The Productive Character

Abstract

This chapter explores the contributions of social and personality psychologists to the development of Cold War liberal philosophy and social theory. Psychologists helped to define “totalitarianism,” one of the central concepts of Cold War liberalism, as an expression of individual psychopathology – a result of the failure of people in a given society to develop a coherent, healthy sense of self. This state of psychological health, the antidote to totalitarianism, was often referred to as the “productive” character or personality and was defined by an individual’s capacity to express their selfhood in creative work. Cold War liberals identified myriad techniques to promote the productive character and discourage totalitarian psychopathology, including social-democratic policymaking, new childrearing methods, and the practice of both scientific research and spiritual searching. They also sought to develop productive characters in the supposedly psychologically immature societies of the postcolonial world, an elite-driven approach to social and economic development that laid the groundwork for the rise of neoliberalism and neoconservatism in the late twentieth century. The productive, anti-totalitarian personality, argued many Cold War liberal development experts and their neoliberal and neoconservative successors, was an entrepreneurial personality, the psychic wellspring of economic growth.

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