Nice one Jacqui, I had similar reactions to David’s post. I
also thought about his responses to Sophie’s post about developing a CAMHS
service. I am currently a volunteer on a young person’s project by my Borough
council to 'include' children who are often ‘excluded’ from ‘mainstream’ physical
activity in the 'community' due to ‘special health needs’ (labels like ADHD,
autism and increasingly obesity come attached).
We have spent a lot of time listening to parents’ and young
peoples’ experiences of ‘exclusion’ and ‘inclusion’ in community settings and some
parents are clear that they want parenting programmes and extra specialist
support in order to improve their social-material circumstances. The underlying approach was prefigurative practice. While they
have found the project valuable as a way of connecting with others, some still
want specialist services that are increasingly unavailable due to the Tier
system in CAMHS and the underlying agenda about preventing many cases getting
to CAMHS and instead being addressed by other means. But I digress; should
we then as a group of people interested in psychology and community, because we
know better through position in relation to power (knowledge and practice in
the academic and applied fields and membership of this list), invalidate these
experiences and expectations of the people we work with and say ‘do you know
what, you don’t need support from the state, you can do it yourself, you just
need to see beyond your power horizon and see how these services you want
(help) arise form an oppressive global economic movement and if you can just see
that you can... … … well, erm [what?].’
People in CAMHS are often committed systemetists, recognising
the limits that they can achieve ‘therapeutically’ and therefore work to
highlight and change often hidden oppressive and harmful practices that go on
around young people. They are often politically active in the community in
other ways and all too aware of the potential for oppression and toxic
collusions and effects of governmentality, and David, really, the NHS and
public sector workers generally are also the oppressed and the locus of much
toxic action of the state so give us a break. I do worry David that you have
thrown the baby out with the bath water through a reflexive / dogmatic position
when your energies and talents towards the list could be directed at expressing
solidarity with, encouragement for and helpful challenges and guidance to
workers instead of possibly alienating them.
And the kind of individualising stuff David says arises from
blaming parents in version A of his post (often mothers) for childhood
experiences – well, attachment and developmental theories which I thought of
from this do not limit it to the mother or parent, but recognise that these
issues or whatever, arise in relation to their experiences of being parented
and being parents, of current social support, of employment practices and
solidarity. Most theories in some way or another pay homage to how these things
occur in the space between people, not within them. Comparing my own
experiences of childhood and adult mental health services, people working with
young people often have very different discourses available to them than people
working with adults. When seeking to support
individuals or groups, workers are of course limited in what they can do, but
more often than not in my experience do not collude with the state, but
recognise right now for this family we can do something, provide some
social-material support, however limited, while we continue to be active
elsewhere in the system. I can make a lot more money and enjoy far better
working conditions by stepping out of the state and working in the private
sector, but I choose to remain engaged and active in the state system, offering
and enjoying solidarity with workers
David, I can’t speak for all public sector workers, but can
say on behalf of some that we are wittingly working with the psychologically
destructive status quo because we can shift the dunes a grain of sand at a
time. I find you position at the end of the post -
“I am sorry to say that I regard a standpoint which
suggests young people's problems in the neoliberal economic order can be
addressed by psychologists and / or gardeners working with youing people
to develop their emotional literacy is unwittingly complicit with the
psychologically destructive status quo.”
- to be both nihilistic and arrogant, as if you think none
of us know and challenge the hegemony in any significant way. In a lot of respects, the right
ring/conservative socio-economic position of a reduced state-provided system of
welfare parallel what I understand to be David’s position,
although the underlying intellectual route can be different.
Jacqui, I think your project sounds interesting and hope it
works well and in this way express solidarity with you, I too object to David’s
tone and remarks and question how his shaming and blaming approach towards
workers resonates with neoliberal practice.
Gareth
----- Original Message ----
From: jacqui lovell <[log in to unmask]>
To: [log in to unmask]
Sent: Monday, May 19, 2008 9:59:51 AM
Subject: Re: Gardening and the York Poverty statement
Hi David,
re your comments I don't remember saying that the lack of emotional literacy was anyones fault, I am not into shaming and blaming, although I recognise that without it they struggled in their world as I did in mine!
Re parent blaming, as a mother of five daughters and a step daughter I am not into that either and recognise that when I knew better I did better and that the world is patriarchal and more often than not works against me in my parenting of my children.
I take offence at your attempting to say that I am unwittingly colluding with the dominant discourse, I thought that I was merely giving some info re the project not commenting on the philosophical assumptions behind it, which are more about the redistribution of economics and working with people so that they have the means to eat good food on what for most is a meagre income.
I think that you have chosen to comment without asking for the full information and are using my posts as a way of furthering your own politics, with which I happen to agree but the way in which you chose to do this I do not and cannot agree with! Get off your soapbox!
Jacqui
________________________________
Date: Sun, 18 May 2008 14:42:37 +0100
From: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Gardening and the York Poverty statement
To: [log in to unmask]
Dear Jacqui, Lucy and all,
Gardening metaphors are interesting but how well do different versions fit with community psychology, particularly critical versions of community psychology, as opposed to other approaches?
Version A
In the post below, the labelling of young people as having 'emotional and behavioural difficulties' is characterised as problematic because 'in reality' they 'have just had crap childhoods with little or no input to develop emotional literacy'. From the standpoint of a critical version of community psychology that is itself problematic because young people's (lack of) emotional literacy is positioned as the cause of difficulties. This seems an individualistic, psychologistic, intra-psychic, deficit-oriented victim-blaming way of making sense and legitimating intervention. Moreover, because dominant discourses position parents (or more often mothers) as responsible for the quality of their children's 'childhoods', explaining things in terms of a 'crap childhood' can unwittingly collude with another form of second-level victim blaming (of oppressed parents).
Version B
The environmental justice movement offers other gardening metaphors. People who have found their housing has been built on toxic dumps have found that few plants or people thrive and many become sick. Rather than get gardening and psychotherapeutic guidance, they have had to engage in collective political and legal action, sometimees met formidable opposition, found that the nature of the response to them seems to depend on their class and ethnicity and have had to overcome that. This offers a gardening mataphor in which some schools, workplaces, communities and societies are such psychologically toxic environments that it is vitually impossible for people to be healthy and happy in them and they need to be detoxified before they are fit for human beings.
This brings us back, at last, to poverty and societal inequality. Richard Wilkinson's work has shown, to the satisfaction of many community psychologists, that inequality at the societal level is 'personally, collectively and socially destructive' (quoting from the poverty statement)
In fact to quote more fully from the statment:
'psychologists have a fundamental responsibility to join with others to end both poverty and societal inequality independent of absolute wealth, which we believe are personally, collectively and socially destructive. We believe mainstream psychology to be complicit with the prevailing psychologically toxic neo-liberal economic order and believe psychology has allowed itself to be used to hide systemic effects of poverty and inequality and instead position poverty as a consequence of individual psychological dysfunction. We call for the radical transformation of psychology so that it has the resources necessary to expose the personally, collectively and socially destructive effects of poverty and inequality and the proactive deployment, with allies, of this transformed psychology to end poverty and societal inequality and the exploitation, exclusion, oppression, distress and illness which result from them."
I am sorry to say that I regard a standpoint which suggests young people's problems in the neoliberal economic order can be addressed by psychologists and / or gardeners working with youing people to develop their emotional literacy is unwittingly complicit with the psychologically destructive status quo.
David
________________________________
From: The UK Community Psychology Discussion List on behalf of jacqui lovell
Sent: Sun 18/05/2008 13:50
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: York Poverty statement
Thanks Lucy,
it sounds very similar to the work we want to achieve, my partner is a gardener who has worked with young people who are labelled as having emotional and behavioural difficulties, but who in reality have just had crap childhoods with little or no input to develop emotional literacy!
My background is in transactional analysis and I am using freire's approach to learning and teaching together with Ignacio's approach to the praxis being informed from the ground up, as well as an eclectic mix of anything else that works from feminist relational approaches to Goddess cards cos they're so healing.
I think it all comes down to kindness though in the end, it really is that simple, well for me anyway.
I will look up the book cos it will be good to see how others have done it,
Cheers
Jacqui
> Date: Sun, 18 May 2008 12:41:43 +0100
> From: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: Re: York Poverty statement
> To: [log in to unmask]
>
> Dear Jaqui
>
> In relation to your post I have just read a fantastic book by Jenny
> Grut and Sonja Linden called 'The healing fields'. It describes the
> work carried out at the Natural Growth Project by the Medical
> Foundation alongside people who have been tortured. Using nature for
> healing, a psychologist and gardener work with people to rebuild their
> lives. It provides a real flavour of the work, how it has progressed
> and very practical ideas and reflections. You may already be aware of
> her work but if not it is well worth a look at.
>
> Lucy
>
>
> On Sat, May 17, 2008 at 8:48 PM, jacqui lovell
> <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> > Hi Mark,
> > just wanted to say that we may well use it in a bid I am preparing to set up
> > a community garden in partnership with people who suffer from economic
> > deprivation and social exclusion, many of whom are asylum seekers and
> > refugees, including all groups of people who experience social exclusion,
> > the majority of whom also have associated mental health needs, so if we are
> > succesful we could highlight it as part of our launch via the media.
> >
> > Not sure if this is what you are looking for but our aim is to supplement
> > meagre incomes and nutrition by working with people to grow their own food,
> > the excess of which can also be sold to further the project. We are going to
> > do so within a safe and supportive environment hopefully impacting
> > positively upon peoples mental health at the same time. So it fits with the
> > ethos of the statement.
> > Jacqui
> > on behalf of developing partners members
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >> Date: Sat, 17 May 2008 19:31:06 +0100
> >> From: [log in to unmask]
> >> Subject: York Poverty statement
> >> To: [log in to unmask]
> >>
> >> I have been looking back over the CP list archives and rather wondered
> >> what had happened to this initiaitive
> >>
> >> THis is pretty much the last we saw of it I think.
> >> Has anyone done anything with it? The idea was flowated by Jan of trying
> >> to link it to some kind of news item, and Carl made the point that we'd
> >> need a person prepared to act as contact point.
> >>
> >>
> >> ----___________---------__________-------------___________------------__________
> >>
> >> te: Sun, 28 Oct 2007 19:07:48 -0000
> >> Reply-To: The UK Community Psychology Discussion List
> >> <[log in to unmask]>
> >> Sender: The UK Community Psychology Discussion List
> >> <[log in to unmask]>
> >> From: David Fryer <[log in to unmask]>
> >> Subject: Poverty statement redrafted
> >> Content-Type: multipart/alternative;
> >>
> >> Dear All, as promised I have redrafted the poverty statement which emerged
> >> from the York UK CP Conference and kindly developed by Wendy Franks. I
> >> have amended it in the light of comments received from Jacqui Akhurst,
> >> Julie Bird, Jan Bostock, Paul Duckett, David Fryer, Sue Roffrey and Annie
> >> Mitchell. Apologies if I missed anyone's feedback:
> >>
> >> As community and critical psychologists we believe that psychologists have
> >> a fundamental responsibility to join with others to end both poverty and
> >> societal inequality independent of absolute wealth, which we believe are
> >> personally, collectively and socially destructive. We believe mainstream
> >> psychology to be complicit with the prevailing psychologically toxic
> >> neo-liberal economic order and believe psychology has allowed itself to be
> >> used to hide systemic effects of poverty and inequality and instead
> >> position poverty as a consequence of individual psychological dysfunction.
> >> We call for the radical transformation of psychology so that it has the
> >> resources necessary to expose the personally, collectively and socially
> >> destructive effects of poverty and inequality and the proactive
> >> deployment, with allies, of this transformed psychology to end poverty and
> >> societal inequality and the exploitation, exclusion, oppression, distress
> >> and illness which result from them."
> >> on behalf of the UK community psychology network
> >>
> >> Comments welcome. Would anyone be willing to take responsibility for
> >> dissemination of the final agreed version? The question arises as to how
> >> and where to disseminate it - Jan suggested waiting til an opportunity to
> >> respond to an inequality issue. Others have suggested a letter in The
> >> Psychologist. Any other ideas? David
> >>
> >> ___________________________________
> >> COMMUNITYPSYCHUK - The discussion list for community psychology in the UK.
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> >
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