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Psychoanalysis, Catastrophe & Social Action: Catastrophe and Trans-Subjectivity

Author(s) : Robin McCoy Brooks

Reviews and Endorsements

A bold and challenging book that interrogates the awakening of ourselves to our responsibilities as political agents. McCoy Brooks takes us deep into the complexities of the self as it is wrenched away from its personal concerns and called into political action. By exposing this shift in concern and the extent to which it can be mastered we are treated to invaluable insights into the psychodynamics of social transformation and into the socio-political crises we continue to wrestle with on a global scale. Her forceful argument is both grounded in and used to critique key ideas of Heidegger, Lacan, Jung, Kristeva, Zizek and Badiou, making it an astute and thought-provoking book on many levels. - Lucy Huskinson, Professor of Philosophy at Bangor University, UK, author of various works including Nietzsche and Jung and Architecture and the Mimetic Self.

For too long the relationship between psychoanalysis and the political has felt forced. In a work of invigorating scholarship, McCoy Brooks revisits questions central to psychoanalysis and political philosophy alike, exploring the themes of solidarity, the nature of the subject, collective blindness, abjection, and the trans-subjective. It is rare that one finds such a bracing series of intersections between Lacanian and Jungian psychoanalysis and the philosophies of Zizek, Badiou and Heidegger, which so originally foregrounds the political crises of today (of COVID-19, Black Lives Matter, global warming, etc.) that define our times. She uniquely incorporates the clinical and theoretical perspectives of her theses throughout. - Derek Hook, Duquesne University, USA, author of Six Moments in Lacan, (Post)apartheid Conditions and A Critical Psychology of the Postcolonial: The Mind of Apartheid.


Robin McCoy Brooks has brought the therapeutic and the political - the individual and the collective - into delicate tension in what is nothing less than a masterful study of what it means to 'do' applied psychoanalysis. By mobilising the notion of trans-subjectivity, McCoy Brooks opens us to the potential for radical change in times of rapid upheaval. Through careful, comparative analysis and a determined focus on that which binds humanity together, she weaves a compelling narrative of relationality - a continuum of I and Other - that is only overshadowed by an equally relentless compassion, delivered through critical analysis and psychological insight. Give hate the right to exist and it will. Provide a doorway leading to greater mutuality, dialogue, and understanding, and the possibilities are endless. Stated succinctly, I would follow Robin McCoy Brooks down the rabbit hole of boundless futures yet to be imagined. - Dr Kevin Lu, Senior Lecturer, Department of Psychosocial and Psychoanalytic Studies, University of Essex.