Introduction

In order to develop a view of emotional distress which is both helpful and true, one has, I believe, to turn prevalent understandings inside out. Instead of looking inward to detect and eradicate within ourselves the products of ‘psychopathology’, we need to direct our gaze out into the world to identify the sources of our pain and unhappiness. Instead of burdening ourselves with, in one form or another, the responsibility for ‘symptoms’ of ‘illness’, ‘neurotic fears’, ‘unconscious complexes’, ‘faulty cognitions’ and other failures of development and understanding, we would do better to clarify what is wrong with a social world which gives rise to such forms of suffering.