Self-Help: The Making of Neosocial Selves in Neoliberal Society

Abstract

Throughout the last two decades, therapeutic practices have come to permeate society in various forms and fashions. Indeed, various authors have noted that we live in a world that may justly be characterized by an intensified and highly variegated preoccupation with the self (e.g., Giddens, 1991; Maasen, 1998; Rimke 2000, p. 61; Taylor, 1989). In addition to therapy proper, counseling and self-help have assumed increasing popularity. Journals, radio, television, Internet — wherever one looks, one finds yet another new version of (one-way) therapy and counseling. While the individual variants differ enormously as to their ambition, expertise, and impact, they all imply certain requirements in terms of a highly specific kind of communication: first, they are firmly based upon everybody’s capability to perform a demanding discourse called therapeutic communication. It entails our ability to present a problem to an expert, who will then help us, as a layperson, to solve that problem in various settings (be it short-term, long-term therapy or counseling). Second, they require that one knows when to seek professional help and how to choose among various offers on the market (you pick up the phone, click into the self-help chat, or buy a book). Third, in all cases you need to transfer the lessons learned in special settings (on the couch or in a group seminar) into your everyday life.