The Present State
of Latin America's Psychological Well-Being
José María Vigil

Spirit, soul, mysticism, spirituality: all express a part of our reality as human beings. The other part is matter, nature, flesh and the body. The spirit motivates, animates, inspires, arouses and lifts us up. The body roots us in the flesh, in the earth and in nature. Situated between these two poles is our psychology - the meeting place of realism and utopia, nature and history, the angel and the beast, and a profound psychosomatic unity.

We are incarnate spirits, rooted in the flesh and in nature. Because of this, our spirit has its own clock, its highs and lows regulated by the highs and lows of our own bodies and our psychology.

As it is with individuals, peoples (who can be defined as collective personalities) also have their own psychology, with highs and lows which are distinctively theirs. Where is this continent situated as regards this psychological clock; in other words, what psychological diagnosis could be made of Latin America at this time?

Collective Illnesses

An illness can be physical or psychological. Someone may have a healthy body but suffer from a psychological illness. This is also true with human groups. A community, a society, even a continent can all suffer from a collective psychological illness.

The social branch of psychoanalysis has extensively studied this phenomenon. It has shown that each society has patterns of behaviour that follow its psychological structures. Each of us may feel autonomous and original but in reality we are profoundly affected by the patterns of behaviour, thought structures, social imagination and collective drives that are frequently unconscious but which influence us by the simple fact that we live in this society. When these structures are damaged or have deteriorated, the society becomes sick and those who live in it all suffer from this illness by the mere fact of living in it.

In the 1960s and 70s it was said that the collective psychological illness in modern western society was neurosis. Today, in the 1990s, we hold that the collective psychological illness of Latin American society is depression.

The Roots of Depression

According to behaviourism, depression (in both humans and animals) results from subjects receiving, over a long enough period, negative stimuli which they cannot control or stop regardless of how much they change their behaviour. When this situation continues for too long, the level of tolerance is overstepped and subjects learn that there is no way out and that whatever they do, they will receive a negative stimulus. Thus, the subject, individually or collectively, learns that there is no point in making an effort; that it is better not to do anything, to resign oneself, or to run away. The subject also learns that not defending itself is the best method to avoid this series of punishments which has befallen it.

This is not a conscious process; it takes place outside of the field of personal awareness, at the deeper level of the unconscious which rebels and refuses to act. Then the subject suffers a syndrome, revealed by an assortment of symptoms, such as sadness, a desire to cry, loss of self-esteem, self accusation, hypochondria, suicidal thoughts, a narrowing of the field of consciousness, difficulties in concentrating, memory loss, withdrawal, insomnia and digestive problems. The subject does not make these decisions of its own volition; the body forces them upon itself by rebelling, by refusing to continue the struggle, by saying "enough". When all these symptoms are present, we can safely say that the subject is suffering a depression.

Our Continent

What has happened on our continent in the past years is structurally the same. Our people, despite their efforts, have suffered for too long the unmerited punishment of underdevelopment, poverty, hunger, war, external intervention, colonialism and neo-colonialism, repression and forced emigration. The events of 1989 and 1990, the actual failure of the popular hopes that had stirred such a deep mystique and had entailed so much bloodshed were the straw that broke the camel's back, the change of the epoch which exceeded the limits of tolerance. With it, our people finally learned what it is to be helpless. Something very profound, a voice from deep within our social body said "Enough!" and threw in the towel. A collective depression installed itself at this psychological moment in the life of the Continent.

The same symptoms as individuals experience occurred: disappointment, loss of self esteem, self accusation, demobilization, disorientation, loss of organization on the part of popular movements, depoliticization, an escape into spiritualism, loss of memory, withdrawal, psychosomatic problems, etc.

All of this, as with individual depression, was neither rational nor the result of conscious decisions. It was a syndrome that pitted the people against all of their convictions: a rebellion of the body.

Now that we are well into the second part of the 1990s, we can ask: what is the present state of this depression? what are we now experiencing? what is our diagnosis?

A Reactive Depression

There are two fundamental types of depression: endogenous, caused by factors within the subject (individual or collective) and reactive, occurring as a result of external factors. The first has an organic constitutional basis within the person, while the second is brought about by an outside situation that has interfered with the person's life.

Irrespective of what can occur in other continents, ours is clearly a reactive depression. It can be easily dated. It appeared almost simultaneously with the "change of epoch", a collapse of popular hope which had obvious psychological consequences.

A Case of Major or Minor Depression?

Generally speaking, reactive depressions are less serious than endogenous depressions since they do not arise out of peoples' constitutional structures but to events arising out of specific circumstances in their lifetime. In fact, in Latin America, depression is not an innate psychological trait. On the contrary, our continent is happy and festive, full of rebellion and utopian ideals with a great creative ability to confront problems, and with such a good sense of humour that it is not afraid to have a laugh at its own expense.

Nor is our depression caused by a centuries-old process that has gnawed away at the fundamental psychological make-up of our continental consciousness. Our continent is one that, more than any other, has always been very clearly in touch with its own feelings, displaying the most signs of its own identity, right up to today.

A Long- or Short-term Depression?

If history is always accelerating, today in the age of instant communication and exchanges among the continents, we can share and develop our continental experiences much more rapidly than those who preceded us decades or even centuries before. Who can deny that this depression will soon be overcome?

Because it is not constitutional, reactive depression often spontaneously goes into remission. One day our body, to whose dictates we have submitted gets used to the new situation and recuperates the vital energy it had lost. It returns to normal even without special therapy. Time heals everything. Who can say that this will not be the case with our Latin American depression?

A Pathological or Healthy Depression?

It may seem strange, but it is possible to talk about a healthy depression. Modern psychotherapeutic studies conceive of depression as nothing but a reactive psychological process whereby the life instinct is set in motion to block unbearable situations when an organism is exposed to them. Our body in this way sends a message which at first seems dysfunctional - depression. But this dysfunctionality is only short-term. In the long-term, depression is found to be the only way our body has of obliging us to take a global view of the situation and thereby preventing us from struggling in vain. Finally, depression (always remembering that we are speaking of the reactive type and at a level where it is not especially serious) is one of our instinct's important tricks for restoring our health and for getting back to work.

There are those who remain firm, steadfast and impervious to dismay and depression. They are our Latin American prophets, anonymous, hidden in the barrios, in the countryside, in the popular, feminist, indigenous, black, and labour movements. Like sentries, alone and exposed to wind and weather, they stood guard during the night and are now helping us to work through our traumas and heal our wounds, to rescue our memory and identity with the sure hope that daylight will come once again. A just and free society will dawn.

[Resume of the book Aunque es de noche. Hipótesis psicoteológicas sobre la Hora espiritual de AméricaLatina en los 90, by the same author (Edit. Envio, Managua, 1996) fax 505-277-2583.