Ressentiment: a complex emotion or an emotional mechanism of psychic defences?
Ressentiment: a complex emotion or an emotional mechanism of psychic defences?
Ressentiment is central for understanding the psychological foundations of reactionary politics, right‐wing populism, Islamic fundamentalism, and radicalism. In this article we theorise ressentiment as an emotional mechanism which, reinforcing a morally superior sense of victimhood, expedites two parallel transvaluation processes: What was once desired or val-ued, yet unattainable, is reassessed as something undesirable and rotten, and one’s own self from being inferior, a loser, is reassessed as being noble and superior. We establish negative emotions of envy, shame, and inefficacious anger as the main triggers of ressentiment, with their associated feelings of inferiority and impotence, which target the vulnera-ble self. We identify the outcomes of ressentiment as other‐directed negative emotions of resentment, indignation, and hatred, reinforced and validated by social sharing. We map the psychological structure of ressentiment in four stages, each employing idiosyncratic defences that depend on the ego‐strength of the individual to deliver the transvaluation of the self and its values, and finally detail how social sharing consolidates the outcome emotions, values, and identities in ressenti-ment through shallow twinship bonds with like‐minded peers. Our interdisciplinary theoretical account integrates classic philosophical scholarship of ressentiment and its contemporary proponents in philosophy and sociology, which highlight envy as the prime driver of ressentiment; it also considers the sociological approaches that focus on the repression and transmutation of shame and its social consequences, as well as the psychoanalytic scholarship on psychic defences and political psychology models on the emotionality of decision‐making. We conclude the article by elaborating the political implications of ressentiment as the emotional mechanism of grievance politics.
Emotional mechanism, Philosophy, Political psychology, Psychic defences, Psychoanalysis, Reactionism, Resentment, Ressentiment, Sociology
191-203
Salmela, Mikko
e1deaa50-cfe6-47b3-939e-6856ea5a1513
Capelos, Tereza
bd3b5744-cbcc-44a4-9b73-b088d82154e7
27 August 2021
Salmela, Mikko
e1deaa50-cfe6-47b3-939e-6856ea5a1513
Capelos, Tereza
bd3b5744-cbcc-44a4-9b73-b088d82154e7
Salmela, Mikko and Capelos, Tereza
(2021)
Ressentiment: a complex emotion or an emotional mechanism of psychic defences?
Politics and Governance, 9 (3), .
(doi:10.17645/pag.v9i3.4251).
Abstract
Ressentiment is central for understanding the psychological foundations of reactionary politics, right‐wing populism, Islamic fundamentalism, and radicalism. In this article we theorise ressentiment as an emotional mechanism which, reinforcing a morally superior sense of victimhood, expedites two parallel transvaluation processes: What was once desired or val-ued, yet unattainable, is reassessed as something undesirable and rotten, and one’s own self from being inferior, a loser, is reassessed as being noble and superior. We establish negative emotions of envy, shame, and inefficacious anger as the main triggers of ressentiment, with their associated feelings of inferiority and impotence, which target the vulnera-ble self. We identify the outcomes of ressentiment as other‐directed negative emotions of resentment, indignation, and hatred, reinforced and validated by social sharing. We map the psychological structure of ressentiment in four stages, each employing idiosyncratic defences that depend on the ego‐strength of the individual to deliver the transvaluation of the self and its values, and finally detail how social sharing consolidates the outcome emotions, values, and identities in ressenti-ment through shallow twinship bonds with like‐minded peers. Our interdisciplinary theoretical account integrates classic philosophical scholarship of ressentiment and its contemporary proponents in philosophy and sociology, which highlight envy as the prime driver of ressentiment; it also considers the sociological approaches that focus on the repression and transmutation of shame and its social consequences, as well as the psychoanalytic scholarship on psychic defences and political psychology models on the emotionality of decision‐making. We conclude the article by elaborating the political implications of ressentiment as the emotional mechanism of grievance politics.
Text
PaG 9(3) - Ressentiment_ A Complex Emotion or an Emotional Mechanism of Psychic Defences_
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Accepted/In Press date: 13 June 2021
Published date: 27 August 2021
Additional Information:
Funding Information:
We thank the anonymous reviewers of Politics and Governance, whose comments on an earlier version of this manuscript allowed us to improve it significantly. We also thank Madeleine Provost for her generous help in proofreading our work. Salmela’s work was supported by funding from the European Research Council (ERC) under the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innova‐ tion programme (grant agreement no. 832940).
Funding Information:
We thank the anonymous reviewers of Politics and Governance, whose comments on an earlier version of this manuscript allowed us to improve it significantly. We also thank Madeleine Provost for her generous help in proofreading our work. Salmela?s work was supported by funding from the European Research Council (ERC) under the European Union?s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme (grant agreement no. 832940).
Keywords:
Emotional mechanism, Philosophy, Political psychology, Psychic defences, Psychoanalysis, Reactionism, Resentment, Ressentiment, Sociology
Identifiers
Local EPrints ID: 482942
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/482942
ISSN: 2183-2463
PURE UUID: d6552fcf-2136-43a5-95c4-9e009c8d545d
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Date deposited: 17 Oct 2023 16:55
Last modified: 18 Mar 2024 04:15
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Author:
Mikko Salmela
Author:
Tereza Capelos
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