Here is a snippet from TPM Barnett's comment on Diplomacy as Psychiatry (second from bottom) to which I must respond:
So this blogger's basic question really is, Is there a role for national "psychiatry" in bringing a Gap nation up from the depths?
And I guess I would say, yes, there is.
And it would run like this: First in security, you need to help them understand their self-destructive behaviors and gain confidence in themselves and their capacities for self-rule and self-defense. Second, in economics, you'd need to help them understand similarly their capacity for self-development of capital (especially human through education and the liberation of women). Ultimately, you'd have to work on their political identity in the world, a sense of who they are and what they're capable of.
I say it in BFA: the journey from Gap to Core is one of youth (Gap) to middle-age (New Core) to seniority (Old Core). It really is a demographic journey as much as anything else, so remember that when you deal with national identity in the Gap, you're dealing with kids, so to speak, or very youth-skewed demographics.
This is why the spread of religion in the Gap, especially the dueling spreads of Islam and Christianity, is so vital. Youth look for guidance, and the most accepted global package for that is religion, which, like much psychiatry, is all about gaining self-control, self-awareness, etc.
This a very logical, linear and conventional way thru to maturity. A more interesting take which would resonate much more with dynamic style is articulated by people taking archetypal pattern recognition and the new sciences further than this. The Assisi Institute has been doing this for over 20 years. They give depth and breadth to discussions of organizations of any kind from families and corporations to religions and countries as entities and how we can move within complex situations. This approach is neither reductive nor behaviorist and often not linear unlike thinking coming out of academic institutions.
As well, I was aiming toward a fine small book by Rafael Lopez-Pedraza, Cultural Anxiety, which offers a long riff on The Consciousness of Failure. Here one can begin to see what patterns are in play and see how important they are to sus out and give them their dues. These work underneath all religions, races, nations and genders. I will go into how this gives clues to failed states, of our own and others and calls for instinctual reflection on fear, trauma and maturity. This note will have to do in pointing these ways for now.
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