Alienation from Self As a Virtue

This discussion addresses alienation as a psychological problem or “illness” that involves the separation of a subject (a self) from an object—either other objects or other selves, including one’s own self. Self-alienation is thus regarded as a problem as equally serious as alienation from the other, from one’s work, or from the means of production.

An existing interpretation of alienation as a psychological phenomenon suggests that alienation is a separation of self from both other selves and non-selves, and from itself. However, this assumption is problematic from a mirosociological or symbolic interactionist point of view. I propose that particular problems of modern society do not necessarily have their locus in social structures, but are instead associated with deficiencies in social selves, one of which is the lack of a capability for alienation-from-self. In this respect, self-alienation is not an individual problem, but rather a social problem, insofar as a self that is incapable of alienating from itself and looking at itself from without is not capable of cooperation and of playing cooperative games and social roles.

From this perspective, I qualify self-alienation and a return-to-self-as-other (me) in order to build a new and more sophisticated self (I-me)—which acknowledges that the other’s opinion is taken into account—as a social virtue that heightens social integration and builds interpersonal trust. I maintain that self-alienation, in any of its forms, does not necessarily contribute to loneliness, as is sometimes assumed. I instead argue that non-alienated or non-alienable selves, which apparently depict the ideal of authenticity, may be viewed from another perspective as self-enclosed, self-centered, self-sufficient, and unreflective. They thereby possess neither an opportunity to gain a modern type of complexity, nor the possibility to know themselves as a whole.