The first of the two groups, the 2020 Analysis and Activism/Presidency team, formed in 2017 and began to imagine an international conference to be held in October, 2020 a few weeks before the United States Presidential election on the theme of “The Reality of Fragmentation and the Yearning for Healing: Jungian Perspectives on Democracy, Power, and Illusion in Contemporary Politics”. We chose two symbolic images to represent the opposite poles of fragmentation and healing, which, placed side by side, became the logo for the conference.

FRAGMENTATION:  A Parched and fragmented Earth.

HEALING:  Mpatamo or "pacification knot", from Ghana, West Africa, symbolizing forgiveness, reconciliation, interconnectedness, and healing.

Little did we know in 2017 how virulent the reality of fragmentation and how deep the yearning for healing would become by 2020. Although originally scheduled to be held live at the Brower Center in Berkeley, California, we realized in early 2020 that we would have to retreat to a virtual format which paradoxically permitted presenters from 17 different countries to be “present” to create an extraordinary conference that was surprisingly intimate and powerful in its impact.  In this special edition, ARAS is proud to present the papers from the 2020 Analysis and Activism/Presidency Conference.

Click here to access the online book.

 

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