Psychology and humanism in the democratic South African imagination

• Published in: South African journal of psychology Vol. 47; no. 4; pp. 520 - 530
• Main Author: Seedat, Mohamed
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: London, England Psychological Society of South Africa (PsySSA) 01.12.2017; SAGE Publications
• Subjects: Decolonial ethics; Decolonial psychology; Humanism; Reflexive critical openness; South Africa; Subjectivities; humanism; reflexive critical openness; Decolonial ethics; South Africa; decolonial psychology; subjectivities
• ISSN: 0081-2463; 2078-8208
• DOI: 10.1177/0081246317737943

Attentive to a psychology underlying South Africa’s democratic imaginations, I describe how Nelson Mandela’s intervention at a critical moment of conflict management, along with mechanisms such as at the Truth and Reconciliation Commission and the Moral Regeneration Movement, invoked and enacted a humanising ethos. Centred on the ideas of restraint, empathy, emotional proximity, witnessing, and fluid generative subjectivities, the humanising ethos was awakened to support the process of reconciliation, social justice, and the making of inclusive and socially just communities. Inspired by a decolonial attitude, and in part successfully enacted in support of the country’s liberal democratic ideals, the elaboration of this psychology has been limited by ongoing socio-economic disparities and a ruling psychology that naturalises extractive relations.