The Tavistock Programme: The Government of Subjectivity and Social Life
- 1 May 1988
- journal article
- research article
- Published by SAGE Publications in Sociology
- Vol. 22 (2) , 171-192
- https://doi.org/10.1177/0038038588022002002
Abstract
In contemporary western societies the subjective features of social life have become the object and target of a new expertise. The paper addresses the limitations of certain influential approaches to this phenomenon, in particular analyses framed in terms of `social control' and `medicalisation'. It offers an alternative framework based on three elements: firstly, a conception of government as a varying set of rationales and programmes which seek to align socio-political objectives with the activities and relations of individuals; secondly, the constitutive roles of psychological and managerial techniques and vocabularies. These are seen to be crucial in the formation of new ways of thinking about and acting on the social relations of the family and the workplace; thirdly, a notion of subjectivity as a capacity promoted through specific regulatory techniques and forms of expertise. This framework is utilised in the analysis of the Tavistock Clinic and Tavistock Institute of Human Relations to explore some of the fundamental transformations in twentieth century British society. Three `case studies' are provided: the mental hygiene movement in the 1920s and 1930s; the role of psychological expertise in the Second World War; and the links between industrial productivity, group relations and mental health forged in the immediate post-war period.Keywords
This publication has 21 references indexed in Scilit:
- The Fall of Public ManCapital & Class, 1987
- Beyond the Public/Private Division: Law, Power and the FamilyJournal of Law and Society, 1987
- Labor and Monopoly CapitalMonthly Review, 1974
- A HISTORY OF GROUP AND ADMINISTRATIVE THERAPY IN GREAT BRITAINPsychology and Psychotherapy: Theory, Research and Practice, 1958
- Changes in Accidents and other Absences with Length of ServiceHuman Relations, 1955
- Some Social and Psychological Consequences of the Longwall Method of Coal-GettingHuman Relations, 1951
- Transitional Communities and Social Re-ConnectionHuman Relations, 1947
- GROUP TECHNIQUES IN A TRANSITIONAL COMMUNITYThe Lancet, 1947
- The Uses of Psychology in War-TimeNature, 1941
- THE BIRTH OF SOCIAL PSYCHIATRYThe Lancet, 1940