Search Results
The metaphor of the casino, with its associations of risk, uncertainty and illusion resonate at different levels of the contemporary cultural and political imagination where notions of chance and luck–together with the arbitrariness of being either a ‘winner’ or a ‘loser’ are pervading themes. This article discusses the notion of casino culture as a psycho-cultural formation and its relationship to the emergence of what I call ‘casino politics’. The article deploys a psycho-cultural approach that combines cultural and political analyses with object relations psychoanalysis in order to examine the cultural and unconscious investments that underpin the ideology of casino culture and its politics – particularly in the contemporary context of Brexit politics in the UK and Donald Trump’s Presidency in the US, where manic fantasies associated with gambling are mobilised as a defence against loss and uncertainty.
This article deploys a new psycho-political approach to examine the relationship between female political leadership and the emotionalisation of political culture by focusing on the case study of the media coverage of the former UK Prime Minister Theresa May. The article argues that the emotional turn in political culture is a gendered phenomenon because it reinforces deeper fears and fantasies about irrational femininity and the inherent instability of female political leadership and women in the public sphere.
Women in political leadership have been the topic of much discussion since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, with a number of women in executive office being praised for their empathic approach. The pandemic has raised questions about the role of women in political leadership at a time of crisis and the drivers behind the feelings they evoke. Drawing on online reflective focus groups with participants mainly from the United Kingdom during the COVID-19 national lockdowns, this article explores the feelings and affective responses evoked from seeing women in political leadership roles at a time of crisis. The focus groups highlighted the conflict that participants felt at seeing women political leaders navigating crisis situations, with expected displays of empathy at the forefront of discussions. The findings also suggest that, in order to be trusted, women political leaders must still overcome gendered expectations about their authority and warmth. The participants felt conflicted when evaluating the leadership styles of women in politics and grappled with notions of trust and authenticity. The article provides new psychosocial insights into the way we think and feel about women political leaders and highlights the complex gendered terrain that women in political leadership have to navigate.
