ISPSO Annual Meeting

 

The dark side of competition : psychoanalytic insights

 

Title : The impact of organisational structures on people’s violence.

 

Abstract :

The problems of competition can be either aggravated or reduced by the management of the organisation. Indeed, the very structure of the organisation itself may well be contributing to increased internal violence, creating an extremely negative environment for its people. This in itself may then lead to the development of competition, in order to find an outlet for the excessive violence inherent in the system.

Following observations over the past few years into violence in a wide range of large and small organisations, in both the private and public sectors, we have reached the following conclusion :

That there is a greater level of innate violence in public sector institutions than in private companies.

Content :

What could explain the difference?

We considered a parallel between villages and public institutions and, on the other hand, between private organisations and big cities. Villages are fixed areas where people do not move, the same as in many public sector institutions where employees might work all their life. In this environment, the internal violence of the system cannot express itself though job mobility and staff turn-over. Violence gets “old” and focussed back on itself, like a death wish. The means to externalise this innate violence becomes blocked, and in the majority of cases its intensity is greater than that found in private companies. This lack of movement leads to greater rigidity, and increasing focus on the internal ‘nervous system’ that can introduce lots of diseases into the organisation in the same way as a cancer invades a body.

Sometimes clear emulation facilitates the elimination[1] of violence, but in public institutions, most of the time, such expressions are forbidden. Everyone behaves in a very polite manner and exchanges are very courteous, but the need to criticise, the frustration and the disagreement are there as in every social group. Without any rules to deal with this internal violence the group focuses inwards on itself, in a similar way that in the past (before the big expansion of transport encouraged mobility) a village’s surplus violence was externalised onto someone identified as the scapegoat. Thus the foreigner and stranger are the targets for such attacks. This in turn creates a regular pattern of symbolic sacrifice, and pushes people not to confront the situation because they fear to be the next target / scapegoat.

On the other hand, this does not mean that violence doesn’t exist in a private environment, it takes other forms and the origins are different. We will  develop this argument during the presentation.

This specific situation of a public institution or family companies where internal changes are small, challenges the organisation with the difficult question : does it want to consider its dark side ? That raises an additional problem. The normative system of the organization tries to eradicate any kind of problem. The quality system is looking for zero mistakes and to avoid any risk, (driven by the politics of zero risk and regular documents about eradication of violence as if it was a virus!).

The main problem that has been found is that the human being is ambivalent, and based on positive feelings, motivations, intentions as well as on endemic violence. We can consider many causes, to explain human violence (that the other person is perceived unconsciously as a critical threat to life, that he is also an innate threat because he is different, all of which can give rise to problems of fear and alienation.  The list is long if we are to review the psychological and sociological causes of human violence. The reality is that we, as human beings, can either create the best or the worst for ourselves. We are the only predators on earth that might destroy themselves.

So organizations wish to totally avoid the problem of violence because it causes so many difficulties. However, when we deny a reality it needs to appear anyway, so the more we contain the violence and impede its ability to surface, the more it needs to appear. Thus the dark side of organizations is real, and the main question is : how does a company face it?

An organisation which decides to deal with its internal violence makes the “choice” of the life wish and develops more diverse behaviours in which confronting violence has its place.

This is because there is an incorrect representation of Eros and Thanatos. Eradicating violence does not indicate progressing on side of Eros. It is cutting out one of the main impulses that can be changed into positive aspects such as creativity for instance. Violence might create Thanatos, but it might also demonstrate the dark side of the Eros libido which is not recognised, or accepted in both its aspects.[2]

Then, in public insitutions the weight of the death wish is so strong that it reduces its ability to be creative, diminishes individual initiative, and leads to a lack of confidence between people. Fear itself develops, blocking thinking and action. Our concern is that these diseases are much more developed in public insitutions than in private organisations. The fixed environment and the lack of “future” creates for some people an aggressiveness based on renunciation that has to express itself somewhere. The majority of people focus this violence against themselves, most of the time unconsciously.

A company, whether it is public or private, might cope with its dark side and inner violence by developing spaces, times and opportunities for meeting and dialogue. These need to be the opportunity to get to know each other and so understand differences, to enhance the areas of common ground between people and times, and not encourage competition. And above all to diminishing the fears of the other person, who was before always perceived as a threat, in order that they can be considered as a huge source of wealth. This means that each person can be considered as a positive resource,  and when linked together with others this can create a very attractive collective contribution. This then is the intelligent organisation. After a period of collective ‘mind intelligence’, there then develops ‘heart intelligence’ combining emotions, human qualities and interpersonal factors, providing the means to achieve expansion, innovation, added value and so the key to the company’s  growth and success.

Facing inner violence and dealing with the dark side of ourselves and of organisation means developping individual and collective autonomy, in the psyhological meaning. More mature the people are, more able they are to decide what to do with their dark side… and then they will chose emulation rather than competition. One is constructive as the other one is destructive, especially for any groups as it enhances violence in the long run.[3]

This abstract is based on research carried out in various companies and the result has been articles published in Journal du Psychologue and Expansion Management Review.