capitalism and mental health

Humans developed the ability to express a creative intelligence, transforming this into a core human characteristic that requires fulfillment.28 Third, humans, psychologically, require rootedness and a sense of belonging. It is a loss of his self.”. Public spaces are scarce and increasingly privatized, locking out those without the means to pay for the luxury of human interaction (how many places can you think of where you can sit down for an hour and chat with a friend, without buying something or paying a fee?). The current state of capitalism is in turmoil, according to independent op-eds, political pundits, and even the United Nations; a group of scientists has recently warned the UN that capitalism will fail because it focuses on short-term profits, not long-term benefits. Having been endowed with reason and imagination, humans cannot exist as passive beings, but must act as creators.39 Nevertheless, it is clear that work under capitalism does not achieve this. However, the social, political, and economic organization of society must be recognized as a significant contributor to people’s mental health, with certain social structures being more advantageous to the emergence of mental well-being than others. Pharmaceutical companies who have identified it as a market opportunity have been the primary beneficiaries of this approach, exemplified by the proliferation of anti-depressants as illustrated by Brett J. Deacon and Grayson L. Baird, “The Chemical Imbalance Explanation of Depression: Reducing Blame at what Cost?,” Journal of Social and Clinical Psychology 28, no. ↩ David Marjoribanks and Anna Darnell Bradley, You’re Not Alone: The Quality of the UK’s Social Relationships (Doncaster: Relate, 2017), 17–18. Emblematic of this is the theory of chemical imbalances in the brain—focusing on the operation of neurotransmitters such as serotonin and dopamine—which has gripped popular and academic consciousness despite remaining largely unsupported.5 Moreover, reflecting the popularity of genetic reductionism within the biological sciences, there has been an effort to identify genetic abnormalities as another cause of mental-health disorders.6 Nonetheless, explanations based on genomics have also failed to generate conclusive evidence.7 While potentially offering illuminating insights into poor mental well-being in specific cases, biological interpretations are far from sufficient on their own. See Nicholas Baran and John Bellamy Foster, The Age of Monopoly Capital: Selected Correspondence of Paul A. Baran and Paul M. Sweezy, 1949–1964 (New York: Monthly Review Press, 2017), 127, 131. ↩ Baran and Sweezy, Monopoly Capital, 346. ↩ Baran and Sweezy, Monopoly Capital, 364. ↩ Baran and Sweezy, Monopoly Capital, 354–55. And it was from this that Baran, in particular, was to draw.16. Yet, despite this, the medical model continues to dominate, reinforcing an individualistic conception of mental health and obscuring the detrimental effects of the present mode of production. ↩ Sally McManus, Paul Bebbington, Rachel Jenkins, and Traolach Brugha, Mental Health and Wellbeing in England: Adult Psychiatric Morbidity Survey 2014 (Leeds: NHS Digital, 2016). Mental Health Crisis: The Role Of Capitalism. 1 (1867; repr. In the second half of this week’s show, Professor Wolff Dr. Harriet Fraad on how capitalism is affecting mental health in the U.S. She should not let her mind drift off into thoughts about life that might make her conclude that she…is unlikely to find fulfillment. It follows that capitalism is crucial to … The medical model also encourages the suspension and curtailment of individuals’ civil rights if they experience mental distress, including by legitimizing the infringement of their voluntary action and excluding them from decision-making. As such, the degradation of mental well-being is normalized. BY: Flavio Casoy, MD | December 12, 2016. Not so under capitalism, when one toils in the factory or office for a wage. 7 (2015): 231–35. Trump says the faster we hustle back into the workplace, the more our national mood will improve. The term ‘anxiety’ is used particularly when the threat is not immediate or is unclear, but it is fear by another name… Whether the particular mental illness does not involve major disorganization of thought or perception (traditionally called neurosis) or is severe with disorganization of thought or perception (psychosis) or brain functioning (Delirium and Dementia), fear is often a central component of suffering and distress. At the heart of many mental health problems is a perceived lack of control over one’s circumstances, or fear of external forces. Rather than a source of enjoyment, the nature and organization of work under capitalism clearly does not act as a satisfactory means to fulfill an individual’s creativity. ↩ As exemplified by Jordan W. Smoller et al., “Identification of Risk Loci with Shared Effects on Five Major Psychiatric Disorders: A Genome-Wide Analysis,” Lancet 381, no. Rarely is satisfaction truly achieved through consumption, because what is being consumed is an artificial idea rather than a product that imbues our existence with meaning. It is untenable to assume “man’s mental constitution is a blank piece of paper, on which society and culture write their text, and which has no intrinsic quality of its own.… The real problem is to infer the core common to the whole human race from the innumerable manifestations of human nature.”22 Fromm recognized the importance of basic biological needs, such as hunger, sleep, and sexual desires, as constituting aspects of human nature that must be satisfied before all else.23 Nonetheless, as humans evolved, they eventually reached a point of transcendence, from the animal to the uniquely human.24 As humans found it increasingly easier to satisfy their basic biological needs, largely as a result of their mastery over nature, the urgency of their satisfaction gradually became less important, with the evolutionary process allowing for the development of more complex intellectual and emotional capacities.25 As such, an individual’s most significant drives were no longer rooted in biology, but in the human condition.26, Considering it imperative to construct an understanding of human nature against which mental health could be evaluated, Fromm identified five central characteristics of the human condition. At the end of the 19th century, of course, Max Weber wrote his remarkable book The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism, in which he located the origins of capitalism in the mind of the Protestant, suggesting in many ways that it was a form of mental … Social media keeps us ever more connected online, while walling us off in the real world. In the Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts of 1844, Marx strenuously argued that labor should be a fulfilling experience, allowing individuals to be freely expressive, both physically and intellectually. ↩ Jacqueline Olds and Richard Schwartz, The Lonely American: Drifting Apart in the Twenty-First Century (Boston: Beacon Press, 2009). Moreover, representing ethnic minorities, Kindred Minds vigorously campaigns on an understanding that mental distress is less a result of biological characteristics and more a consequence of social problems such as racism, sexism, and economic inequality “pathologised as mental illness.”63 For Kindred Minds, the catalyst for deteriorating mental health is oppression and discrimination, with ethnic minorities having to suffer greater levels of social and economic inequality and prejudice. Capital makes the worker ill, and then multinational pharmaceutical companies sell them drugs to make them better. Work feels draining rather than satisfying, because we understand that those hours do not belong to us; our lives begin when work ends. In response, an analysis of British families was conducted in 2011 comparing them to those in Spain and Sweden, countries that ranked in the top five for child well-being.61. This was followed by, among others in both Britain and the United States, August B. Hollingshead and Frederick C. Redlich, Social Class and Mental Illness (New York: John Wiley, 1958); Leo Srole, Thomas S. Langer, Stanley T. Michael, Marvin K. Opler, and Thomas A. C. Rennie, Mental Health in the Metropolis: The Midtown Manhattan Study (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1962); and John J. Schwab, Roger A. Worker cooperatives, meanwhile, are still subject to the competitive dictates of the market. Rather than being an opportunity to fulfill passions, Baran and Sweezy argued that leisure has become largely synonymous with idleness. For forty years, wages have been stagnant or falling for most households, while those who are fortunate enough to have a steady job typically work longer hours than the average medieval peasant. ↩ Baran and Sweezy, Monopoly Capital, 345. ↩ Baran and Sweezy, Monopoly Capital, 347–48. In this process, consumerism as a form of alienation becomes evident. Capitalism creates conditions for mental illness and suicide to manifest. More specifically, competition is, economically, one of the bases on which the market operates and, ideologically, corresponds to the widespread belief that, to be successful, one must compete with others for scarce resources. Moreover, more severe mental-health conditions, such as stress, depression, and anxiety, are increasingly emerging as the consequences of discontentment at work. Connecting the Dots: Iran, China, and the Challenge to U.S. Hegemony, The Nakba Generation and the Makings of Palestinian Revolution, Hampton Institute, PO Box 4058, Clifton Park, NY 12065, United States, Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. But far from being confined to economic policy, contemporary capitalism (often called “neoliberalism”) also embodies a philosophical belief that self-interest and competition, not cooperation, should pervade every aspect of our lives. The mental health crisis is a symptom of the profoundly diseased system of capitalism that is only getting sicker. In the era of competitive capitalism, Marx could not foresee how the sales effort would evolve both quantitatively and qualitatively to become as important for economic growth as it has.57 Advertising, product differentiation, planned obsolescence, and consumer credit are all essential means of stimulating consumer demand. Mental illnesses, including addiction, exemplify this problem. A mental-health crisis is sweeping the globe. Radford, Virginia: Wilder Publications, 2011). Individuals may resort to alcohol and drug abuse to numb their misery, while persistent experience increases blood pressure and stress, as well as negatively impacts cardiovascular and immune-system functioning.46 A mental-health condition in its own right, loneliness exacerbates additional mental-health problems and is often the root cause of depression.47 In 2017, it was estimated that 13 percent of individuals in Britain had no close friends, with a further 17 percent having average- to poor-quality friendships. Despite this, the research showed that, in Britain, many were not having such needs satisfied. Food insufficiency and physical and mental health in a longitudinal survey of welfare recipients. Recognizing social inequality as a contributor to the emergence of poor mental health, National Survivor User Network proposes that the challenge posed by mental-health service users should be part of a wider indictment of the general inequality in society, arguing that “austerity measures, damaging economic policies, social discrimination and structural inequalities are causing harm to people. Learn more, Follow the writers, publications, and topics that matter to you, and you’ll see them on your homepage and in your inbox. Each purchase, however, regularly fails to live up to its promise. ↩ Baran and Sweezy, Monopoly Capital, 115. ↩ Robert Bocock, Consumption (London: Routledge, 2001), 51. ↩ United Nations Children’s Fund, Innocenti Report Card 7: Child Poverty in Perspective: An Overview of Child Well-Being in Rich Countries (Florence: UNICEF Innocenti Research Centre, 2007), http://unicef-irc.org. ↩ Fromm, Beyond the Chains of Illusion, 63. ↩ Investors in People, Job Exodus Trends: 2018 Employee Sentiment Poll (London: Investors in People, 2018), http://investorsinpeople.com. Why do we feel such lack of control over our own destinies? Psychiatry, no matter how well-intentioned, is largely structured as a capitalist enterprise, and does not address the causes of the problem. According to Irish psychiatrist Peadar O’Grady. What will you learn from writing letters to yourself? Reflecting on the present day, is this not precisely what has transpired? Reality is not pathogenic. Such a mental health professional needs patients or clients in a way that firemen do not need fires. Under capitalism, however, the full satisfaction of the human psyche is thwarted. Which structures in society give rise to these conditions? The first most notable study of this kind is Robert E. L. Farris and Henry W. Dunham, Mental Disorders in Urban Areas (Chicago: Chicago University Press, 1939), which identified higher rates of mental disorders in the poorest districts of Chicago. As a neurosis, loneliness has debilitating consequences. David Matthews is a lecturer in sociology and social policy at Coleg Llandrillo, Wales, and the leader of its degree program in health and social care. For Fromm, there existed an inherent relationship between positive mental health, meaningful personal relationships in the form of both love and friendship, and expressions of solidarity. While consumerism as a value exists in all capitalist societies, in those of greater inequality—with Britain displaying wider wealth disparities than most—the desire to consume and acquire greatly contributes to the emergence of neuroses, as the effort to maintain social status and emulate those at the top of society becomes an immense strain. This was a value shared by the children themselves, with many accepting that social prestige was based on ownership of branded consumer goods, which, evidence suggests, contributed to arising worry and anxiety, especially for children from poorer households who recognized their disadvantage. The National Alliance on Mental Illness(NAMI) quantifies some of our challenges… Furthermore, Olds and Schwartz fail to accept the trend as a reflection of the structural organization of the labor market, which makes more work a necessity instead of a choice. Ultimately, however, we will need to think bigger. He had been associated with the Institute for Social Research in Frankfurt in the early 1930s and was directly influenced by the work of Eric Fromm and Herbert Marcuse.15 It is within this broad framework that a theory of mental health can be identified in Baran and Sweezy’s analysis, with the contradictions between capitalism and human need expressing themselves chiefly through the repression of human energies. Fromm emphasized that all humans have certain needs that must be fulfilled in order to ensure optimal mental health. Alienation’s specific value for understanding mental health lies in illustrating the distinction that emerges under capitalism between human existence and essence. Of the three nations, the culture of consumerism was greatest in Britain, as it was prevalent among all families regardless of affluence. This elides any serious criticisms of capitalism and the reality that the cult of busyness has largely been an outcome of the economic system’s inherent need for self-expansion. Thus, loneliness is embedded within the structure of any capitalist society as an inevitable outcome of its value system. In this study, five of the most common mental-health disorders, including schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, and depression, were associated with genetic variations. Attempting to avoid work at all costs, leisure frequently fails to offer any consolation, as it is also rendered meaningless. Capitalism can never offer the conditions most conducive to achieving mental health. The present situation calls for a new, radical politics that de-commodifies as much as possible, including and especially human labor. Individualism has always reigned supreme as a principle upon which the ideal capitalist society is constructed. Health care is a multi-billion dollar business. Write on Medium, work longer hours than the average medieval peasant, unemployed people are much more likely to become depressed. The paradox we keep on reproducing. From the episode: Andrew Keen: I’m particularly interested in this relationship between capitalism and mental health. Although the exact figures are likely to remain unknown due to the intangibility of such experiences, it can be inferred that, for many members of the labor force, it is commonplace for work to provoke general unhappiness, dissatisfaction, and despondency. Most of us intuitively understand this game and its stakes, which is why we set out very methodically to climb the corporate ladder and keep our resumes in top shape. Capitalism can never offer the conditions most conducive to achieving mental health. It is only for a fortunate minority that work can be considered pleasurable, while for the majority it is a thoroughly unsatisfactory experience. 70% of separation and divorce petitions are now being initiated and presented by woman. Today, the severity of the mental health crisis is now widely recognized. Fortunately on the socialist left, we have arguably the most powerful ideological tools available. Nevertheless, some elements of the mental-health argument were interspersed in other parts of the book. For Fromm, the origins of poor mental health are located in the mode of production and the corresponding political and social structures, whose organization impedes the full satisfaction of innate human desires.33 The effects of this on mental health, Fromm argued, are that “if one of the basic necessities has found no fulfillment, insanity is the result; if it is satisfied but in an unsatisfactory way…neurosis…is the consequence.”34, Like Marx, Fromm asserted that the instinctual desire to be creative had the greatest chance of satisfaction through work. This principle permeated Fromm’s psychoanalytic framework, which maintained that, under capitalism, humans become divorced from their own nature. In the final chapters of Monopoly Capital, Paul Baran and Paul Sweezy made explicit the consequences of monopoly capitalism for psychological well-being, arguing that the system fails “to provide the foundations of a society capable of promoting the healthy and happy development of its members.”10 Exemplifying the widespread irrationality of monopoly capitalism, they illustrated its degrading nature. This is worth watching all the way through if you can. Having become an axiomatic notion, rarely is the idea of expanded production challenged. But as we have seen, mental distress arises in large part because of the discrepancy between human needs — connection, security, meaning — and the alienating social conditions offered by society. Once we have reduced this complex social phenomenon to the apolitical realm of individual medicine, it follows that the solution to the broader mental health epidemic is presented as merely public “awareness” and “destigmatization” — essentially efforts to funnel people into the therapy pipeline. ↩ Paul Baran and Paul Sweezy, Monopoly Capital (New York: Monthly Review Press, 1966), 285. ↩ Baran and Sweezy, Monopoly Capital, 346–47. As understood today, the notion of the individual has its origins in the feudal mode of production, and its emphasis on greater collectivist methods of labor—such as within the family or village—being surrendered to the compulsion of individuals, who have to be free to sell their labor power on the market. Everyone from insurance companies, to hospitals, to pharmaceutical and medical device companies are pulling in large profits, many times at the expense (versus in the benefit of) the patients whom they’re supposed to be helping. But with the symptoms so widespread in our population, we ought to ask: what if correcting ourselves is not enough? The desire to do nothing is reflected in popular culture, with books, television, and films inducing a state of passive enjoyment rather than demanding intellectual energies.11 The purpose of both work and leisure, they claimed, largely coalesces around increasing consumption. With birth severing ties of natural belonging, individuals constantly pursue rootedness to feel at one with the world. No longer consumed for their use, consumer goods have become established markers of social prestige, with consumption as a means to express an individual’s social position. All of these directions should be explored, nurtured, and funded. See Robert Heilbroner, Between Capitalism and Socialism (New York: Vintage, 1970), 237–46; Paul M. Sweezy, “Monopoly Capital” (letter), New York Review of Books, July 7, 1966, 26. ↩ The influence of Fromm is evident in Baran’s work and correspondence. This week on Economic Update Professor Wolff delivers updates on the ICE raid in Mississippi, global comparisons of gun violence and conservatives’ reactions to Democrats’ proposed wealth tax ideas. When “The Quality of Monopoly Capitalism II” was finally published in Monthly Review in 2013, almost sixty years after it was drafted by Baran, the section on mental health was excluded due to its incomplete character. Labor under capitalism, however, is an alienating experience that estranges individuals from its process. Additionally, the number of individuals whose experiences were severe enough to warrant intervention rose from 6.9 percent to 9.3 percent.4, In capitalist society, biological explanations dominate understandings of mental health, infusing professional practice and public awareness. While Marx never produced a formal psychology, Fromm considered that the foundations of one resided in the concept of alienation.18 For Marx, alienation was an illustration of capitalism’s mortifying physical and mental impact on humans.19 At its heart, it demonstrates the estrangement people feel from both themselves and the world around them, including fellow humans. What can be done about all this? Other members of society are not considered as sources of support, but rather obstacles to personal advancement. Coronavirus, capitalism and a crisis of mental distress. 4 (2009): 415–35. For one, they made references to the centrality of latent energies such as libidinous drives and the need for their gratification. In 2017 in Britain, the mental-health action group National Survivor User Network unequivocally rejected the medical model and planted social justice at the heart of its campaign. In capitalist society, biological explanations dominate understandings of mental health, infusing professional practice and public awareness. “While fulfilling the basic needs of survival,” Baran and Sweezy argued, both work and consumption “increasingly lose their inner content and meaning.”12 The result is a society characterized by emptiness and degradation. The psychological toll of this market-extremist thinking is ubiquitous and measurable. We need to challenge this as part of a broader social justice agenda.”62 Furthermore, the action group Recovery in the Bin positions itself and the wider mental-health movement within the class struggle, pushing for a social model that recognizes capitalism as a significant determinant of poor mental health. Amplifying the proletarianization of the labor force, with ever-more workers existing in a state of insecurity and experiencing increased exploitation, the centrality of work has become greater as the threat of not having a job, or being unable to secure an adequate standard of living, has become a reality for many in a “flexible” labor market.52 Individuals have no choice but to devote more time to work at the expense of establishing meaningful relationships. Covid poses the "greatest threat to mental health since the second world war", according to the president of the Royal College of Psychiatrists. In such a world, it is extremely dangerous to fall below average — to be deemed inadequate, too lazy or incapable of pulling one’s weight, dependent on government handouts, and ultimately a burden on society. How can we go beyond mainstream psychiatry, and build a movement to advance mental health at the societal level?

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