A history of the struggle against racism in the social unconscious of group analysis

Abstract

Institutional racism is a social unconscious process. It is the collective operation of shared unconscious assumptions and values that exist in groupings and cultures such as group analytic institutions where individuals may consciously believe they are not racist. In such cultures this conscious belief is protected by unconscious processes of denial, avoidance and negation. Attempts to address the issue within group analysis reveal some of its problematic dynamics.

The dialectics of Chat: Privilege, power and institutional racism

“…Instead, they are ducked and dodged, avoided and evaded, denied, disavowed and dissociated from. (Blackwell, 2021) This I suggest is exactly what we find in the opposition to Chat, most notably in the refusal to address the way the issue of racism is repeatedly raised on Chat while it is substantially denied in the spoken discussion. This sort of refusal to address the dimensions of race and racism, its implicit erasure and negation of black voices in Chat, is absolutely what is meant by 'institutional racism'.…”

“…In my discussion of racism in the social unconscious of the group analytic community (referred to earlier Blackwell, 2021) I described several scenarios in which the issue of racism had been avoided or suppressed or silenced. What characterized all of these instances was their indirectness.…”

“…Instead, they are ducked and dodged, avoided and evaded, denied, disavowed and dissociated from. (Blackwell, 2021)…”

“…Yet they remain largely ignored and disregarded. Given what appears to be considerable resistance to engaging with these issues-something I have discussed in some detail as 'the struggle against racism in the social unconscious of group analysis' (Blackwell, 2021)-it is probably unsurprising that their discussion in large groups is so routinely suppressed. It is also perhaps equally unsurprising that a number of black 2 and working-class voices, but particularly black voices have, in online large groups, taken to Chat to comment on the monocultural, white, Western, middle-class, professional discourse that characterizes the main spoken discussion.…”

How (non)discriminatory are the Institute of Group Analysis and group analysis? An institutional ethnography study

“…Of course, this impacts on the IGA Code. Nevertheless, it is sobering to read its ‘non-discrimination’ in conjunction with Blackwell’s (2021) account. He describes his experience when attempting to address the realities of racism and discrimination decades ago.…”