Colonial Trauma and Postcolonial Anxieties

Book excerpt: Colonial Trauma and Postcolonial Anxieties argues that economic decisions reflect unconscious anxieties about survival and dignity experienced in a cycle of repeat trauma tracing back to the original trauma of loss in colonialism. Readers will understand how emerging economies evaluate the costs and benefits of key economic policies in the postcolonial era using a psychoanalytical framework. While there are psychoanalytic studies of the economy and finance from a western perspective, there have been no sustained psychoanalytic studies from the perspective of East Asian economies, the fastest growing in the world. Scholars will also find the methodology combining archival research with and field studies, including rare interviews with senior decision-makers useful in their own research since it is rare to find studies of social theory that are empirically rich. This book will be of interest to policymakers and scholars of political economy, international development, human geography, postcolonial studies, psychoanalysis, and area studies (Southeast and East Asia). The book can also be used as a text for graduate and upper level university courses.