Ressentiment: A Complex Emotion or an Emotional Mechanism of Psychic Defences?

Abstract

<em>Ressentiment </em>is central for understanding the psychological foundations of reactionary politics, right-wing populism, Islamic fundamentalism, and radicalism. In this article we theorise <em>ressentiment </em>as an emotional mechanism which, reinforcing a morally superior sense of victimhood, expedites two parallel transvaluation processes: What was once desired or valued, yet unattainable, is reassessed as something undesirable and rotten, and one’s own self from being inferior, a loser, is reassessed as being noble and superior. We establish negative emotions of envy, shame, and inefficacious anger as the main triggers of <em>ressentiment</em>, with their associated feelings of inferiority and impotence, which target the vulnerable self. We identify the outcomes of <em>ressentiment </em>as other-directed negative emotions of resentment, indignation, and hatred, reinforced and validated by social sharing. We map the psychological structure of <em>ressentiment </em>in four stages, each employing idiosyncratic defences that depend on the ego-strength of the individual to deliver the transvaluation of the self and its values, and finally detail how social sharing consolidates the outcome emotions, values, and identities in <em>ressentiment</em> through shallow twinship bonds with like-minded peers. Our interdisciplinary theoretical account integrates classic philosophical scholarship of <em>ressentiment</em> and its contemporary proponents in philosophy and sociology, which highlight envy as the prime driver of <em>ressentiment</em>; it also considers the sociological approaches that focus on the repression and transmutation of shame and its social consequences, as well as the psychoanalytic scholarship on psychic defences and political psychology models on the emotionality of decision-making. We conclude the article by elaborating the political implications of <em>ressentiment</em> as the emotional mechanism of grievance politics.

Grievance Politics: An Empirical Analysis of Anger Through the Emotional Mechanism of Ressentiment

“…According to Nietzsche (1885Nietzsche ( /1961 and Scheler (1915Scheler ( /1961, ressentiment is a largely unconscious experience which works primarily as a "psychic shield" from negative emotions and feelings of injustice and humiliation, as well as deprivation from the desired, with a shadow of inferiority. Salmela and Capelos (2021) offer a consolidated review of theories of ressentiment, and define it as a long-lasting compensatory emotional mechanism, triggered by envy, shame, or inefficacious anger, all involving a sense of self-reproaching victimhood. Unlike the short-lived character of anger, ressentiment has a lasting impact on the individual, as it involves a transvaluation of the self and its values.…”

“…One shortcoming of extant measures of ressentiment is that they are static, while emotional mechanisms are dynamic. Salmela and Capelos (2021) proposed the empirical measurement of ressentiment via the observation of defenses alongside its key markers and highlighted the value of the defenses of reaction formation (as the exaggerated opposition and preoccupation with the object of desire), splitting (the world is all good/the world is all bad; I am all good/the other is all bad), denial of facts (refusal to accept reality), projection (bad elements of the self are projected out), introjection (good elements of external objects are incorporated with the self), and mirroring/idealization (strong identification with the other as a mirror to oneself). While defenses operate at the level of individual psychology, they are supported and reinforced by public discourses in traditional and social media by opinion leaders and political entrepreneurs whose affective rhetoric contributes to the transvaluation process (Kazlauskaitė & Salmela, 2021).…”

“…These studies make an important distinction between prosocial and antisocial forms of political grievance. Salmela and Capelos (2021) theorize ressentiment as the emotional mechanism that transmutes the inputs of grievance politics into anti-social outputs of morally righteous indignation, destructive anger, hatred, and rage. Flinders and Hinterleitner (2022) discuss the decline of party politics and the rise of grievance politics.…”

“…Originating from Nietzsche (1885Nietzsche ( /1961 and elaborated by Scheler (1915Scheler ( /1961, it is applied in studies of extremism and fundamentalism (Posłuszna & Posłuszny, 2015;Žižek, 2008), Trumpism (Knauft, 2018;Wimberly, 2018), fanaticism (Katsafanas, 2022), right-wing populism (Salmela & von Scheve, 2017, reactionism (Capelos & Demertzis, 2018;Capelos & Katsanidou, 2018;Sullivan, 2021), narcissism (Demertzis, 2020), terrorism (Posłuszna, 2019(Posłuszna, , 2020, extremism (Mishra, 2017), and cynicism (Capelos et al, 2021;Halsall, 2005). Drawing from studies of emotional mechanisms and their key function of transforming an input emotion into a different output emotion (Elster, 1999;Salice & Salmela, 2022), Salmela and Capelos (2021) approach ressentiment as an emotional mechanism that transmutes political, social, or private grievances felt as deprivation of opportunity, injustice, humiliation, and lack of political efficacy, to anti-social emotional expressions of morally righteous indignation, destructive anger, hatred, and rage.…”

Online Trolls: Unaffectionate Psychopaths or Just Lonely Outcasts and Angry Partisans?

“…It is logical to expect that people like Trump and his supporters are also active and spread hostility online. Yet so-called "rednecks" and other populist supporters are also often seen as social "losers": individuals whose economic situation objectively worsened in the last decades (Gidron & Hall, 2017), who feel misunderstood, unjustly treated, disempowered, and excluded due to their beliefs (Abts & Baute, 2021;Hochschild, 2016), and who fuel ressentiment and reactionarism (Salmela & Capelos, 2021). This negative emotionality is channeled not only through populist support, but also vented on social media, for example by trolling out-party supporters (Bail, 2021)-thereby further fueling affective polarization (Bulut & Yörük, 2017).…”