Publications

If psychology is seriously to address the despair and anguish that increasingly afflict us all, it needs to develop 'outsight'. It needs to stop looking inside the head of each troubled individual that seeks its help and turn its gaze outwards. The causes of distress are not to be found in faulty or dysfunctional brains, but in the often toxic family circumstances, community settings, the workplace and the wider social world, with all its inequalities, injustices and environmental breakdown.

David Smail and his work
Editorial for special edition of the journal of critical psychology, counselling and psychotherapy
jcpcp, Volume 25, Number 2, Summer 2025: david smail and his work
David Smail Memorial Conference, Special Issue of Clinical Psychology Forum, September 2017
Introduction: Midlands Psychology Group
How inequality hollows out the soul: Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett
‘It’s not your fault’: Consciousness-raising as a reversal of magical voluntarism: Mark Fisher
The rich, the rich, we’ve got to get rid of the rich: Lisa Mckenzie
Understanding power in order to share hope: A tribute to David Smail: Jan Bostock
Compassionate solidarity: Drawing links between the work of David Smail and Cuban psychology: Steve Melluish
The promise (and potential pitfalls) of a public health approach in clinical psychology: David Harper
The necessary ambivalence of David Smail: A critical realist reflection: David Pilgrim
Schools, wellbeing and clinical psychology: Julia Faulconbridge
Working across boundaries in services for children, young people and families: Iyabo Fatimilehin
Putting Smail’s ideas into practice: Introducing MAC-UK and the INTEGRATE approach: Peddie, J.Jones-Hewitt, K.Steadman, S.McGillivary, R.Foss, M.Hatton, P.Casale, L.Zlotowitz, S.
Speaking our minds as clinical psychologists: Lucy Johnstone
What then must we do? Craig Newnes
Reflections on organising the power, interest and psychology conference: Midlands Psychology Group
Power, Interest and Psychology: developing David Smail’s ideas, 12th and 13th November 2015, Birmingham
Jan Bostock: Understanding power in order to share hope
Dave Harper: From the individual to the social: The promise (and problems) of a public health approach to distress
Dave Pilgrim: On The Necessary Ambivalence In The Work of David Smail
Midlands Psychology Group: IAPT: Interest, Austerity, Psychological Therapy
Lucy Johnstone: Speaking our minds as clinical psychologists
Iyabo Fatimilehin: Working across boundaries in services for children & families
Special Issue of Clinical Psychology Forum, No 256, April 2014: Draft Manifesto for a Social Materialist Psychology of Distress
Editorial for the special issue (Midlands Psychology Group). Clinical Psychology Forum, No. 256, April 2014
Draft Manifesto for a Social Materialist Psychology of Distress (Midlands Psychology Group). Clinical Psychology Forum, No. 256, April 2014
Misery is more than brain chemicals (Barbara Riddell). Clinical Psychology Forum, No. 256, April 2014
The ethics of psycho-policy (Lynne Friedli). Clinical Psychology Forum, No. 256, April 2014
From Ideology to Good Sense Psychology (East Midlands Critical and Community Psychology Group). Clinical Psychology Forum, No. 256, April 2014
So what do we need to do? (Anne Cooke and friends). Clinical Psychology Forum, No. 256, April 2014
Continuing the conversation (Dave Harper). Clinical Psychology Forum, No. 256, April 2014
A political-representational crisis (Jan Burns). Clinical Psychology Forum, No. 256, April 2014
Is the MPG Manifesto consistent with continued support for clinical and counselling psychology? (Jim Orford). Clinical Psychology Forum, No. 256, April 2014
Special Issue of The Psychologist, Vol 27, No 4, April 2014: Charting ‘the mind and body economic’
Charting the ‘mind and body economic’ (Midlands Psychology Group)
Austerity in the University (Ian Parker)
Inequality and the next generation (Gary Thomas)
Neoliberal austerity and unemployment (David Fryer and Rose Stambe)
The impact of austerity on a British council estate (Carl Harris)
Draft Manifesto for a Social Materialists Psychology of Distress. Journal of Critical Psychology, Counselling and Psychotherapy, Vol 12, No 2, June 2012, 93-107
Psychotherapy and Politics: uncomfortable bedfellows? Group Analytic Contexts, Politics Special Issue, December 2011, Issue No 54, pp 9-17
Response of the Midlands Psychology Group to Hassall and Clements. Clinical Psychology Forum. No 217, January 2011, 32-34
Post qualification training in selective ignorance. Clinical Psychology Forum. No 212, August 2010, 46-51
Welcome to NICEworld. Clinical Psychology Forum. No 212, August 2010, 52-56
Blissed Out Britain is Back in Business. Clinical Psychology Forum. No 184, April 2008, 52-55
Our Big Fat Multi-Million Pound Psychology Experiment. Clinical Psychology Forum. No 181, January 2008, 34-37
Questioning the science and politics of happiness. The Psychologist. Vol 20, No 7, July 2007
Unhappiness is Inevitable. The Guardian, 28.8.2006
Clinical Psychology Forum Special Issue. No.162, June 2006
other publications by mpg members
(more coming soon!)
the tour de nice and the art of deception
mike fox and the poverty tourists
what did david smail really think?
Team of one (interview in the psychologist)
Team of one (interview in mad in the uk)
Four-part series on Neurodiversity, by john cromby and lucy johnstone, ON mad in the uk
Part 1: neurodiversity-what exactly does it mean?
Part 2: Are we all neurodivergent nowadays?
Part 3: Neuro-authenticity, neuro-identities, and the neuro-industry
Part 4 Neurodiversity: New paradigm or Trojan Horse?

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