Growth and Guilt

by Luigi Zoja, Henry Martin (Translator)

The relentless exploitation of the earth's resources and technologys boundless growth are a matter of urgent concern. When did this race towards the limitless begin?
The Greeks, who shaped the basis of Western thinking, lived in mortal fear of humanity's hidden hunger for the infinite and referred to it as hubris, the one true sin in their moral code. Whoever desired or possessed too much was implacably punished by nemesis, yet the Greeks themselves were to pioneer an unprecedented level of ambition that began to reverse that tabu.
If it is true that no culture can truly repudiate its origins, and that gods who are no longer potent can vanish but still leave behind a body of myth which coninues to live and assert itself in modernized garb, then our concern with the limits of growth reflects something more than an awareness of new technological problems - it also brings to light a psychic wound a a feeling of guilt which are infinitely more ancient.

Genres: Psychology, Nonfiction

Paperback

First published January 1, 1993

About the author

Luigi Zoja Luigi Zoja Ph.D. (1943) is an Italian psychoanalyst and writer. He took a degree in economics and did research in sociology during the late 1960s. Soon thereafter he studied at the C. G. Jung Institute in Zurich. After taking his diploma, Zoja returned to Zurich to work at a clinic for several years. He maintains a private practice in Milan. He also practiced for two years in New York City, during a period that bracketed the terrorist attacks on New York and Washington, D. C. He has taught regularly at the Zurich Jung Institute, and also on occasion at the Universities of Palermo and Insubria. From 1984 to 1993, Zoja was president of CIPA (Centro Italiano di Psicologia Analitica), and from 1998 to 2001 was president of the IAAP (International Association of Analytical Psychology). Later he chaired the IAAP's International Ethics Committee. His essays and books have appeared in 14 languages.

Most of his essays interpret present-day predicaments (addiction, limitless consumption, the absence of the father, hatred and paranoid projections in politics, etc.) by placing them in the light of persistent ancient patterns, as expressed in myth and classical literature. Archetypal psychologist James Hillman has called Zoja an "anthropological psychologist" as one way of indicating the range and depth of his thinking.

Reviews

[Gabriela Shine · Rating 5 out of 5]

Scrisa cu mult rafinament si multa claritate, este dovada unei gandiri profunde ce se poate detasa de prezent pentru a strabate secole de istorie si perspective psihologice. O carte speciala despre psihologia limitei, despre hubris, despre nevoia omului modern de a-si restabili echilibrul, reevaluandu-si dimensiunile - de fiinta muritoare - si imbratisandu-si limitele, fizice si psihologice. Numai adevarul ne reda libertatea. Implinirea nu inseamna a cuceri, a dobandi si a depasi, ci mai degraba a trai plenar ceea ce esti, simti si faci. Grecii antici stiau ceva ce noi am uitat.

[Sara-Maria · Rating 4 out of 5]

'the seeds of european expansionism can be rediscovered in the passage from tragic thought to scientific and philosophical thought, which is also, accepting the terms of Nietzsche, the passage from the world of pessimism to the world of optimism' 105