Ian Parker (psychologist) - Marxist Psychology

Marxist Psychology

Marxist arguments are already present in his first book, and that book on the ‘crisis’ ends with a discussion of ‘transitional demands’ that borrow from Trotskyist politics (and these demands are designed to start from what it is reasonable to ask for but in such a way as to lead to a questioning of oppression). A co-edited book, Psychology and Society: Contradiction and Coexistence (1996) is explicitly concerned with Marxist approaches to psychology, and a note indicates that the original title was to be Psychology and Marxism. All the contributors to this book are Marxists, but using a variety of different psychological theories (and Parker’s chapter is on Trotsky and psychoanalysis).

Discussion of Marxist psychology is scattered throughout Parker’s work, but it is clear that he does still define himself as a Marxist. There is a reflection on this in the opening chapter of Critical Discursive Psychology, and Marxist ideas are outlined (alongside psychoanalysis, post-structuralism and feminism) in a paper ‘Discursive resources in the Discourse Unit’ written for the Discourse Unit, a research group which he founded with Erica Burman at Manchester Metropolitan University. Recent interviews indicate that feminist arguments have become more important to Parker, and that Marxism itself may not provide a complete true theory (or alternative to psychology). The discipline of psychology is now treated as an ongoing process of ‘psychologisation’ operating within institutions suffused with the power to define and manage individual behavior and experience.

Marxist responses to Ian Parker’s work have come from Vygotskian developmental psychologists using his work in the political domain (e.g., Holzman, 1995; Newman and Holzman, 2000), and from mainstream experimental psychologists (e.g., Jost and Hardin, 1996).