O compromisso social da psicologia: um estudo sobre o desenvolvimento de um projeto crítico

Abstract

This work is a historiographical study developed with the aim of analyzing the social commitment of Brazilian psychology in the light of its development and understood as a critical project. The historiographical writing was based on dialectical historical materialism as a perspective for the production of historical reading, including the categories proposed by Antonio Gramsci: organic intellectuals, relations of force and hegemony. The documents analyzed in this work were gathered from literature review, including articles, books, dissertations, theses as well as from the mapping of events of the area of psychology such as the Mostras Nacionais de Práticas (National Exhibits of Practices) and editions of the Congresso Nacional da Psicologia (National Congress of Psychology), produced by Sistema Conselhos. Professional projects express principles of society projects and can be constructed by any category from an ideal image about itself and the effect it wishes to produce in the world. As a professional project, social commitment presents three dialectically interwoven dimensions: it is at the same time the condition of the project by providing the philosophical base in the sense of an organic ideology to the interests of the working classes, evidencing the alignment to a society project, as an alternative to the capitalist order; an element of the project, its public face, when it presents itself as a motto subsidized by the representative entities; and the broad designation of the project, which aggregates different political strategies to consolidate this perspective. Social commitment indicates the critical perspective as transversal stance to different personages and historical moments: initially, criticism towards type of population served and workplace; subsequently, towards instruments, theoretical models and methods used; and most recently in the discussion of the feasibility and risks taken by its adoption as a project in psychology. The constitution of the historical course of social commitment enabled us to conclude that this project intends to contribute to the transformation of society and, in its development, substantially transforms psychology