Politicizing the Politics of Postmodern Social Psychology

Abstract

The paper considers the postmodern turn in social psychology, offering an account of similarities and differences between postmodern social psychology and more `standard' versions of social psychology. Various possible versions of postmodern social psychology are put to the test. The argument is made that the institutional construction of postmodern social psychology forces it to keep separate the following themes: the human and the non-human, the biological and the social, surveillance and self-realization, government and forms of ethical comportment. These dualisms can be understood in new ways through a reconceptualization of technology in postmodern social psychology. Our critique is intended to focus attention on the political implications of a postmodern social psychology which understands itself as a self-consciously `better' psychology.