TIM BOSTON is a graduate student in the Department of Environment and Resource Studies, Faculty of Environmental Studies at the University of Waterloo. He is an honours graduate of Montreal's John Abbott College and has completed a first class undergraduate degree in Environmental Studies and Geography from the University of Victoria. He sits on the board of directors for the Ecological Rights Association in Victoria, B.C., and is presently working on a dictionary entitled An Anatomy of Anti-Ecological Thought with Fred Knelman and Joan Russow of the University of Victoria. His areas of interest include radical environmentalist praxis (particularly in relation to forest issues in British Columbia); indigenous, ecocentric & spiritual ecological knowledge; anti-environmentalism; wellness; ecopsychology; and environmental justice. He would like to thank Greg Michalenko for his inspiration, helpful comments and suggestions.
This essay examines the emerging field of ecopsychology. It begins with an overview of ecopsychology followed by an exploration of the main branches of this new area of inquiry. There is also an investigation of the self/Self connection. It includes a critique of dominant psychology's focus on the ego or small self, and an examination of ecopsychology as a context driven subject that transcends individualism and recognises the interconnection between community, land and people. This leads into a discussion of ecopsychology as environmentalist therapy. Many environmental activists face disorders including severe emotional and physical burnout. It is argued that ecopsychology can respond to such conditions by helping create self-actualising environmental activists. In addition to positing ecopsychology as environmentalist therapy, it is also shown that ecopsychology can provide the opportunity for environmentalists to conduct a psychological impact assessment of their public actions. A number of ecopsychologists argue that there are environmentalists who emphasize negative reinforcement as a means to achieve social change, a rather problematic approach. There is an exploration of a controversial topic: abnormal ecopsychology (which is related to the original subject: abnormal psychology). Finally, this paper ends with a critical analysis of ecopsychology.
Ecopsychology (also known as psychoecology, ecotherapy, green therapy, Earth-centred therapy and reearthing), is an area of study dedicated to an examination of the emotional bonds that exist between humans and the natural world. It seeks to understand the complexity of these bonds, and suggests paths to healing the weakened connections embedded in the human-nature relationship. Ralph Metzner says that: "ecopsychology may be defined as the expansion and revisioning of psychology to take the ecological context of human life into account".1 While one can describe a general vision of ecopsychology, it should be said that there is a danger in believing that it is possible to transform this vision into a universal definition of it. Some might contend that Metzner's statement provides a succinct description of a new and emerging discipline, but the definition it proposes is too narrow, deterministic and limited in scope. Ecopsychology certainly can not (and should not) be didactically defined in too bounded a manner. It is far too complex, extensive and multifarious. Ultimately, ecopsychology represents an emerging synthesis between psychological and radical ecological thought which, by its very nature, fuses the visions and practices of numerous areas of inquiry that do not easily fit under a monolithic definition. For example, there are cultural, spiritual and political ecopsychologists as well as Gestalt, perceptual and depth ecopsychologists. A number of ecopsychologists are choosing to focus their attention on the ecopsychology of child development, while others are studying what can be referred to as wilderness ecopsychology.
Cultural ecopsychologists examine psyche/earth interconnections in living and non-living indigenous cultures. Long before the word ecopsychology was invented, these cultures not only embraced but lived and deeply understood the human/nature relationship. Among indigenous people it is homely common sense that humans must live in a state of vital reciprocity with the flora and the fauna, the rivers and the hills, the sky and the soil on which they depend for physical sustenance and spiritual instruction.2 On a related note, spiritual ecopsychologists explore the emotional relationships that exist between human beings and the supernatural. They insist that there is an emotional interchange between nature's sacred forces and the human world. It is also argued that psyche/earth healing can be expressed on a transpersonal level. Conversely, for the political ecopsychologist John Mack, inventing a psychology that comprehends the human/nature relationship is far more than a spiritual, intellectual or therapeutic project, it entails a call for political commitment.3 Through Harvard's Centre for Psychology and Social Change (an academic institute that has a strong interest in the field of ecopsychology), Mack suggests that ecopsychology should be socially relevant. Recognizing the severity of socioecological degradation, he argues for a personal empowerment based on exploration and activism.
As an area of inquiry that is tied to a history of political activism that began with Allison Montagne, Elliot Shapiro and Paul Goodman (all members of the original Gestalt study group), Gestalt therapy is one of the few areas of psychology that has been open to not only the political and activist branch of ecopsychology, but to all the subdisciplines. As Joe Wysong, editor of the Gestalt Journal writes: "gestalt therapy, of all the therapeutic approaches, places such an emphasis on the environment within which the individual functions (lives and breathes is more environmentally appropriate) that it is uniquely qualified to serve as a foundation upon which the ecopsychologist can build.4 Gestalt therapy is based on the premise that living beings do not perceive the world as being composed of individual atomised components, but rather as Gestalten or significant wholes which display characteristics that are missing in a reductionist analysis of isolated parts. The orientation of Gestalt therapy is explicitly holistic, emphasising the tendency, inherent in all individuals, to integrate their experiences and to actualize themselves in harmony with their environment.5 It is argued that emotional symptoms exemplify blocked features of experience. Thus, the purpose of therapy is to enhance holism, expression and awareness by helping the client complete the experiential gestalt.
To unlock the client's blocked experiences the Gestalt therapist will direct attention toward various patterns of communication, both interpersonal and internal, with the aim of enhancing the client's awareness of the detailed physical and emotional processes involved. This sharpening of awareness is meant to bring about the special state in which experiential patterns become fluid and the organism begins the process of self-healing and integration. The emphasis is not on interpreting problems, nor on dealing with past events, but on experiencing conflicts and traumas in the present moment. Individual work is often done within the context of a group, and many Gestalt therapists are combining psychological approaches with some form of bodywork. This multilevel approach seems to encourage profound existential and, occasionally, even transpersonal experiences.6
Merging Gestalt therapy and ecopsychology, Gestalt ecopsychologists are sympathetic with the preceding perspective, but prefer to focus greater attention on the individual's integrated engagement with the ecosphere. They recognize the importance of communing with nature as a form of meditation in which the psyche is intimately aware of nature's nonverbal sensations, symbols and characteristics. This is accomplished through the practice of ecological groundedness which is a process that incorporates an understanding of the original Gestalt notions of sensuous living and acting in the world. Groundedness is a dynamic state of the person that includes the sense of confidence, pleasure, and wonder resulting from progressively deepening contact with the wild and domesticated natural community of the person's neighbourhood and larger land region; with unpaved ground, soil, or landscape; with weather and the diversity of native plants and animals; as well as with family, friends, and local cultural activities.7
Seeking a different form of groundedness, perceptual ecopsychologists argue that human and nonhuman sensory capacities such as taste, smell, sight, hearing and touch are the primary means of connecting human to nonhuman nature. They argue that the suppression of the senses is contributing to the socioecological crisis, and that freeing them is necessary in order to revitalise the human/nature relationship. Laura Sewell, a perceptual ecopsychologist, offers five perceptual practices that can help human beings realize their interconnection with nature:
Depth ecopsychologists also see the need for perceptual practices, and a greater sensory capacity. However, utilizing the language of Jungian psychologists, they frame such needs in the context of a world unconscious. The world unconscious is a more extensive and engaged side of the psyche than the collective unconscious. Carl Jung believed that this latter form of consciousness contained the inherent psychic repository of humanity. Jungians argue that it embodies the primordial knowledge which forms the essence of humanity. Clearly, this is a substantially different concept from the notion of a world unconscious. Within the dimension of the world unconscious the Earth's beings and subjects, living or otherwise join in as one. Depth ecopsychologists argue that all phenomena in the world bear ingrained unconscious attributes. They refer to the world unconscious knowing full well that it is the human mind that is largely unconscious of the subjective inner natures of the non-human world. Ultimately, the world unconscious is rooted in the inner natures of non-human nature. Moreover, as Stephen Aizenstat writes:
At the dimension of the world unconscious, the inner subjective natures of the world's beings are experienced as dream images in the human psyche. In addition, I believe dream images are real, have imaginal weight and body, and act in dreams on behalf of themselves. For example, the elephant that appeared in my dream last night was fully engaged in his activity, not mine. In the dream, I watched as he looked intently at me with shiny black eyes and wide flopping ears. He used his trunk to spray dirt and tiny rocks over his fine-haired rump, his tail all the while swatting flies from his sagging hindquarters. After a time he plodded back to join the rest of the herd. The dream elephant, like all dream images, is alive, has body, and moves about according to his own inner nature.9
Young children can develop a wonderful sense of the world unconscious and in turn foster a deep connection with a natural whole. The ecopsychology of child development recognizes the importance of a child's link with the natural world. This field of inquiry suggests that the natural environment has a beneficial effect on the early years of human development. Children learn to recognise and respect the `otherness' in plants and animals, rather than turning all animals into fussy, Disneyesque pets or demons, or assuming that `plants are like people'.10 Such a respect for nature can in turn lead to an overall respect for community, land and people. This respect is particularly evident amongst aboriginal children. So much so that child ecopsychologists look to traditional cultures for sources of inspiration on the topic of child development. Anita Barrows looks to the Hopi for example.
The relationship between the child and the natural world is honoued in the southwestern United States by the Hopi, in a ritual reenacting their belief that newborns emerge from the underworld through the sipapuni, or Earth navel. For the first twenty days the infant remains in the darkness of this transition; then, at dawn, he is carried to the east and presented to the rising sun, while his mother says, "This is your child." Thus the Hopi's dependence on the cycles of nature, the diurnal rhythms, is acknowledged; the infant joins not only the human community, but the community of Earth.11
Wilderness settings can be particularly influential on a child's development. Wilderness ecopsychology recognizes that wild nature has healing powers. It sees wilderness as a subject which embodies regenerative qualities, and a colourful web of patterns, processes and rhythms which can revive the psyche. However, wilderness is not only colourful, but includes mud, grey rainy days and deathly hazards. Dominant society is conditioned to believe that these are the evils of wild nature. It is taught to perceive wilderness, in whole or in part, as an enemy to be subjugated. People learn that wilderness is hostile, a threat to survival and a `thing' to be conquered. According to wilderness ecopsychologists, such an outlook hampers active participation in personal `raininess' or `muddiness'. Contact with wilderness requires nothing less than embracing wilderness as it truly exists, whether rainy or otherwise. Wilderness ecopsychology holds that the wilderness environment in all its forms nourishes the psyche. However, in the last analysis, it goes beyond this level of personal or individual nourishment and represents a wild nature/psyche fusion. Wilderness ecopsychology attempts to merge the psyche with a wilderness environment. Ultimately, it seeks to reveal how to deeply and unconditionally love, appreciate and feel for wild nature. This by necessity requires an awareness of the self/Self relationship.
In addition to providing a wide spectrum of ecopsychologies, ecopsychology as a whole offers a critique of the psychoanalytic, the behavioural and the humanistic subdisciplines of dominant psychology for focusing their research interests merely on the intrapsychic and interpersonal facets of human behaviour, and in turn disregarding the larger ecological context. All uncritically accepted an extreme individualism that has contributed to modernity's cultural pathology. This cultural significance on the ego-oriented individual has led to a psychological belief system that embraces, for example, negative punishment, exchange theories, and Freudian analysis that typically give power and authority to self-absorption. As James Hillman writes:
There is only one core issue for all psychology. Where is the `me'? Where does the `me' begin? Where does the `me' stop? Where does the `other' begin? For most of its history, psychology located this `me' within human persons defined by their physical skin and their immediate behaviour. The subject was simply `me in my body and in my relations with other subjects.' The familiar term that covered this entire philosophical system was `ego,' and what the ego registered were called experiences.12
Rooted in the Cartesian interpretation of reality, psychology has adopted a strict division between the res cogitans and the res extensa or mind and matter. It has focused on the decontextualized individual who is said to be independent from nature. The creation of ego-oriented individualism is not only a result of the directions taken in the development of psychology. The growth of an individualistic ideology within dominant societies evidently modified psychology in its attempts to establish academic and societal legitimacy. There is a coincidental intermingling between the psychological interpretation of the decontextualized individual and the diurnal individualism that is evident in modern cultures. Nevertheless, psychology has been in the forefront of those disciplines that have sought to legitimate the individualistic ideology, and it has portrayed this ideology as natural and inevitable, despite the evidence suggesting that the individualistic configuration of self is actually rather unusual when viewed in cross-cultural perspective.13
In response to the orthodoxy and inconsistency that weaves its way into the psychology profession, ecopsychology has steadfastly rejected the notion of a biographical `me'. It has strongly questioned the existence of a forged self (individual)/Self (whole) dichotomy and thereby challenged the established foundation of dominant psychological thought. Ultimately, ecopsychology in its most critical form embraces the radical and deep ecological notion of Self-realisation which can be defined as an encircling and interweaving process of identification with not only individuals, family, friends and humanity but with the nonhuman world. Self-realisation is illustrated in diagram 114.
The ripened self in this ecological model is multifarious, knotty and complex. This self derives its manifold identity from its interrelatedness and its interconnectedness to a larger web of human and nonhuman life. Moreover, the concept of self in the preceding diagram, by its very nature, avoids being defined "as an isolated ego striving primarily for hedonistic gratification or for a narrow sense of individual salvation in this life or the next."15 Instead, it embraces global responsibility and gains the "capacity to `act in relationship' by considering [personal] feelings, and perceptions of other peoples, other life forms, and of the Earth as a whole."16
Spiritual ecopsychologists maintain that this sense of Self-realisation is limited and needs to be expanded to include the surreal, non-tangible and cosmic forces of the universe. In this case, Self then becomes the identification and interconnection of everything that exists over time and space, both natural and supernatural. Essentially, a transpersonal ecocentric ecological notion of Self-realisation would firmly reveal that the forged split between the ego, humanity, the non-human world and the greater universe is an illusion. There are ecopsychologists who would prefer not even to draw a distinction between self and Self. For example, they perceive planetary pain and ecological degradation as being akin to human anguish and suffering. Internal pain is not only a personal expression, but is also an expression of nature's pain. Indigenous Okanagans experience this person/planetary or pernetarian sensation:
We refer to the land and our bodies with the same root syllable. This means that the flesh which is our body is pieces of the land come to us through the things which the land is. The soil, the water, the air, and all other life-forms contribute [as] parts to be our flesh. We are our land/place. Not to know and to celebrate this is to be without language and without land. It is to be dis-placed. 17
D.W. Winnicott, the British object-relations theorist, formulated for us the concept of transitional phenomena, essentially the investment of subjective meaning in objective phenomena, a shadowy area of experience where there is neither me nor not-me, but rather a dynamic interpenetration between the self and something in the world.18 Ultimately, the `external,' the `disconnected me' is a product of dominant dualistic rationality. It is only by a construct of the dominant reductionist and mechanistic mind that people believe themselves to be living in an `inside' bounded by their personal body, with little psychophysical interfusion with the outside human and nonhuman worlds.
Sarah Conn's original version of diagram 1 paints a picture of the inherently good person who removes her/himself from individual/self identification and attempts to, then, seek closer connections with the larger whole. There is an admirable morality in this vision. However, such a perspective does not take into account the intersecting and interconnecting nature of the Self. In practice, it could result in extreme altruism whereby an environmental activist sacrifices her/his individual well-being for the `sake' of the greater whole. There are numerous environmental activists who have sacrificed themselves for the greater good only to consequently hurt themselves and their ability to effect socioecological change. Ecopsychology attempts to address this problem by comforting the environmentalist, and fostering a hardy self/Self bond. It examines the sources of stress and burnout that are evident in the environmental movement, and seeks to relieve such deleterious emotional turmoil. Burnout is particularly apparent amongst environmental activists. About two-thirds [of environmentalists] say that they have experienced one significant episode of burnout.19 It is a critical environmentalist disorder that has the potential to seriously weaken the environmental movement.
One of the many physical signs of burnout is chronic fatigue... [Moreover,] people become vulnerable to diseases or find they cannot throw off minor illnesses such as colds. Other symptoms are frequent headaches, stomach pains and backache. Some people have trouble getting to sleep, others wake in the early hours with their thoughts racing... For some [burnout] amounts to personality change. Common feelings are depression, chronic anxiety and a sense of being overwhelmed by demands... Hair-trigger emotions can quickly produce tears or flareups. [Family, friends and] colleagues may notice withdrawal, rigid thinking, cynicism and negativity in someone who had formerly been quite positive. [Burnout can lead to] distorted perceptions of reality, such as paranoia... Such reactions inevitably lead to relationship and family problems which add to the overall stress.20
Ultimately, environmental activism can be a very nurturing and selfless endeavour, but it can also quite easily lead to emotional distress and burnout. Unlike those who deny the existence of a socioecological crisis, environmentalists directly confront extremely disturbing realities. They are all too familiar with ecological and social decay, and can become mentally suffocated by the consequences and significance of such problems. Essentially, to be a passionate environmentalist demands formidable sociopolitical and psychological nerve. It should therefore come as no surprise that there are environmentalists who literally lose their minds and project their frustrations, distress and anxiety onto others, including the public. As Mary E. Gomes states:
The anger and resentment also can take the form of self-righteous bitterness, in which anger is directed at the unresponsive public. Said one activist, `I find myself thinking, oh, a pox on them. They don't want to save themselves... Why should I go out of my way for these people?'... This can ultimately turn potential supporters away from the movement.21
Ecopsychology examines such maladaptive and anti-social behaviour. Ultimately, not only does this green psychology allow environmentalists to assess the well-being of themselves, it provides the opportunity for them to conduct a psychological impact assessment of their public actions. It seeks to acquaint the environmental movement with a subtler, more sensitive psychological approach to the public it seeks to win over to its cause.22 This suggests the need for posing questions about the beliefs, values and motivations that create behavioural change. It also means listening to people with the sort of compassion and kindness that is often expressed by therapists. Historically, there have been dedicated environmental activists with the most sincere intentions who have involved themselves in activities without carefully assessing the sensitive, fragile and emotional nature of the public. As Theodore Roszak states:
As intensely aware as environmentalists may be of the complexity of the natural habitat, when it came to human behaviour their guiding image was simplistic in the extreme. They worked from a narrow range of strategies and motivations: the statistics of impending disaster, the coercive emotional force of fear and guilt. Even though many environmentalists act out of a passionate joy in the magnificence of wild things, few address the public with any conviction that human beings can be trusted to behave as if they were the living planet's children.23
This is not terribly surprising. For too long much of environmentalist literature has been mute to the world of psychology. Few environmentalists (if any) have factored the role of psychology into their cause. However, there is one exception. For many years there have been numerous environmentalists who have unknowingly embraced what might be termed abnormal ecopsychology. Needless to say, environmentalists have been fascinated (and it might be argued at times overly preoccupied) with the dominant system's abnormal behaviours.
Abnormal ecopsychology claims that the split between the inner and outer worlds is a source of both behavioural and ecological plight. It perceives a self/Self disconnection as the source of psychosis. This area of study describes abnormality, insanity and madness according to the degree to which there are socioecologically destructive behaviours. If particular behaviours contribute to the exploitation of nature and humanity, then this represents abnormal behaviour. In essence, abnormal behaviour is Self-destructive behaviour. Abnormal ecopsychologists acknowledge that this behaviour is largely institutionally driven. Essentially, given various systemic constraints, it is recognized that those living in modern societies have little choice but to involve themselves in Self-destructive behaviours. There are key actors, institutions and processes which have the structural power to exclude normality i.e. self/Self praxis from the domain of reliable options, and thereby legitimize and reinforce socioecological decay. It is for this reason that those in the field of abnormal ecopsychology do not always speak of, for example, alienation and addiction on an individual level but rather they refer to these concepts on a structural level. There is an understanding that it is not solely the individual but rather the dominant system as a whole that is responsible for an individual/human/nature alienation and technological as well as consumer addiction.
Alienation appears to be of particular interest to those studying abnormal ecopsychology. On an individual/human or interpersonal level, alienation takes many forms and has many roots i.e. the trauma of birth separation, the ordeal of individuation from parents, the anguish of establishing an authentic point of reference in one's social world.24 These differing experiences form an overlapping individuation crisis.25 This crisis is rooted in a social construction of reality that interprets human beings and nature as individual parts separate from the greater whole. Such a social construct perpetuates the view that there are `individuals' as opposed to `people'. It reinforces the perspective that independence and competition are of greater value than community and cooperation. Moreover, it implies that the `successful' individual is one that experiences personal achievement. This dominant social construct can transform into actions that have not only social but ecological consequences; actions which can force and/or influence people to become separate from themselves and from the love and the earth that surrounds them. Essentially, abnormal ecopsychology holds that individuals in dominant societies have not only become alienated from each other, but from the natural rhythms and processes that nurture their lives. They have become alienated from nature's expressions, and estranged from the wind, water and soil.
Abnormal ecopsychology also focuses on technological and consumer addiction. Technological addiction is associated with technophilia or the intractable, compulsive love of technology. Dominant societies, as a whole, have become not only enveloped by, but obsessed with their own technologies. A number of abnormal ecopsychologists contend that those who live in technocratic societies are psychologically addicted to specific technological items such as automobiles, telephones and computers. There are some who are even obsessed by the notion of a technotopia where technology and society are completely interwoven. Individuals can become so enamoured with technologies that they permeate their lives. `Insults' to them become personal affronts, and can be felt as threats to self-esteem.26 Many have developed relationships with their cars, boats and computers. Essentially, technological addiction turns the technological venture into one of the highest ends in life. Ultimately, it allows education, commerce, work, governance and health to be governed by technology and its associated processes. At this point, addiction represents the living by and for technological development. Technology has become our environment as well as our ideology; we no longer use technology, we live it, writes the Dutch social critic Michiel Schwarz.27 Langdon Winner, in Autonomous Technology, moves the idea further, arguing that the technological artifacts and methods invented since the technological revolution have developed in size and complexity to the point of concealing our very ability to grasp their impact upon us.28
Many abnormal ecopsychologists insist that the technological imperative has gained such momentum that it is determining the course of human and non-human life. This momentum is revealing the extent to which dominant societies have become psychologically addicted to technology. Technological addiction can be thought of as a progressive condition that commences with innermost cognitive changes, alters, shifts and distorts ecological perception and overall behaviour, and eventually leads to self/Self decay. Furthermore, there are abnormal ecopsychologists who contend that the character of technological addiction is rooted in the absence of a significance and connectedness that is embedded in nature, home and community.
Consumer addiction is interrelated with technological addiction. This form of addiction is a result of the psychopathological accumulation of `things'. Obtaining a greater quantity of new `things' has become not just a want but a need. The notion of obtaining desirable, special and additional material items is part of the heart, identity and security of dominant societies. According to Mary Gomes and Allen Kanner, the addiction to an unrestrained consumerism appears to be accelerating:
As plans for the implementation of multimedia technology take form priority is being given to the technology necessary for around-the-clock interactive shopping. Television sets are being transformed into electronic mail catalogues. The goal is to allow viewers to buy anything in the world, any time of day or night, without ever leaving their living rooms.29
Some abnormal ecopsychologists have suggested that the dominant system conditions people to believe that consumer goods are neither wants nor needs but rights. Recent corporate advertising has focused on the consumers `right to shop'. Ultimately, materialism and consumerism are given sacred status.
Consumerism acts as a means to temporarily relieve the empty soul. The purchase of a new product, especially a big ticket item such as a car or computer, typically produces an immediate surge of pleasure and achievement, and often confers status and recognition upon the owner.30 However, withdrawal symptoms become increasingly evident as time passes and as the new product becomes the lifeless object. In order to relieve the material-fix, the consumer's behaviour becomes focused on the short-term remedy which is to seek out another material item. The consumer is continuously hoping that the next purchase will fulfil inner desires and needs. The consumer addict:
...seeks the experience of being continually filled by consuming goods, calories, experiences, politicians, romantic partners, and empathic therapists in an attempt to combat the growing alienation and fragmentation of [her/his] era. This response has been implicitly prescribed by a post-World War II economy that is dependent on the continual consumption of nonessential and quickly obsolete items and experiences. In order to thrive, [the dominant system] requires individuals who experience a strong `need' for consumer products and in fact demands them.31
Finally, in addition to those who speak of technological and consumer addiction, there are also those who discuss addiction in a general context. Delores LaChapelle has completed an extensive examination of addiction in her book Sacred Land, Sacred Sex. In a chapter entitled "Addiction, Capitalism and the New World Ripoff", she analyses the interrelationships between the pursuit of addictive substances, including gold, silver and sugar, and the insidious global spread of the capital-accumulating, growth-oriented industrial society from the sixteenth century to the present.32 Several other authors have also pointed to the addictive quality of [the consumer's] relationship to fossil fuels, another major force of unrestrained industrial growth and ecological destruction.33
Abnormal ecopsychology and the more general field of ecopsychology are open to criticism. Psychology and its subdiscipline abnormal psychology have been heavily criticized for the means by which they shape human behaviour. Historically, some psychologists particularly those familiar with the medical model of mental illness have drawn upon their professional expertise as a means of defining what is normal and abnormal behaviour, what is psychopathological and acceptable behaviour, and who is sane and insane. While few psychologists dichotomously class people as either strictly abnormal or normal, there is, nevertheless, a general tendency to perceive behaviour as normal/abnormal in degree, depending on the extent to which a behaviour is deviant, distressing or maladaptive. In recent decades, critics have seriously questioned the applicability of this approach. A particularly vocal critic has been Thomas Szasz, author of The Myth of Mental Illness. He argues that:
... such deviations are `problems in living', rather than [mental illnesses]. According to Szasz, the medical model's disease analogy converts moral and social questions about what is acceptable behaviour into medical questions. Under the guise of healing the sick, the conversion allegedly allows modern society to enforce its norms of conformity.34
There is the distinct possibility that ecopsychologists and in particular those in the field of abnormal ecopsychology could decide to use their knowledge as a maculinist sociopolitical tool to enforce those who fail to conform to an established ecological worldview. The following quotation from Ecopsychology: Restoring the Earth, Healing the Mind is particularly worrisome:
...ecopsychology could produce a timely reappraisal of the environmental movement's political strategy. It might generate a new, legal actionable, environmentally-based criterion of mental health that could take on prodigious legal and policy-making implications. To suggest with the full weight of professional psychological authority that people are bonded [disconnected] emotionally to the Earth reads a powerful new meaning into our understanding of `sanity' [insanity], a meaning that might even achieve the same legal and policy-making force that now attaches to physical hazards like toxic waste.35
Traditionally, the standards for mental normality have been established by those who weld high levels of socioeconomic and political power, and for whom the most expedient way of preserving their own social construction of reality is to define nonconformist or deviant behaviour (that is behaviour that does not conform to their social construct) as an illness and treat it accordingly. Non compos mentis, psychological disorder, madness are a few of the terms that have led to the institutionalisation, incarceration and dehumanisation of those that are different. While ecopsychologists are unlikely to embrace such inhumane measures, there are some who walk a fine line between suggesting for an earth/psyche bond, and utilizing their discipline as a form of structural power. This form of power monitors deviance in the context of the ecopsychologist's ecological worldview. It grants the ecopsychologist the ability to control what is depicted as the unruly impulses of a dominant culture. Such moral surveillance assures the ecopsychological domination of normalizing values.36 Structural power instils authority to place a high-handed diagnostic label on a person or group of people who have done nothing more than think in ways the ecopsychologist sees as either pathological or normal. Ultimately, the assumption of power that appears in ecopsychology can be pathological, as pathological as any of the symptoms that ecopsychology tries to change or suppress in the dominant system.37
A number of ecopsychologists can also be criticized for coming precariously close to positing a universal essentialism. In professing the psyche/nature relationship, many ecopsychologists embrace the notion that human beings are inherently bonded with nature. This essentialism ignores variations along lines of race, class and gender. While it is true that human-beings regardless of there background can bond with nature, not all people have uniform psyche/earth experiences, with a similar sense of consciousness, under the same circumstances, or within identical patterns of social relations.
The universalising sweep of many ecopsychologies not only ignores social and cultural context, but by emphasizing an psyche/earth interrelatedness as central concern, it also runs the risk of leaving no room for considering people as actors outside their biological categories.38 The universalism that plagues ecopsychology echoes the patriarchal assumption that `biology is destiny' - a trap that robs people of the power of independent agency.39 Moreover, it suggests that an emotional interchange with nature is not merely a human choice or desire, but rather it is a psychological need. Essentially, a number of ecopsychologists come close to embracing genetic determinism through accepting the Biophilia Hypothesis:
In 1984, Edward O. Wilson published an extraordinary book, Biophilia, which sought to provide some understanding of how the human tendency to relate with life and natural process might be the expression of a biological need, one that is integral to the human species' developmental process and essential in physical and mental growth. Most simply put, Wilson defined biophilia as the `innate tendency to focus on life and life-like processes.' The biophilia hypothesis proclaims a human dependence on nature that extends far beyond the simple issues of material and physical sustenance to encompass as well the human craving for aesthetic, intellectual, cognitive, and even spiritual meaning and satisfaction.40
More recently the fallacy of genetic determinism has given rise to a widely discussed theory known as sociobiology, in which all social behaviour is seen as predetermined by genetic structure.41 Critics maintain that this perspective is not only unsound but unconscionable. It can lead to deterministic rationalisations for racism and sexism by interpreting variations in psychological behaviour as genetically preprogrammed and inevitable.
Another challenge for many ecopsychologists lies in the area of social analysis. For the countless amount of people who feel their oppression through imperialism, racism, and poverty, an argument for social change based on a psyche/nature relationship is difficult to swallow. To have the time and opportunity to discuss the need to bond with nature while, for example, the poor are more immediately concerned about survival rings a familiar elitist bell. A number of radical ecologists of the deep green orientation have been criticized for such a lack of social awareness. As is the case with other ecocentric fields of study, ecopsychology as a whole needs to become more socially aware, and attempt to include, for example, studies of the role of ecopsychology in supporting the disenfranchised. For, a majority of ecopsychologists are weakening their analysis by standing in a privileged position as largely upper to middle class academics speaking, writing and attending conferences suggesting that `we' need to bond with nature. This leads to the final point.
In relation to an earlier criticism of universalism, it should be noted that ecopsychologists suffer analytically by using the concepts `we', `us' and `our' in their discourse. A vast number of ecopsychologists are repeatedly using these terms which gives credence to an undifferentiated and homogenized humanity. There is a need to deconstruct such concepts in order to reveal human diversity. Such concepts blur distinctions of gender, race, class and nationality. Moreover, the majority of ecopsychologists not only universalize humanity, they speak of nature and the environment without distinguishing the variations of natures and environments, and thereby monoculture the complexity of the biophysical world. Hopefully, as ecopsychology develops, it will be able to provide interested parties with information that is grounded within specific situated experiences of nature. These experiences would bring to bear each individual's and culture's distinctive interpretation of nature.
The aforementioned criticisms are by no means meant to undervalue the importance of ecopsychology. However, they do point to an overall need begin to seek out multiple, vibrant, culturally relative and continually transforming ecopsychological epistemologies. Each situated vision of ecopsychology would be valued as distinctive, and based on multiple earth/psyche bonds. Essentially, such an approach would attempt to avoid a totalizing ecopsychology. I also propose that these multiple ecopsychologies be based on a rigorous understanding of modern psychology. With all its faults and failures, dominant psychology offers core concepts for the further exploration of ecopsychology. All in all, ecopsychology has the potential to provide people, communities and the environmental movement itself with a profound psychological awareness of the contexts, complexities and interconnections that lie within the human/nature relationship. Ecopsychology, carefully, creatively and critically developed, has the capacity to establish a cognitive sensitivity within environmental discourse and, thereby expand the understanding of socio-environmentalism and its planetary role.
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4 Wysong, J. (1995). "From the Editor", The Gestalt Journal. Vol.XVIII, No.1., p.5.
5 Capra, F. (1988). The Turning Point: Science, Society, and the Rising Culture. Toronto, ON: Bantam Books.
6 Ibid., p.385.
7 Cahalan, W. (1995). "The Earth is our Real Body: Cultivating Ecological Groundedness in Gestalt Therapy", The Gestalt Journal. Vol.XVIII, No.1., p.99-100.
8 Adapted from Sewall, L. (1995). "The Skill of Ecological Perception", in Roszak, T., Gomes, M.E. & Kanner, A.D. (eds), Ecopsychology: Restoring the Earth, Healing the Mind. San Francisco, CA: Sierra Club Books.
9 Aizenstat, S. (1995). "Jungian Psychology and the World Unconscious", in Roszak, T., Gomes, M.E. & Kanner, A.D. (eds), Ecopsychology: Restoring the Earth, Healing the Mind. San Francisco, CA: Sierra Club Books., p.96.
10 Nabhan, G.P. (1995). "A Child's Need for Wildness", The Ecopsychology Newsletter. Vol.1, No.4., p.5.
11 Barrows, A. (1995). "The Ecopsychology of Child Development", in Roszak, T., Gomes, M.E. & Kanner, A.D. (eds), Ecopsychology: Restoring the Earth, Healing the Mind. San Francisco, CA: Sierra Club Books., p.102.
12 Hillman, J. (1995). "A Psyche the Size of the Earth", in Roszak, T., Gomes, M.E. & Kanner, A.D. (eds), Ecopsychology: Restoring the Earth, Healing the Mind. San Francisco, CA: Sierra Club Books., p.xvii.
13 Kidner, D.W. (1994). "Why Psychology Is Mute about the Environmental Crisis", Environmental Ethics. Vol.16, No.4., p.363.
14 Adapted from Conn, S.A. (1991). "The Self-World Connection: Implications for Mental Health and Psychotherapy", Woman of Power. Vol.20, No.1., p.74.
15 Devall, B. & Sessions, G. (1985). Deep Ecology: Living as if Nature Mattered. Layton, UT: Gibbs Smith., p.67.
16 Conn, S.A. "The Self-World Connection: Implications for Mental Health and Psychotherapy", Woman of Power., p.74.
17 Armstrong, J. (1995). "Keepers of the Earth", in Roszak, T., Gomes, M.E. & Kanner, A.D. (eds), Ecopsychology: Restoring the Earth, Healing the Mind. San Francisco, CA: Sierra Club Books.
18 Barrows, A. (1995). "The Ecological Self in Childhood", The Ecopsychology Newsletter. Vol.1, No.4., p.4.
19 Gomes, M.E. (1994). "Preventing Burnout Among Environmental Activists", The Ecopsychology Newsletter. Vol.1, No.1., p.5.
20 Shields, K. (1994). In the Tiger's Mouth: An Empowerment Guide for Social Action. Gabriola Island, BC: New Society Publishers., p.120.
21 Gomes, M.E. "Preventing Burnout Among Environmental Activists", The Ecopsychology Newsletter., p.5.
22 Roszak, T. (1994). "The Greening of Psychology", The Ecopsychology Newsletter. Vol.1, No.1., p.1.
23 Ibid.
24 Carothers, A. (1994). "Community is our Natural Habitat", The Ecopsychology Newsletter. Vol.1, No.1.
25 Ibid.
26 Drengson, A. (1985). "Four Philosophies of Technology", in Hickman, J. (ed), Philosophy, Technology and Human Affairs. Houston, TX: A&M Press.
27 Glendinning, C. (1995). "Technology, Trauma, and the Wild", in Roszak, T., Gomes, M.E. & Kanner, A.D. (eds), Ecopsychology: Restoring the Earth, Healing the Mind. San Francisco, CA: Sierra Club Books.
28 Ibid., p.46.
29 Kanner, A.D. & Gomes, M.E. (1995). "The All-Consuming Self", in Roszak, T., Gomes, M.E. & Kanner, A.D. (eds), Ecopsychology: Restoring the Earth, Healing the Mind. San Francisco, CA: Sierra Club Books.
30 Ibid., 79.
31 Mullen, K.D., Gold, R.S., Belcastro, P.A. & McDermott, R.J. (1990). Connections for Health. Dubuque, IA: Wm.C. Brown Publishers., p.80.
32 Metzner, R. (1995). "The Psychopathology of the Human-Nature Relationship", in Roszak, T., Gomes, M.E. & Kanner, A.D. (eds), Ecopsychology: Restoring the Earth, Healing the Mind. San Francisco, CA: Sierra Club Books.
33 Ibid., p.60.
34 Weiten, W. (1989). Psychology: Themes and Variations. Pacific Grove, CA: Brooks/Cole Publishing Company., p.513.
35 Roszak, T. (1995). "Where Psyche Meets Gaia", in Roszak, T., Gomes, M.E. & Kanner, A.D. (eds), Ecopsychology: Restoring the Earth, Healing the Mind. San Francisco, CA: Sierra Club Books., p.15.
36 Adapted from Glass, J.M. (1995). Psychosis and power: Threats to Democracy in the Self and the Group. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.
37 Adapted from Robitscher, J. (1980). The Powers of Psychiatry. Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin Company.
38 Adapted from Seager, J. (1993). Earth Follies: Coming to Feminist terms with the Global Environmental Crisis. New York, NY: Routledge.
39 Ibid.
40 Kellert, S.R. & Wilson, E.O. (1993). The Biophilia Hypothesis. Washington, DC: Island Press.
41 Capra, F. The Turning Point: Science, Society, and the Rising Culture., p.115.
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