We are now living within a societal nightmare. While we insist upon living within the "specious present," we know that today's political nightmare--is not substantially different from the political nightmare's that preceded this one.

We see clearly--from the current example--that it is we human beings who create the nightmare. It is not something separate or apart from us. We are the source.

I'm a psychologist and historian--a scientist who studies the language of political leaders--whose rhetoric gives rise to collective, forms of violence (war and genocide). I'm an empiricist working "from the ground up" to reconstruct the throught processes--the phantasies and ideas--that give rise to ideologies enacted to generate as mass-murder.
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Richard Koenigsberg's Nations Have the Right to Kill is now available as an ebook at a special discounted rate as. Scroll down the page for information on purchasing, or simply click here.
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When I speak about "awakening from the nightmare" of history, I'm suggesting that it is possible to become aware of the phantasies and ideas--the "hidden narratives--that give rise to collective forms of violence.

Richard Koenigsberg received his Ph.D. in Social Psychology from the Graduate Faculty of the New School for Social Research.

AWAKENING FROM THE NIGHTMARE
OF HISTORY: Psychological Interpretation
of War and Genocide

by Richard A. Koenigberg

Read the complete paper here.

I. The Psychological Interpretation of Culture

A psychological approach to the study of society seeks to identify the sources and meanings of its cultural formations. For any ideology or institution, I pose the question: “Why does it exist?” To understand an element of culture requires uncovering the psychic function that it provides or performs. An ideology or institution comes into being, is embraced and perpetuated insofar as it does something (psychologically) for individuals within that society.

Nations Have the Right to Kill: Hitler, the Holocaust and War

Nations Have the Right to Kill is now available at a as at special discounted rate as ebook. For information on purchasing, click here.

“Koenigsberg’s ideas cut trenchantly through conventional, rationalized notions about culture, the nation, and war, and enable us to see through the psychic machinations of human institutions in utterly new ways.”   —Ruth Stein, New York University, author of For Love of the Father