. With respect to multicultural understanding, the absence of a "white identity" is a case in point. As many critics have suggested, the construal of white identity as "cultureless" invokes a tacit assumption that whites are the norm, an assumption that subsequently perpetuates power dynamics and prejudices. This perspective promotes a lack of reflection on the sociocultural embeddedness of values, ideals and norms. A similar dynamic can be observed in the cultural transmission of the tacit assumptions of individualism. We often lack an understanding of how it is that we privilege certain ideas and ways of living.

By demonstrating how the values associated with individualism form an intractable part of Western, and particularly American culture, I believe we can begin to understand their impact on our self-understanding and ways of practicing therapeutically. I suggest that individuality is a construct produced by specific foundational ideas, historical trajectories and social practices; as such, it is one interpretation of being human among others, with no privileged status in telling us about our "true" nature. I contend that a crucial step towards overcoming the pervasiveness of individualism lies in achieving a fuller understanding of the extent to which these values are ingrained our responses to the Other. I examine the trajectory of these values and ideas as they develop through Descartes, Locke and Freud. I conclude by suggesting a contextualist and hermeneutic form of thinking and practice that enables us to focus on the centrality of the Other and her needs.