Prevention or therapy and the politics of trust: inspiring a new human agenda

Abstract

This paper gives a brief overview of the developmental origins of human alienation, depression, violence and drug abuse. It provides a foundation for understanding how the politics of culture structure the human condition. The most critical early life experiences are formed in the mother-infant/child relationship. This affects all future relationships and the development of culture. The role of body pleasure in affectional bonding in the mother-infant/child relationship and in the human sexual relationship will be shown to be an important factor in the formation of non-violence in the individual and in human cultures. It will be shown that basic trust must occur before a politics of trust can be formed to effect changes at the individual and cultural levels and to transform violent individuals and cultures into peaceful individuals and cultures. The limitations of psychotherapy (which involves neocortical brain process) in effecting changes in the damaged emotional social sexual brain (which involves the subcortical brain) will be illustrated. Cultural conditions for the development of the neurointegrative brain, which mediates healthy behaviors, versus the development of the neurodissociative brain, which mediates dysfunctional behaviors, will be given. As culture shapes the developing brain, so the brain shapes culture. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.