We can also turn to the other end of the spectrum: societies in which there is considerable social dis-engagement. As I noted in my previous essay, the culture of disengagement involves a focus on individual rights (rather than on the collective responsibility found in an enmeshed society). A society in which the culture of dis-engagement is dominant is often the most tolerant of social deviance. This culture is most commonly found in societies where there is not a strong unifying tradition, where there is minimal power differential, and where people tend to be spread out from one another.
A society that tends toward disengagement is inclined to embrace an even more dis-engaging set of norms and expectations when confronted with diffuse anxiety (caused by wide-spread social change). Under these conditions, the dis-engaged society is likely to produce psychopathy. It is not the case of stricter enforcement of social norms (as is found in an enmeshed society); rather it is a case of psychopathy being caused or exacerbated by the isolation and alienation to be found in a disengaged society. I turn now to this alternative perspective on an assumptive world that focused on societal norms and structures.
Psychopathology and Alienation
One of the most profound and disturbing of the social deviant perspectives on psychopathy is offered by those who are identified as social critical analysts. Building on their own neo-Marxist foundation, these social critics turn to issues regarding the distribution of wealth and power in society. They are particularly inclined to focus on alienation—a term that is now being used widely by social scientists in general. While many of the latter group of scientists (psychologists and sociologists) attend primarily to the estrangement of human beings from one another in our modern world, or more philosophically, on the experiences of existential dread regarding life and death, the neo-Marxist social critics focus primarily on the workplace.
The Industrial, Corporate and Agrarian Worker
The Neo-Marxists point out how people during the industrial era (and increasingly in our contemporary world) become isolated from the product of their work. In modern corporations and large public and human service bureaucracies, the “owners” and leaders of an organization are the only ones who can truly take pride in the work being done. Even they are often isolated from the achievements – with stockholders somehow (and often quite indirectly) being the beneficiaries of organizational productive.
