What Do Humans Need to Be Human? Self Psychology and the Problem of Social Justice

Abstract

This article shows how self psychology can be used as a basis for social critique. It examines the inherent injustices of modern economic society and shows how self psychology can both reveal them and show the dire consequences for this systematic de-humanization. It compares humans as economic subjects with humans organized around self-structure and shows how modern economic society undermines the possibilities of developing and sustaining self-structure. Finally, it inquires as to whether the nascent program at Lod, which combines psychoanalysis and Buddhism, might represent a new vision of human ontology.