BROADCASTS.com

"I decided I would\\xa0try to understand things psychologically because it seemed to me that the current wisdom that people\\xa0were\\xa0acting as rational actors\\xa0operating in their own best interests\\xa0didn\\u2019t actually fit the facts.\\xa0Many people and communities were doing things that were harmful to themselves.\\xa0 I thought,\\xa0\\u2018Well, one profession that spends a lot of its time exploring why individuals and\\xa0indeed\\xa0communities do things that harm themselves rather than operating in their best interest\\xa0is\\xa0psychiatry and indeed psychoanalysis\\u2019.\\xa0So\\xa0I\\xa0went into medicine and qualified in\\xa0medicine and then in\\xa0psychiatry\\xa0and later\\xa0I went into analysis and tried\\xa0to explore individual psychoanalytic work, but also group analysis, family therapy\\xa0-\\xa0any of the approaches that seemed\\xa0to me\\xa0would\\xa0deepen\\xa0our\\xa0understanding."\\xa0\\xa0

\\xa0

Episode Description:\\xa0John begins by describing the early family influences on his interest in hearing others\\u2019 points of view. He developed this orientation and eventually trained as a psychiatrist and then received training in psychoanalysis which he has brought to the many negotiations in which he has participated. He learned to appreciate the centrality of relationship building in his political work. We discuss the fundamentals of analytic listening as it applies in the political arena which includes the expectation that disruptions inevitably characterize the back and forth of these tense collaborations. He describes his ongoing work in monthly IPA-affiliated meetings that are devoted to considering how a psychoanalytic perspective may ease struggles in the international arena. We close with his explaining the meaning of his title of Lord.\\xa0

\\xa0

Our Guest:\\xa0John, Lord\\xa0Alderdice\\xa0FRCPsych\\xa0is a psychiatrist who served as leader of the Alliance Party of Northern Ireland for eleven years.\\xa0Dr.\\xa0Alderdice\\xa0played a significant role in negotiating the 1998 Good Friday Agreement. He then stood down as Party Leader and became the first Speaker of the new Northern Ireland Assembly. As the first Assembly\\xa0mandate was ending, he was appointed by the British and Irish Governments to be one of four international commissioners appointed to monitor security normalization and\\xa0close down\\xa0the illegal paramilitary activities in Ireland. He had been appointed in 1996 to the House of Lords\\xa0where he chaired the Liberal Democrat caucus during the Liberal/Conservative Coalition Government in the United Kingdom.\\xa0He was also for many years a psychoanalytical psychiatrist in Belfast where he established the Centre for Psychotherapy and a range of analytically informed trainings. Now retired from clinical work he is a Senior Research Fellow at Harris Manchester College, at the University of Oxford, and is the Director of the Centre for the Resolution of Intractable Conflict.\\xa0

\\xa0

Recommended Readings:\\xa0

Alderdice, John, Lord (2010) Off the couch and round the conference table, Chap 1, 15 \\u2013 32, in\\xa0Off the Couch \\u2013 Contemporary Psychoanalytic Applications,\\xa0ed Alessandra Lemma and Matthew Patrick, Routledge, London, and New York ISBN: 978-0-415-47615-7\\xa0

\\xa0

Alderdice, John, Lord, (2017) Fundamentalism, Radicalization and Terrorism Part I: Terrorism as Dissolution in a Complex System,\\xa0Psychoanal. Psychotherapy\\xa0\\xa0

\\xa0

Alderdice, John, Lord, (2017) Fundamentalism, Radicalization and Terrorism Part II: Fundamentalism, Regression and Repair,\\xa0Psychoanal. Psychotherapy,\\xa0

\\xa0

Alderdice, John, Lord (2021) On the Psychology of Religious Fundamentalism, Chap 11, 193 - 212, in\\xa0A Deeper Cut \\u2013 Further Explorations of the Unconscious in Social and Political Life, ed. David Morgan, Phoenix Publishing House, Bicester, UK ISBN-13: 978-1-912691-19-7\\xa0

\\xa0

Alderdice, John, Lord (2021) Conflict, Complexity, and Cooperation,\\xa0New England Journal of Public Policy: Vol. 33:\\xa0Iss. 1, Article 9.\\xa0