Editing Critical psychology (section)

==Origins==
Psychology, draws a history filled with theoretical and political conflict. Within its history various stream of critiques have emerged, some of them sharing similarities, as well as different starting points and substantial differences. Criticisms of mainstream psychology consistent with current critical psychology usage have existed since psychology's modern development in the late 19th century. Use of the term ''critical psychology'' started in the 1970s at the [[Freie Universität Berlin]]. The German branch of critical psychology predates and has developed largely separately from the rest of the field. As of May 2007, only a few works have been translated into English.<ref>Klaus Holzkamp (1992): ''On Doing Psychology Critically''. Theory and Psychology 2, S.193–204; for further references see also Charles Tolman (1994): ''Psychology, Society and Subjectivity: An Introduction to German Critical Psychology'', London: Routledge & Thomas Teo (1998): ''Klaus Holzkamp and the Rise and Fall of German Critical Psychology''. History of Psychology 1998, Vol. 1, Nr. 3; Wolfgang Maiers (1999): ''Critical Psychology – An Unfinished Modern Project''. In: Wolfgang Maiers et al. (Eds.): ''Challenges to Theoretical Psychology'', 457–66</ref> The German Critical Psychology movement is rooted in the post-war student revolt of the late 1960s; see [[German student movement]]. [[Marx]]'s ''[[Critique of Political Economy]]'' played an important role in the German branch of the student revolt, which was centered in [[West Berlin]]. At that time, the capitalist city of West Berlin was surrounded by communist-ruled [[East Germany]], and represented a "hot spot" of political and ideological controversy for the revolutionary German students. The sociological foundations of critical psychology are decidedly Marxist.<ref>{{Citation |last=Teo |first=Thomas |title=Holzkamp, Klaus. |date=2000 |url=http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/10519-064 |encyclopedia=Encyclopedia of psychology, Vol. 4. |pages=141–142 |access-date=2023-06-05 |place=New York |publisher=Oxford University Press |doi=10.1037/10519-064 |isbn=1-55798-653-3}}</ref>

===Klaus Holzkamp===
[[File:Klaus Holzkamp.jpg|thumb|262x262px|Klaus Holzkamp]]
One of the most important and sophisticated books in the German development of the field is the {{Lang|de|Grundlegung der Psychologie}}<ref>Klaus Holzkamp (1983): ''Grundlegung der Psychologie''. Frankfurt/M.: Campus</ref> (''Foundations of Psychology'') by [[Klaus Holzkamp]], who might be considered the theoretical founder of German critical psychology. Holzkamp wrote two books on theory of science<ref>Klaus Holzkamp (1964), ''Theorie und Experiment in der Psychologie''. Berlin: de Gruyter (''Theory and Experiment in Psychology''); Klaus Holzkamp (1968): ''Wissenschaft als Handlung. Versuch einer neuen Grundlegung der Wissenschaftslehre''. Berlin: de Gruyter (''Science as Action – A new Approach to the Theory of Science'')</ref> and one on sensory perception<ref name="ekoart">Klaus Holzkamp (1973): ''Sinnliche Erkenntnis. Historischer Ursprung und gesellschaftliche Funktion der Wahrnehmung''. Frankfurt/M.: Athenäum (''Sensory Perception: Historical Origins and Social Functions of Perception'')</ref> before publishing the {{Lang|de|Grundlegung der Psychologie}} in 1983. Holzkamp believed his work provided a solid [[paradigm]] for psychological research because he viewed psychology as a pre-paradigmatic scientific discipline ([[T.S. Kuhn]] had used the term "pre-paradigmatic" for [[social science]]).

Holzkamp mostly based his sophisticated attempt to provide a comprehensive and integrated set of categories defining the field of psychological research on [[Aleksey Leontyev]]'s approach to [[cultural–historical psychology]] and [[activity theory]]. Leontyev had seen human action as a result of biological as well as cultural evolution and, drawing on Marx's materialist conception of culture, stressed that individual cognition is always part of social action which in turn is mediated by man-made tools (cultural artifacts), language and other man-made systems of symbols, which he viewed as a major distinguishing feature of human culture and, thus, human cognition. Another important source was [[Lucien Sève|Lucien Séve's]] theory of personality,<ref>{{cite web| url = http://www.marxists.org/archive/seve/index.htm| title = Lucien Seve<!-- Bot generated title -->}}</ref> which provided the concept of "social activity matrices" as mediating structure between individual and social reproduction. At the same time, the {{Lang|de|Grundlegung}} systematically integrated previous specialized work done at Free University of Berlin in the 1970s by critical psychologists who also had been influenced by Marx, Leontyev, and Seve. This included books on [[ethology|animal behavior]]/[[ethology]],<ref>Volker Schurig (1975): ''Naturgeschichte des Psychischen 1: Psychogenese und elementare Formen der Tierkommunikation''. (''Natural History of the Psyche 1: Psychogenesis and Elementary Forms of Animal Communication''. Frankfurt/M.: Campus; Volker Schurig (1975): ''Naturgeschichte des Psychischen 2: Lernen und Abstraktionsleistungen bei Tieren'' (''Natural History of the Psyche 2: Learning and Abstraction Capabilities in Animals''. Frankfurt/M. Campus; Volker Schurig (1976): ''Die Entstehung des Bewußtseins'' (''The Emergence of Consciousness''). Frankfurt/M.: Campus;. Frankfurt/M.: Campus;</ref> [[sensory perception]],<ref name="ekoart"/> [[motivation]]<ref>Ute Osterkamp (1975/1976): ''Grundlagen der Psychologischen Motivationsforschung'' (''Foundations of Psychological Research of Motivation'', Frankfurt/M: Campus (2 Volumes)</ref> and [[cognition]].<ref>Rainer Seidel (1976): ''Denken. Psychologische Analyse der Entstehung und Lösung von Problemen''. (''Cognition. Psychological Analysis of Formulating and Solving Problems''. Frankfurt/M.: Campus</ref> He also incorporated ideas from Freud's [[psychoanalysis]] and [[Merleau-Ponty]]'s [[phenomenology (philosophy)|phenomenology]] into his approach.

One core result of Holzkamp's historical and comparative analysis of human reproductive action, perception and cognition is a very specific concept of meaning that identifies symbolic meaning as historically and culturally constructed, purposeful conceptual structures that humans create in close relationship to material culture and within the context of historically specific formations of social reproduction.

Coming from this phenomenological perspective on culturally mediated and socially situated action, Holzkamp launched a methodological attack on behaviorism (which he termed S–R (stimulus–response) psychology) based on linguistic analysis, showing in minute detail the rhetorical patterns by which this approach to psychology creates the illusion of "scientific objectivity" while at the same time losing relevance for understanding culturally situated, intentional human actions.<ref>Klaus Holzkamp (1987): ''Die Verkennung von Handlungsbegründungen als empirische Zusammenhangsannahmen in sozialpsychologischen Theorien: Methodologische Fehlorientierung infolge von Begriffsverwirrung'' (''Mistaking Reasons for Causes in Theories of Social Psychology: Methodological Errors as a Result of Conceptual Confusion''), Forum Kritische Psychologie 19, Berlin: Argument Verlag, pp. 23–59.</ref><ref>Klaus Holzkamp (1993): ''Lernen: Subjektwissenschaftliche Grundlegung''. Frankfurt/M.: Campus, Chapter 1: "Hinführung auf das Verfahren der Problementwicklung" (''Introduction to the Sequence of Presentation''), pp. 17–39</ref> Against this approach, he developed his own approach to generalization and objectivity, drawing on ideas from [[Kurt Lewin]] in Chapter 9 of ''{{Lang|de|Grundlegung der Psychologie}}''.

His last major publication before his death in 1995 was about learning.<ref>Klaus Holzkamp (1993): ''Lernen: Subjektwissenschaftliche Grundlegung'' (''"Learning: Subject-Scientific Foundations"''). Frankfurt/M.: Campus</ref> It appeared in 1993 and contained a phenomenological theory of learning from the standpoint of the subject. One important concept Holzkamp developed was "reinterpretation" of theories developed by conventional psychology. This meant to look at these concepts from the standpoint of the paradigm of critical psychology, thereby integrating their useful insights into critical psychology while at the same time identifying and criticizing their limiting implications, which in the case of S–R psychology were the rhetorical elimination of the subject and intentional action, and in the case of cognitive psychology which did take into account subjective motives and intentional actions, [[methodological individualism]].

The first part of the book thus contains an extensive look at the history of psychological theories of learning and a minute re-interpretation of those concepts from the perspective of critical psychology, which focuses on intentional action situated in specific socio-historical/cultural contexts. The conceptions of learning he found most useful in his own detailed analysis of "classroom learning" came from cognitive anthropologists [[Jean Lave]] ([[situated learning]]) and [[Edwin Hutchins]] ([[distributed cognition]]).

The book's second part contained an extensive analysis on the modern state's institutionalized forms of "classroom learning" as the cultural–historical context that shapes much of modern learning and [[socialization]]. In this analysis, he heavily drew upon [[Michel Foucault]]'s ''[[Discipline and Punish]]''. Holzkamp felt that classroom learning as the historically specific form of learning does not make full use of student's potentials, but rather limits her or his learning potentials by a number of "teaching strategies." Part of his motivation for the book was to look for alternative forms of learning that made use of the enormous potential of the human psyche in more fruitful ways. Consequently, in the last section of the book, Holzkamp discusses forms of "expansive learning" that seem to avoid the limitations of classroom learning, such as apprenticeship and learning in contexts other than classrooms.

This search culminated in plans to write a major work on ''life leadership'' in the specific historical context of modern (capitalist) society. Due to his death in 1995, this work never got past the stage of early (and premature) conceptualizations, some of which were published in the journals ''Forum Kritische Psychologie'' and ''Argument''.<ref>Klaus Holzkamp (1995): ''Alltägliche Lebensführung als subjektwissenschaftliches Grundkonzept'' ''(Everyday Life Leadership as Basic Concept of a Scientific Theory of the Subject)''. Das Argument, 37. Jahrgang, Heft 6, November/December 1995</ref>

===1960s–1970s===
In the 1960s and 1970s the term ''radical psychology'' was used by psychologists internationally to denote a branch of the field which rejected mainstream psychology's focus on the individual as the basic unit of analysis and sole source of psychopathology. Instead, radical psychologists examined the role of society in causing and treating problems and looked towards social change as an alternative to therapy to treat mental illness and as a means of preventing psychopathology. Within psychiatry the term ''[[anti-psychiatry]]'' was often used and now British activists prefer the term ''[[critical psychiatry]]''. ''Critical psychology'' is currently the preferred term for the discipline of psychology keen to find alternatives to the way the discipline of psychology reduces human experience to the level of the individual and thereby strips away possibilities for radical social change.

===1990s===
Starting in the 1990s a new wave of books started to appear on critical psychology, the most influential being the edited book ''Critical Psychology'' by Dennis Fox and Isaac Prilleltensky. Various introductory texts to critical psychology written in the United Kingdom have tended to focus on discourse, but this has been seen by some proponents of critical psychology as a reduction of human experience to language which is as politically dangerous as the way mainstream psychology reduces experience to the individual mind.  Attention to language and ideological processes, others would argue, is essential to effective critical psychology – it is not simply a matter of applying mainstream psychological concepts to issues of social change.

===Ian Parker===
In 1999 [[Ian Parker (psychologist)|Ian Parker]] published an influential manifesto in both the online journal ''Radical Psychology'' and the ''Annual Review of Critical Psychology''. This manifesto argues that critical psychology should include the following four components:
# Systematic examination of how some varieties of psychological action and experience are privileged over others, how dominant accounts of "psychology" operate ideologically and in the service of power;
# Study of the ways in which all varieties of psychology are culturally historically constructed, and how alternative varieties of psychology may confirm or resist ideological assumptions in mainstream models;
# Study of forms of surveillance and self-regulation in everyday life and the ways in which psychological culture operates beyond the boundaries of academic and professional practice; and
# Exploration of the way everyday "ordinary psychology" structures academic and professional work in psychology and how everyday activities might provide the basis for resistance to contemporary disciplinary practices.

===Critical psychology today===
There are a few international journals devoted to critical psychology and critical discussions in Psychology, including ''Psychology in Society'',  ''Theory & Psychology'',  ''Culture & Psychology'',  ''Feminism & Psychology'',  ''Human Development'', ''Annual Review of Critical Psychology and''  the no longer published ''International Journal of Critical Psychology''  (continued in the journal ''Subjectivity'') and ''Radical Psychology Journal'' (published for ten years until its final issue in 2011).<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Dafermos |first=Manolis |last2=Marvakis |first2=Athanasios |date=2006 |title=Critiques in Psychology – Critical Psychology |url=http://www.discourseunit.com/arcp/5 |journal=Annual Review of Critical Psychology |volume=5 |pages=9 |via=www.discourseunit.com/arcp/5}}</ref> The journals still tend to be directed to an academic audience, though the ''Annual Review of Critical Psychology'' and ''Psychology in Society'' runs as an open-access online journal. There are close links between critical psychologists and critical psychiatrists in Britain through the Asylum Collective. [[David Smail (psychologist)|David Smail]] was one of the founders of The Midlands Psychology Group, a critical psychology collective who produced a manifesto for a social materialist psychology of distress.<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.midpsy.org/draft_manifesto.htm|title=Draft Manifesto for a Social Materialist Psychology of Distress|last=Midlands Psychology Group|website=midpsy.org|access-date=2 May 2018}}</ref> Critical psychology courses and research concentrations are available at [[Manchester Metropolitan University]], [[York St John University]], the [[University of East London]], the [[University of Edinburgh]], the [[University of KwaZulu Natal]], the [[Graduate Center, CUNY|City University of New York Graduate Center]], the [[University of West Georgia]], [[Point Park University]], [[University of Guelph]], [[York University]], and [[Prescott College]]. Undergraduate concentrations can also be found at the [[California Institute of Integral Studies]], Prescott College, and at the [[University of Notre Dame Australia]] (Fremantle).