Process Ethics and the Political Question

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Gendlin, E.T. (1986). Process ethics and the political question. In A-T. Tymieniecka(Ed.), Analecta Husserliana. Vol. XX. The moral sense in the communal significanceof life , pp. 265-275. Boston: Reidel. From http://www.focusing.org/gendlin

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PROCESS ETHICS AND THE POLITICAL QUESTIONEugene T. Gendlin

Two questions will be discussed in this paper: (1) canethics be founded on a certain manner of process, thekind of decision making, rather than the content orconclusions?; and (2) does our personal decision-making

process merely reflect social and political control? Orcan more arise from the individual than what society has

built into the body?

I

Ethics is often said to be lost by an emphasis on authenticity. Heidegger and Sartrewere more successful on the negative side, in showing the breakdown of any code,content, or formulated ethics. What they put in its place seems less: the call of conscience, responsibility, an authentic way of deciding moral issues. This is oftentaken as mere caprice, as if authenticity requires only that I decide, rather thanfollowing conventions. Such an interpretation of authenticity would result in IvanKaramazov's dictum: "Anything is possible." It might be authentic for someone. I

want to show, on the contrary, that "authenticity" can name a distinguishable kindof process.

Ethics is best cared for as distinctions between kinds of processes. After all, it is theprocess which determines the contents. Thoughts, feelings, desires, and otherexperiences are not just given things. They are generated by processes. A certainkind of process creates the ancient virtues. It is not the case that just anything atall can be the content of just any process. Far from it.

Suppose your good friend has decided to marry someone, and you like the person.Marrying that intended spouse seems (in general) a good thing. Is that enough foryou to call the decision r ight? Would you not need to know more about how your

friend decided? What if the decision was made on a drunken afternoon to getmarried that very day? Suppose your friend badly wants money and the intendedspouse has some? Suppose the wedding was announced and your friend wants toback out but is scared of disappointing the relatives? What if your friend talksmostly of not wanting to live alone?

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We commonly call these "wrong reason." Why? They indicate something about theprocess of arriving at the decision. The trouble is not exactly these reasonsthemselves. After all, one rarely marries for the "reasons" one gives oneself. Manypeople spend the rest of their lives trying to discover why they married as they did.In my examples, these clearly wrong reasons indicate something more: the lack of the kind of decision-making process we respect.

It is difficult to delineate "the right kind of process" even though it is well known.Therefore, people describe it indirectly. For example, they describe the process interms of time. You might ask how long your fr iend has thought about it. Or, it can

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be described in terms of a spatial analogy called "depth": how far down inside hasyour friend examined his decision? Or, we describe the process in factual terms:how much is known about the person, the family, where will you l ive, and so on.

The questions of length, depth, and knowledge show that we know of a "right"process, but time, space and facts are accidental parameters. We do not meanmere length of time. We hope the time was not wasted going round in circles. Wemean the process which is opposite to going round in circles. We mean a process of steps which can correct what one thought, felt, or was before. I will say more aboutsuch "steps." Similarly, depth does not help, if nothing changes while digging deep.Sheer depth does not make something right. If the friend comes upon a deepwrong motive, we trust that the decision will change, somehow. Nor are the mostrelevant facts those that now exist as facts. Rather, the process should raise newquestions, newly needed facts.

We depend on this kind of process, but we need to speak from it more precisely.

So far, I said that the "right" kind of process has (1) steps; (2) in which what isfound can also change; (3) and in which new facts can appear. My three involvemore coming out of the process than went in. I spoke of change. Into what? Morethan the person plain is. I do not ask what fits how the person is. Instead, I assert

that human nature is a different sort of "is," an is-for developing into what (welater say) the person really "was." That development cannot be decided or directedby what a person now is, thinks, or wants, nor by anyone else. Purposes andmotives develop. If one's present purposes were to determine the developmentprocess, one would be permanently stuck. Persons and situations are a singleinterlocking system. In our kind of process both person and facts turn out to "havebeen" more than they seemed.

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Let me say that if this kind of process were an assumption, I would reject i t myself.But we observe it, we do it, we must face itbut as the rejection of anotherassumption: this kind of process forces us to reject the assumption that eventsoccur only as previously existing forms and units. More order, forms, and unitsarise from this kind of process than existed at the start.

We must reject the usual science model which "explains" every event byconstructing it out of the forms and pieces of earlier events. But in practice evenscience does not work that way. Like our process, science first studies the events,then redefines what the earlier one "was" so it can explain the later. New formsand units can come with each discovery. The results are put in linear orderretroactively, from the discovery process. In ordinary li fe we do not assume fixedforms and units in advance. For example, an odd "situation" requires to be "met"by some action that has never as yet existed. After our actions change thesituation, hindsight can say what it "really was." But even now, when it demands tobe met, we may sense that familiar actions do not meet it. We stay stuck, ratherthan acting in a way we know.

That a situation can demand a new action is familiar, but odd to say. The newaction is neither determined nor not determined by the facts of the situation. If they determined it, we could derive the action from the facts. All situations wouldbe easy. But if the action were indeterminate, any action would do. Again allsituations would be easy.

Both "determined" and "indeterminate" assume the same kind of order: fixed formand logical derivation. But situations have more than that kind of order. A situationis not only its formed "is." Rather, it is-for action to meet it and change it. It is-for

a change in itself. Therefore, the change cannot be derived from the existingforms. But the change is very finely required. The requiring is not unordered, oronly half determined, with half leeway. Rather, it is more ordered than the givenforms and facts. That is why we may fail to devise an action to meet it. That is verycommon, and no assumption at all. But to speak of it involves rejecting the


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become constricted, smaller than usual. Genuine morality comes rather in the sortof process I am defining here. There is a movement outward from within. You feelcare and concern for the injured person. Those feelings extend and expand you.

We can tell the difference between these two kinds of process. But now the secondquestion: Freud held that only the ego provides order. The "id" consists of chaoticdrives. Ways of action (ways of "discharging" drive energy) are given only bysociety. The ego is the "reality principle" and reality is the social forms.

For Freud, any experience that does not fit social forms must be a throwback topre-ego infancy. It cannot bring apprehensions of reality. Training along these linesmakes each person feel crazy, unrealistic, inappropriate, since we all have suchexperience. But, actually the sense which does not fit the forms may apprehendreality more accurately than the forms we try to impose on it.

Language is not a system of static forms. It has the body's moving type of order Icall "is-for." Words evolve; they often work newly in ways that can not be derivedfrom extant forms. All human situations are patterned with language, but languageis not alone their order. On the contrary, language is never alone, it is implied bythe body in situations. When new and odd situations leave us at a loss for words,we can feel that the usual words will not do. Old and new language (and other

actions) are implied by the body. It senses new actions and phrasings which do notyet exist, but can come in the steps I described.

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The social patterns are not imposed on mere chaotic drive energy. They areimposed on a more intricate texture, a greater orderbut this shows itself only inprocess. There is not a second, natural person under the socially formed person.But all order is not from society. Animals are already very complex. Societydevelops that further, but the body also develops these forms still further. It is not

just a copy of society.

Very complex inherited behavior patterns have been discovered in every animalspecies. Today the tabula rasa hypothesis can no longer be held. Animals withoutlanguage have complex nesting behavior, intricate mating dances, many sequencesthat are inherited via the body, not learned.

Every major therapeutic theory since Freud attributes its own order to the body.They rename Freud's "id," usually as the "organism." This is because in therapeuticsteps one observes more order, more intr icacy, and an inwardly arising "direction"which is very different from imposed form. But these theories do simplify the issue.I say that the organism does implicitly include the social forms. It is not justseparable from them. We cannot say what is from the organism, and what isimposed. We can differentiate only the kinds of process, the kinds of further steps.Let us see to what extent that solves the problem.

Just because a situation is called "psychotherapy" does not insure the kind of process I described. But when it does, one notices a far more powerful ethics thanthe conceptual arguments. From its process-characteristics one can derive theancient virtues. [ 2 ] The process is a deeper honesty than the usual kind. One soonprefers the sincerity of living from that process. One senses one's care and needfor other people. But the process functions more intricately than the abstractionsin which these virtues have been conceptualized. The human being lives withothers, and body-life implies them. Isolation, withdrawal, missing the fullness of other humans feels bad, stifling, thin, dull, weak, and avoidant. Exploitativepatterns can feel like that too; there is no company from the other person, only astand-in for the patterns of one's autism. One may sense one's fear behind the

macho poses. One also comes upon denials of oneself. Hiding feels false. Onesenses the cowering that avoids confronting the other. It is lonely. The other ischeated as well.

Distinctions in this process are often new and finer than the common ones. Here is


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an example of such steps. Note that the old training is certainly buil t into the body,but we can distinguish it from steps in which the body feeds back with new form. Inthis example the concep-

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tual ethics of equality is never questioned or changed. But, at first it functions toblock a more intricate mesh of would-be experience which only develops in thesteps themselves. The isolating "superior" feeling changes in these steps. What shethen says it "was," was not there at the start.

Patient: And I'm mostly alone, and then when I get with people I feel strange. Either I criticiseeverything or I keep quiet. I feel superior, they were playing cards all night, and I just looked downon them, and I was m ad at myself. . . . (Silence) I hate to say anything because it might come outthen, that I feel superior, and I know I shouldn't. Nobody's superior to anybody. I don't want to feelthat way, it's wrong.

Therapist: Your values are that humans are inherently equal and to feel superior is wrong, and can'tbe true. But let it come for a minute, so we can sense what it's like. Is it like "ech" (sweep-awayhand-motion).

Patient: (Silence) No. Feels high and mighty. Kind of good.

Therapist: Sit forward a little . . . yeah, like that . . . Loosen your body so you can let it come inmore.

Patient: (Giggles.) I'm the queen . . . but that's stupid and selfish and, um, it's wrong. But it feelsgood. It's uhm . . . it's so rt of self-confirming. Actually it's no t even superior so much as . . . um. . .. (Silence) It's like "Make room fo r me!"

It turns out to "have been" very different from feeling superior. She has notdiscarded her equality values to permit feeling superior. Rather, what was therechanged in the steps, and turned out to be more ethical than it seemed. Herconceptual evaluation played a role, but not the only role.

Here is another example. (The therapist is omitted here.) Note the training builtinto the bodybut also that the body has its own order. At first there is no way tosay the steps that come.

I've been looking forward to coming, much mo re than I did the other times. I've had a crummy

week. My jo b is really bad . . . and everything seems flat like I'm just watching. . . . (Long silence) Ihave lots of energy there, but it's tied up. . . . (Silence) It's like a heavy wall in front of it. It's behindthat. . . . (Silence) It's a whole part o f me that I keep in. Like w hen I say it's OK when it's not. Theway I hold everything in. . . . (Lo ng silence) There's a part of me that's dead, a part that isn't. . . .One is dead, one survived. . . . (Silence) It wants to scream. . . . To live. . . . (Silence) And there'salso something vague. I can't get what that is. . . . (Silence) It's like I want to run. Someone will bemad at me if I let that part live, and that's very uncomfortable. . . . (Silence) I want to run andnever look back and just be free. . . . (Silence) Then that's sad. Yes. Running from the vague thingis sad. . . . (Silence) Some of me wants to find out what the sad thing is, some of me doesn't. . . .(Silence) I'm very angry. It's a big loss, something missing, That's what the vague thing was. . . .(Silence) And my energy is right there, too. Yes, I feel lighter!

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At each step the bodily sense is implicitly meaningful in a way that then turns outto be speakable. Note the effect on body-energy at the end. These steps are fromthe body's own order. All therapists since Freud have noticed that order.

II

Unlike the therapists, philosophical and political writers still side with Freud on thisissue. Adorno and Foucault [ 3 ] find it simply impossible that a freeing processcould arise within the organism and go counter to the socially imposed forms.Worse, to assert such a thing is to sustain the polit ical status quo; one seems topromise individual freedom under present political conditions. In not even thinkingabout politics, one does reactionary politics.

Social change has its own supra-individual laws and developments, like theevolution from agriculture to industry. Individual bodies live and are programmedby these social developments. But the theories since Marx also assume that therecan be no feedback from the organisms except perhaps disorder and resistance.These theories deny the body an order of its own and imply that social change cancome only from engineering on the social level. It must be imposed on individuals,


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since it cannot come from them. But recent history shows that such social changeis anything but freeing. Therefore, Adorno and Foucault see no freeing possible onthe political level, either. Social patterns are imposed by people in some positionson people in other positions. Change can only be different imposed forms, ordifferent people in power. Change in that fact seems impossible.

For example, Foucault rightly points out that all social functions involve control.Medical people and institutions have acquired a lot of control, which does notalways help them cure. Psychiatry is an agency of social control and privilege.Education shapes people to want to obey and fit in, rather than think. Churchescontrol attitudes more surely than they offer spiritual experience. But we cannothelp deploring this fact. We see that the social functions are something other thancontrol. It is not the control that cures, or develops thinking. At least in principlethere is also health, help with personal problems, the discovery of thinking, andspiritual experience.

We know the difference, even when there is no therapeutic help, only socializationimposed by professionals who know little more than their

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certificates and roles. We know the difference, even when schools do not developthinking and prepare only for obedience and repetition.

I do not argue that the genuine social functions can be found without being largelydefeated by the inevitable control side. But the import of Foucault's work is notdiscouragement. We can certainly lessen the control aspect and devise social formsthat provide more and more of the actual functions. We must always again see andstruggle with the inevitable control aspect of each new form. But the control is notthe functions.

But can education for thinking be distinguished from teaching what to think? Cangenuine help be distinguished from socialization? We need my distinction betweenthe two kinds of processes again here, on the social level. We know this difference

here too.

The theories make a conflict between the individual and the social level of analysis,in order to assert that the social level is independent and determinative. But it iswrong to identify individual with genuine process, and society with control. Then itseems too bad that individuals are impossible without society.

But the genuine individual process is also social. Thinking is inherently social, too!But it is a different kind of process than obedience. The intricate texture of personal feelings is social too. It is from and about living with others in socialpatterns of love and work. But these can be newly elaborated and more complexthan the imposed forms.

Foucault for one assumes that this is impossible. For example, he says: "In theCalifornia cult of the self one is supposed to discover one's true self . . . thanks topsychological and psychoanalytic science which is supposed to tell you what yourtrue self is." [ 4 ] Foucault assumes it can only be some kind of science, sociallyimposed forms, that "tell you what your true self is."

Most political theories hold that the direction can only be one way: social controlprovides order for individual experience. There can be no orderly feedback,certainly not the more intricate feedback we actually find. Foucault thinks thatcreative feedback assumes a nonsocial individual, and rightly denies thatpossibility. But "subjectivity" is not the separated unsocial source he denies. Itsown order is also "social," but we cannot let that word mean only imposed form.Imposed form is not the only kind of order. And we can distinguish the other kind.

I report publicly verifiable measures of authentic psychotherapy steps distinct fromother manners of process. [ 5 ] I do not deny that much of what goes under thename of psychotherapy is mere social control. I do


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not rebut Foucault's critique of psychiatric power to control people. Coming fromCarl Rogers' work, many of us have been saying something like that for manydecades. We welcome Foucault's excellent critique of the medical and psychiatricprofession. The question is only whether it must be so. Or is there a distinctionbetween socially imposed form and another kind of social process?

But do not even now agree too quickly. We can distinguish this difference. But can

we be sure that our process will undo every imposed form we would wish tooverthrow if we could be aware of it? We cannot say that. Political analysis canshow us what we might otherwise never question. Conceptual thinking alone doesnot usually change us, but it has an essential role in the process I described. Butthis role of concepts differs from the usual. In our excerpt, her step ("Make roomfor me!") might not have come without her conceptual ethics of equality whichmade a conflict with her superiority feeling.

Theories, concepts and values do not merely float on an independent conceptuallevel. They may also enable a step of process. But when they do, what comes ismore intricate than the concepts were. We have seen that concepts and old formsdo not "determine" such a step, they do not impose their form on it. The process

can lead to rejection or modification of the very concept that helped the step tocome.

The process I describe does not eliminate controvery and pluralism. The varyingconcepts remain. But, despite their conflict, they can point up somethingexperienced. If we make the process central, conceptual pluralism does not destroyethics. Let me give a self-illustrating example. Aristotle concludes that we are notethically good until we enjoy doing good acts. Until then we are merely practicingat it, acting only from knowing what is right. Kant flatly contradicts this. He saysthat we are ethical only when we act out of duty. He says that even then we are"in danger" of doing it for the wrong reason, if we also enjoy it. Both views areright and needed. But we cannot simply merge them. That would only dull theclarity of thought. Each is systematically connected to other concepts that must notbe lost.

If only conceptual form is considered, ethics disintegrates into competingdogmatisms. This is largely the current state of ethics. But the conflictingconceptual systems must be retained; there is no way to "resolve" them on theirown level. Nor would we want only one system!

Of course we would rather be (and deal with) someone whose inclinations aregood. But, we must also be able to challenge what is

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sensed as good at a given moment. People with good inclinations becomeaccustomed to doing what "feels right," which is often superior to thinking. Thenthe day comes when they mistreat us. They can not see what is wrong; it "feelsright" to them, as usual. We must be able to reason with them, appealing tosomething other than their good inclinations. But neither can we expect mereargument to determine ethics. Our appeal must get the process moving again.

That is why ethics must involve both inclination and concepts. Neither can simplyimpose itself on the other. A finer cognition feeds back from the body's implicitorder in process steps. But a vital role is played by conceptual cognition (as theethics of equality did in our excerpt). The body is not chaos with merely imposedform. Neither is it all-wise so that we would not need to think. Both are needed tosee and change unconscious oppressive forms. That is one reason we cannot be

sure that this process will overthrow every unconscious oppressive form, orarrangement of life.

All we can saybut it is a lotis that this kind of process reveals a more intricateorder which can exceed and reorder existing forms. Imposed form is not the only


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Process Ethics and the Political Question

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