(Un)consciousness-Raising, (Un)knowability, Lack and Spectrums of Solidarity: Discussion of “Unconsciousness-Raising”

ABSTRACT

In this response, I address five selective arguments in relation to Malherbe’s thesis on the implication of the unconscious in the structuring of our political orientations and activities, and the importance of engaging in a process of unconsciousness-raising. First, I raise a seeming conceptual tension in his argument about the relationship between conscious and unconscious activity. Second, I highlight the challenge of occupying a range of subject positions and how their associated multiple unconscious lack(s) may compromise solidarity in political formations. Third, I suggest that surrendering individual unconscious needs to that of the group is a more troublesome process than we anticipate, as it is always ideologically contested, both consciously and unconsciously. Fourth, I argue that unconsciousness-raising is not in and of itself implicitly connected to a specific set of political goals, as the unconscious is not inherently politically partisan, and I consequently conclude with the suggestion that the very idea of solidarity is an unstable and dynamic construct and process.

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Garth Stevens

Garth Stevens (M.Psych., D.Litt. et Phil.) is a Professor and Clinical Psychologist at the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, South Africa. His interests include the intersection of culture and psychoanalysis; socially applied psychoanalysis in the areas of race, class, gender, and violence; affect theory; and psychoanalysis and embodiment. He has published widely, including as co-editor of A Race Against Time (UNISA Press); Race, Memory and the Apartheid Archive: Towards a Transformative Psychosocial Praxis (Palgrave Macmillan); and Decoloniality and Epistemic Justice in Contemporary Community Psychology (Springer). He is a member of the Academy of Science of South Africa (ASSAf), currently serves as the Deputy Vice-Chancellor: People Development and Culture, at the University of the Witwatersrand, and is Past-President of the Psychological Society of South Africa (PsySSA).