Abstract

This chapter examines the different ways that psychoanalysis can help us to move beyond the current polarized culture wars. Part of this process involves exposing the underlying fears, desires, fantasies, and defense mechanisms shaping the political unconscious. Instead of focusing on the psychopathology of the Right, I examine the differences among five fundamental ideologies: conservative, liberal, centrist, Right, and Left. This more complex analysis of our current political terrain helps us to move beyond polarization and the splitting of the world into a good us and an evil other. It is also vital to understand the core values and ideals shaping modern liberal democracy and science, and this commitment to the reality principle represents a psychoanalytic mode of critical introspection.