The Meaning of Trump
Introduction
This blog is not an attempt to give meaning to Donald Trump the individual, for Trump himself is not a very compelling or interesting person. I regard him as a savvy opportunist and populist, prepared to go to any lengths to dominate media interest, and delve to any depths to exploit political vulnerabilities without concern for individuals or groups beyond his own success.
What does interest me is to look at Trump as a social object to which so many people identified with, to enable him to win the Presidency.
I am not denigrating his personality or ability, as a scholar of leadership I can see how it takes someone who is smart and with some charisma (however much we may dislike them) to pull this off. However, Trump’s form of Messiah Leadership covers a lack with fantasy solutions, but doesn’t offer anything to fill the lack in a sustainable way (see Western 2013 for full critique).
Leaders like Trump arrive when certain conditions are in play. It is only then that they can harness and utilise the energy, anger, frustration and zeitgeist change to take advantage of these conditions. The aim is to ask what conditions, what specific psycho-social and political dynamics produced this Trump ‘object’ , that is replicated in diverse ways throughout Europe.
Another way of asking what is the Meaning of Trump, is to ask what is Trump a symptom of? And what does this symptom signify and reflect back to wider society. Trump in this sense is like a mirror reflecting back to civilization ‘its discontents’, to play with Freud’s words. I am currently working on a paper to explore these themes, and invite any thoughts and reflections from this blog. Taking Trump as a social object and a symptom,
I am exploring 3 possible Meanings of Trump:
1.Trump is a product of a New Authoritarian Settlement in society, both within and beyond the USA. Trump makes a wider hidden authoritarianism, open and explicit, to address this he doesn’t counter it, but offers surplus authority in it’s place. The hidden soft-forms of authoritarianism can be found in the liberal-progressive identity politics, and political correct cultures that limit freedom of speech and by implication free-thinking. They create a soft-authoritarian culture control in college campuses and many civic spaces. Their rhetoric is progress and the politics of democracy and egalitarianism, yet they take too much ‘pleasure in their displeasure’ – they enjoy complaining about the bad authoritarian other, whilst enacting a powerful passive-aggressive form of control that alienates and makes voiceless, huge numbers of people (who voted Trump).
The new authoritarian settlement is also found in global corporations and through the impact of neo-liberal politics that leaves so many powerless and disenfranchised (hence the very low poll turn-out). When work is scarce and precarious, employee’s become conformist and compliant-Global corporations such as Apple, Google and Facebook are so powerful they avoid tax at will and lobby the good and the great (Zuckerburg with the Pope kind of sums it up!). These unelected and unaccountable huge corporate machines that control wealth beyond imagination impose authoritarianism below the radar- we passively comply to their feeding us distorted news, to surveying us, and to shaping the world around us.
2.Libidinal politics have displaced rational-emotional politics
This claim is that in today’s digital age, the network society disrupts normal politics and produces a new condition’s that create libidinal excess. For example by reinforcing individuals views in the echo-chambers of Facebook, whereby algorithms send us more of the news and views we want to hear. Trump utilized the libidinal energy of his supporters to great effect. Post-truth politics is one thing, but watching Trump push the libidinal buttons and seeing the world dance to his tune should be a lesson to all future politicians. The game has changed!
3.The triumph of melancholia, and the failure to mourn the loss of empire
The American dream has passed and no amount of shouting ‘we will make America great again will bring it back’. This is not to say that America can’t re-invent itself to rise again, but to do so it has to mourn the loss of the empire it created, dominated and influenced since the 2nd world war. Melancholia is a state whereby the loss is not accepted or integrated into the self. The ego is therefore still attached to the lost object. In this case Trumps identification with making America Great again by building walls, and re-creating the industrial world is a kind of paranoid-nostalgia. Paranoid by blaming the bad other (Muslims, Mexicans, Liberal elites) for stealing our world and our pleasure. The nostalgia points to a 1950’s utopia of near full employment, where white-people lived in secure suburbia and America was the envy of the world. This nostalgia is based on a very partial fantasy of the past, and a very dangerous fantasy of the future.
Conclusion
The Meaning of Trump is that his election signifies that the world has radically changed. To draw on Lacan, Trump is a point-de-capiton (a quilting point). This quilting point fixes things just enough for action to be taken, when all is in flux. Trump is a quilting point that held together the multiple and fluid causes of the discontents. He outed the authoritarianism of the liberal elites, and of the global powers - and offered instead surplus authority in their place. He championed melancholia, and manically laughed in the face of mourning, refusing to face the loss of the American Dream and its empire. He offered the people a fantasy instead, and many liked it. And he adapted quicker than all those around him to the new reality that it is libidinal politics that wins elections in the 21st century. The Meaning of Trump is that he is a symptom of these social and political changes, he plays back to society it’s excess. His politics, are the politics of excess. He offers surplus authority, excessive libidinal energy, and surplus enjoyment (melancholic mania) in the face of great loss.
Note: this blog was first published in a fuller form on this link if you are interested read more. https://www.academia.edu/30105520/The_Meaning_of_Trump
About the Author
Contact [email protected] Twitter @simonwestern
?CEO of Analytic-Network Coaching www.analyticnetwork.com
Dr Simon Western is President-Elect at the International Society for the Psychoanalytic Study of Organizations (ISPSO) www.ispso.org
Adjunct Professor at University College Dublin.
Simon has authored two books:
Leadership a critical text 2nd Ed (Western 2013) https://amzn.to/1RYvzC2
Coaching and Mentoring a critical text, https://amzn.to/1Zhpzd
For further reading
Political Correctness and Political Incorrectness: A psychoanalytictic study of new authoritarians (Western 2016)
Autonomist Leadership in Leaderless Movements https://www.academia.edu/11240946/Autonomist_leadership_in_leaderless_movements_anarchists_leading_the_way
Blog: The Politics of Enjoyment
https://leadershipandcoachingpolemic.com/2014/06/08/the-politics-of-enjoyment-jouissance/
Other Blogs and on-line Papers
https://leadershipandcoachingpolemic.com
https://birkbeck.academia.edu/wwwanalyticnetworkcomSimonWestern
Professor of Innovation Management at M?lardalens University, Sweden.
8 年Nice analysis Simon - politics of excess, indeed. My thoughts where hovering around masculinity - an excess of (but just a variation on what you are already suggesting). But also the 'demand side' which stems from something more than just fear or even anger - but abandonment. A demand for the return of the 'big other' - leadership, direction - however, ill thought-out. His main asset was just his ability to speak loudly about what he will do - regardless of the consequences. He promises impossible things, retracts and contradicts himself - but so did the God of the old testament - folk have never minded that. I am sure Mr Sanders could have beaten him - offering a more controlled form of rational / masculinity. Why masculinity? I am not sure on my own thoughts here - more a sense. The old working and middle class (probably of my imagination)is somehow about that - doing, getting. building, controlling, ordering (all masculine tropes). The soft control of the new organisation (collaboration, innovating, exploring) is, in part, understandable as feminization of the organisation and of organisational life - of life in general - and remains uncomfortable experience for many. It is emergent, lacks certainty - demands commitment rather than just hours in the day. Trump perhaps offers the promise of re-masculiniation; simple solutions - walls, threats, big sticks, tough deals. So I am wondering if this very masculine discourse of his just chimed with a sense of discomfort stemming from a deficit of masculinity. A latent desire for the big other, the return of the father.
Psychoeducational training and consultancy for effective social programs
8 年Of particular importance are those leaders around Trump who move beyond fantasy resolution and, as Bannon, have presented an "intellectually coherent," long-term plan. These policy-driven plans derive from the fantasy-base and libidinal drives you mention, Simon, but have quickly moved beyond them toward what appears a workable reality-base. Historically-based, yet far less toxic, but very similar to the social psychology present in the Weimar Era (and many others), it seems the dynamic between the victimised and the need for repair/entitlements in terms of actual work, revived self-esteem, etc. have gained an 'evidence-base,' a term Bannon uses to describe his strategically coherent plans.
Psychology Lecturer and Coach
8 年Superb analysis, I wonder also about Clinton's role in enabling Trump. He outed the darkness and hypocrisy in the NEO liberal agenda but she couldn't hide it or even rationalise it anymore thanks in part to Wikileaks. Like the wicked queen dressed up as a kindly old lady with a poison apple for Snow White. But the performance was so poor and the illusion so shoddy not even Bon jovi or Brittany could lend her enough glitter to hide behind. Trump played the knight in shining armour and offered to kill the queen and all she stood for and wake up the sleeping population... without the wicked Queen would anyone have needed to project the hero onto the braggart with the sword?
Leadership-, team- and organizational facilitator. Senior Consultant. Teal facilitator. I have also started to write theatre plays, following my own ideas or on demand.
8 年I agree with your analysis Simon. You offer some explanations for which social-political forces Trump is "surfing" on, what he uses and abuses so to say. My concern is more about why single persons trusted him so much that they voted for him and his promises. Because it is the single people we, ordinary folks, meet and cooperate with/refuse to cooperate with. As a single person I can influens vote result by interaction with other single persons. I think that the opportunity to cannalise melancholia with it′s failure to mourn the loss (& thereby avoiding facing the horror of panic) into libidinal happening is a very strong attraction for a single person, no matter how much "democratic" the person is. What is your idea about what we, person to person, can do? Because the history tells us that leders playing on libidinal happennings are dangerous...
RD1st Director
8 年Liking the investigation Simon ... collective consciousness of fear masquerading as anger? Trump is a perfect receptacle for shadow? Disney tells this story all the time ... grin.