Edgy Ideas

In this episode, Simon Western is joined by organisational consultant, certified Analytic Network coach, and Emerita Professor of Psychoanalysis and Culture Caroline Bainbridge to reflect on what is happening in Ukraine, drawing on psychosocial thinking. Their aim is not to provide answers but to stimulate thinking and insights.
This horrific, shocking, and unnecessary war is about the Putin regime deepening its own power base, and imagining themselves as Tsarist heroes ‘making Russia great again’ to borrow from their ‘Trumpist’ friends.
At the heart of this project is repression; the war can be thought of as a ‘return of the repressed'.
Fukuyama proclaimed the End of History when the Soviet Union collapsed, and many swallowed the kool-aid and repressed the clear signs that totalitarianism was returning within China and Russia, while authoritarianism was resurfacing through populist and nationalist politics in the west.
The war can also be thought-about as part of the Putin regime's desire to impose a new repressive regime across the old Soviet empire.
Simon and Caro reflect on these and other thoughts, hoping to create thinking space for those listening to engage in their own reflections, in order not to fall into the traps of repression.       

Simon Western is the host of Edgy Ideas Podcast, founder of the Eco-Leadership Institute www.ecoleadershipinstitute.org, and CEO of Analytic-Network Coaching- an advanced coach training company. He is the author of internationally acclaimed leadership and coaching books, and blogs on wider social-political issues. Previously a past president of ISPSO,  a family psychotherapist, general and psychiatric nurse, and a factory worker.  Simon works with senior leaders in global companies as a leadership consultant with the aim of delivering new eco-leadership cultures that support system-change, and to coach ‘leaders to act in good faith to create the good society’.

Caroline Bainbridge is an organizational consultant, accredited Analytic-Network coach, and Emerita Professor of Psychoanalysis and Culture. She specializes in inclusion-focused leadership work and organizational change, and executive coaching that centers on complex experience. After more than 25 years as a university lecturer, published writer, and researcher, Caroline has been recognized as Emerita Professor of Culture and Psychoanalysis. She is fascinated with how our networked and mediated milieu shapes experience and behavior. Caroline trained at the Tavistock in London and at the Eco-Leadership Institute. Find out more here. 

In this podcast Dr Vamik Volkan shares his fascinating personal journey, and some of the theories that have gained him an international recognition.   Born in 1932, Vamik a Turkish Cypriot lived in Cyprus under British rule, with the second world war and Nazi’s in the shadows as he grew up.  His journey took him to study medicine in Turkey, and psychiatry and psychoanalysis in the USA.  Experiencing the loss of a dear friend through a Greek terrorist attack back in Cyprus, Vamik in the USA found himself separated from mourning his friend. He went on to study mourning and later trauma, drawing also on his experiences of racism in the USA during the 1950s/60s.  His insights led him to work with traumatised countries and nations/peoples in conflict.  He has met and worked with former President Jimmy Carter, Mikhail Gorbachov, Desmond Tutu and Yasser Arafat.  Vamik shares some of his key ideas,  such as how large group identities form around ‘chosen trauma’s’ and ‘chosen glories’ and how these are mobilised by leaders. Vamik shows how leaders personal experiences are played out in large group dynamics, and he addresses what drives Vladimir Putin and reflects on the current the war Ukraine. 

We will be hosting a Clubhouse Discussion Friday 4th 6pm GMT on this podcast content click link to join - a recording of the discussion will be available 

Bio
Dr Vamık Volkan is an Emeritus Professor of Psychiatry at the University of Virginia: Emeritus President of the International Dialogue Initiative, he holds Professorships across the world and has many other honorary positions. Dr. Volkan was a member of the International Negotiation Network under the directorship of former President Jimmy Carter.  His work on trauma and understanding large groups is internationally renowned and he has been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize five times

Dr. Volkan is the author, coauthor of psychoanalytic and psychopolitical books. His book, Large-Group psychology: Racism, Societal Divisions, Narcissistic Leaders and Who We Are Now, received the Gradiva 2021 Best Book Award.

Father David McCallum is at the heart of a very interesting change process taking place in the Catholic Church.  Pope Francis has called for a 2 year process to advance a synodal church.  David discusses how a synodal church embraces leadership from the edges, engaging the laity and being less hierarchical and clerical in its approach.   Simon and David share thoughts on how this process might happen, and how synodal leadership symbolises how the Catholic church is responding to our disruptive age.  Inspired by early church practices of discernment, accompaniment and spiritual friendship, David is working with others to develop new ways of organising, leading and being in this emergent space that is opening.  Enjoy this podcast! 
Bio Father David McCallum, S.J., Ed.D is a Jesuit priest and leadership educator. He serves as the founding Executive Director of the Program for Discerning Leadership. The Program provides leadership formation for senior Vatican officials and major superiors of religious orders in Rome, Italy, as well as internationally. 
Born in Buffalo, NY (1968), and raised in Rochester, Fr. McCallum is a proud Upstate New Yorker.  He serves as a facilitator for mission driven, personal and organizational development programs, provides developmentally informed executive coaching, and delivers leadership development programs and spiritual retreats internationally. He co-founded the Contemplative Leaders in Action program (CLA), an initiative of the Office for Ignatian Spirituality (USA East Coast Province)
Currently, Fr. McCallum lives in Rome and serves as a member of the Secretariat for the Synod of Bishops Commission on Methodology, supporting the Synodal process initiative by Pope Francis. 

Danny is a leading practitioner working with elite athletes. In this podcast he shares his reflections on working at a leading premiership football club in the UK. Drawing on his experiences of studying at the Tavistock clinic, Danny discusses the leadership and power dynamics at play in these soccer clubs.  He applies Menzies-Lyth theory of social defences against anxiety to his experience, observing how the obsessive focus on diet and nutrition are a social defence against the anxiety of poor performance. Whilst diet is clearly important, the excess of the practices tell a different story. 

Simon and Danny discuss the 'happiness imperative', how highly paid footballers feel obliged to be upbeat - 'how can you not be happy, with the wealth and glamour'  yet this represses the shadow side of their lives, and the anxieties and struggles they face.  Discussing mental health issues is not encouraged as they need to be 'at the top of their game' to be selected and successful.  Danny ends by discussing his life-long practice of meditation, and how this helps him in his work, and how he uses an embodied approach to help athletes engage more holistically with their bodies, rather than 'stay in their minds'. I hope you enjoy this fascinating podcast. 
BIODanny Donachie works with World class athletes and leaders to improve performance through greater presence. He has held several leadership positions in elite sports, most recently working with a leading premiership soccer club in the UK.  Danny brings his lifelong practice of meditation from Eastern traditions, alongside a more psychologically informed approach to his work. Through Embodyism he consults with high performing individuals and groups.

Ian Parker is a practising psychoanalyst, an academic and a revolutionary activist.  Ian discusses the radical roots of psychoanalysis and how these have changed overtime, to make psychoanalysis fit with contemporary capitalist society.   Ian believes that psychoanalysis should be a radical practice than impacts on individuals and society, rather than an elite practice that adapts individuals to conform to social norms. He writes “Our task is to connect social struggle with the kind of unavoidable internal struggle described by psychoanalytic theory.”  Ian challenges the standard idea of the unconscious being like an ice-berg where beneath our conscious surface lies a dark abyss of uncivilised, biological and instinctual drives.   He works with a Lacanian approach that addresses the unconscious as a social and external phenomena, one that we individually relate to.  He is critical of  the ‘Psy’ professions such as psychology and psychotherapy as being instrumental to keeping things as they are, rather than offering a past to individual and social transformation.   Ian is working towards developing a psychoanalytic practice that has a liberation ethic Enjoy listening to this fascinating and edgy podcast! 
BIO  Ian Parker is a psychoanalyst and a member of the new revolutionary organisation Anti-Capitalist Resistance, and of the Fourth International. His academic work has always been critical of psychology and psychiatry. His most recent book, co-authored with his Mexican comrade David Pavón-Cuéllar, is Psychoanalysis and Revolution: Critical Psychology for Liberation Movements  https://psychoanalysisrevolution.com/.   Ian is Emeritus Professor at Leicester University and his academic writing is widely published and cited. 

Olya Khaleelee shares her experiences and thoughts on 'OPUS, An organisation promoting the understanding of society'.  OPUS aims to develop a deeper understanding of conscious and unconscious organisational and social dynamics; and to promote reflective citizenship – using this understanding to act authoritatively and responsibly as members of society and organisations within society.  Olya shares some of the OPUS early work in the prison sector and workplace settings, and the development and importance of 'listening posts'.  Olya and Simon discuss the worrying authoritarianism growing in society, and how more than ever reflective citizenship is needed alongside spaces to help citizens take up their agency and authority in society.  Enjoy the listen! 

Olya Khaleelee is a corporate psychologist and organisational consul­tant with a particular interest in leadership, and organisational transi­tion and transformation. She was director of OPUS: an Organisation for Promoting Understanding of Society from 1980–1994, is a profes­sional partner of the Tavistock Institute and was the first female director of the Leicester Conference on the theme of Authority Leadership and Organisation. She has published extensively in the areas of leadership and system psychodynamics in organisations, and beyond, into society

Stanley Gold is concerned with racism, and in his recent book, ‘Unthinkable Evil-Understanding Racism’ he makes the claim that we talk about racism, but not about the cause of racism, because to do so is unthinkable. He takes this phrase from politicians who talk about the ‘unthinkable evil’ when confronted with a racist or terrorist incidents.   Stanley shares his edgy idea that racism is caused by neuro-biological and infantile changes in brain structure. Simon challenges this idea as the sole cause of racism. He believes that whilst racism, authoritarianism, sexism, homophobia, and other forms of scapegoating can be linked to rigid forms of thinking, anxiety states and perhaps even neuro-biological wiring, it cannot be divorced from social causation. This social causation is the space which can be worked on to mitigate and reduce how anxieties and individual/collective troubled mindsets act out on the stage of life.  Simon agrees with Stan that we all have the potential to be racist and authoritarian, and some more than others.  Stan believes it is important to face this ‘unthinkable truth’, that racism is caused by infantile and neuro-biological factors.  Simon claims our task is to work on the social areas – economic, social equity, education, institutional containment etc, that can reduce the potential of racism being manifested, and utilised by populist and nationalist politicians and other sub-groups.  Stan thinks Simon avoids the unthinkable issue, Simon thinks Stan misses the important point that whatever the underlying cause of human behaviour, it is what happens in the social sphere that exacerbates, exploits, the worst of human behaviour or mitigates against it.  They both agree that being able to talk openly about differences, and to think about the unthinkable is vitally important today when so many conversations are shut down or cancelled. Enjoy this lively discussion! 

Stan Gold graduated in Medicine in Melbourne Australia and subsequently Guys Hospital London in Adult and Child Psychiatry where he became the inaugural Research Fellow. studying childhood Psychosis. Returning to Australia as research fellow to the inaugural department of Psychiatry , he was also consultant Psychiatrist at Prince Henry’s Hospital.. He  subsequently trained in Psychoanalysis, becoming a training Analyst of the Australian Society and chair of the Centre for Psychodynamic studies Monash University. Returning to London and a position at the Cassell Hospital, he broadened his interests to groups and organisations and became a board member and later, President of ISPSO. More recently he has been appointed as member of the Mental Health Tribunal in his state. He has written over 40 papers ranging from clinical and research studies in childhood to Psychodynamic aspects of Organisational life. He has written two books, “How to Bring up your Parents” and last October, "Unthinkable Evil: Understanding Racism”.

Josephine is Australia’s first out Transgender priest and on this podcast, shares her experiences, and why she believes that trans people can help to shine a light into the world.   Simon and Josephine reflect on why transphobia occurs, and how trans, queer and non-binary ways of being create anxieties for those who fear transition in their own lives.  Josephine believes that trans liberation is not just about emancipating transgender people, but it offers a vision of a beautiful world, where diversity flourishes.  Josephine shares how being transgender doesn’t take away the gender identities of male and female, it expands the limitations of the binary and adds new possibilities.   Discussing being in the church, Josephine embraces a theology that embraces mystery, a Christianity that is based on love and a church that embraces transitioning in this life and beyond. 

BIO
Josephine McDonnell Inkpin is the first openly and fully recognised transgender Anglican priest in Australia, now currently working as Minister of Pitt Street Uniting Church in Sydney.   Originally from England, where she studied at Oxford and Durham, she is a feminist church historian and theologian who has taught in various university settings over many years, as well as in a variety of ministry settings, typically ‘on the edge’.  Chair of Equal Voices, a peak Australian network of LGBTIQ+ Christians and allies, Jo has also been a prominent leader in Australian inter-faith, multicultural, First Nations Reconciliation, and other justice activities over many years. A former officer of the National Council of Churches in Australia and General Secretary of the NSW Ecumenical Council, and later described as a ‘Dangerous Woman of Queensland’, she was highlighted by Deloittes as one of the 2020 Out50 Outstanding LGBTI Leaders in Australia.

Dr Mishel McMahon, a Yorta Yorta First Nations woman from Australia, draws from 60,000 years of Aboriginal cultural experience to discuss what she terms ‘Relational Ontology’ - ontology meaning how we understand reality, what’s real and what’s not real.   She says “Relational ontology is a view of reality that all entities; plants, animals, elements, seasons, skies, waterways, the land, the spirit world and humans are in relationship, like a web. First Nations peoples and many other groups around the globe have held relational worldviews for thousands of years”.  The relational worldview contrasts with the European/Westernised mindset which places humans at the centre of knowledge creation.  Mishel discusses the importance of equality between all things, and how country, community and Ancestral knowledge are all infused and animated with spirit.  This rich discussion raises many questions and hopefully inspires us to see the world, and to live in it differently.  

BIO 
Mishel McMahon is a proud Yorta Yorta woman, she grew up in a large family in the Murray river region of Victoria, Australia. Mishel completed her undergraduate degree of Bachelor of Human Services and Honours in Social Work in 2012 at La Trobe. Mishel has worked at various First Nations organisations, including Indigenous Academic Enrichment Advisor at La Trobe organising Sorry Day and NAIDOC events. Mishel began her PhD, undertaking research that revealed principles of First Nations childrearing, using methodology informed from a relational worldview, and Yorta Yorta language. Mishel recently won Premier's Research Awards for Aboriginal Research 2019, Fellowship for Indigenous Leadership 2019 and recently worked as Social Work lecturer at Shepparton La Trobe, campus. Mishel is in the last stages of developing a First Nations Health & Wellbeing mobile app, and shorts films from her Fellowship. Currently Mishel is Victorian Aboriginal Research Accord Co-ordinator at VACCHO and lives in Elmore, Victoria on the Campaspe river. 

Paul brings deep insights into climate change drawing on psycho-social thinking. This conversation explores climate anxiety, climate denial and climate delay, and how we as ‘moderns’ find it very difficult to escape deeply embedded ideas that entrap us. Paul relates this thinking back to our founding myths from Judeo-Christianity that throws humanity outside of the Edenic garden, and outside of nature, and is always looking for external salvation.  He reflects that “Us moderns live in a kind of cocoon, continuing in our everyday routines, of living in our comforts, which means that we are able to live in this world, where because of mass media and now social media we know about all these terrible things going on and yet somehow or other remain unaffected”The conversation moves to how to engage with climate change and the anxieties it raises, and at the same time retain ‘radical hope’.  Finally Simon and Paul reflect with caution,  on some real changes taking place.

Bio: Paul Hoggett is a psychoanalytic psychotherapist and is Emeritus Professor of Social Policy at UWE, Bristol where, with Simon Clarke, he was a Director of the Centre for Psycho-Social Studies. In 2000, with Larry Gould, he was founding editor of the journal Organisational and Social Dynamics, a forum for those working within the Tavistock Group Relations tradition. In 2012, with Adrian Tait, he founded the Climate Psychology Alliance (CPA) and was its first chair. He recently edited a collection of CPA research papers, Climate Psychology: On Indifference to Disaster (2019, Palgrave Macmillan). Previous books have included Politics, Identity and Emotion (2009, Paradigm) and Partisans in an Uncertain World (1992, Free Association Books).