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| Dear All, I note Erica's request for detail; but I have an immediate reaction to Erica's message. Not all psychology graduates, by any means, can AFFORD to belong to the BPS. Particularly when only a very small proportion of psychology graduates can now get jobs as professional psychologists, and a considerable proportion cannot get degree level jobs at all. Psychology graudates with no money cannot join the BPS whether or not they like what it has to offer, and whatever their personalities as "joiners" or "non-joiners". Part of the "dark side" of the BPS, although I would rather aim it directly at academic psychologists, is that psychology corporately has done little to address the issue that expanded gradaute education needs to be accompanied by expanded employment opportunities. They have taken the money, for example to validate degree courses or, in the case of academics, in the form of their salaries and public sector benefits, whilst overlooking the people out in the cold. The same applies to Clinical Psychology in relation to the training bottleneck. There is a great danger that Community Psychology, whether sponsored by the BPS or by a collective, will be "you and us". In other words those of you who have secure, by the standards of most likely community psychology clients extremely well remunerated, positions will run projects patronising those with problems because they have not got economic resources. As a lot of studies now show (e.g. Richard Wilkinson's), that will not do because economic inequalities between haves and have nots - and the latter can include its fair share of psychology graduates - in itself causes psychological distress. This approach can at best only have limited palliative success.. Best wishes, Frederic Stansfield --- On Wed, 20/10/10, Erica Brostoff <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
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