The desire for growth is one of the most enduring fantasies in contemporary culture. It pervades how we think about success, development, innovation—and it continues to structure political and economic systems, even as the limits of the planet are increasingly visible.
But what happens when this fantasy meets its limit? And how might we make such limits not only bearable, but desirable?
Together with my colleague Dr Sophia Léonard, we will present our paper “It’s (not) the mother (earth)” at the Annual Meeting of the International Society for the Psychoanalytic Study of Organisations (ISPSO) on Saturday, June 28, 2025, at 9:30 a.m. in Philadelphia. More about the conference here.
Our starting point is a paradoxical one: While the ecological crisis requires collective renunciation of certain libidinal satisfactions—such as consumer excess, boundary transgressions, or the fantasy of limitlessness—there is little evidence that this renunciation is taking place on a meaningful scale. If anything, the current cultural climate appears to push even further into denial, repetition, and displacement.
This raises a crucial question for psychoanalysis and for organisations: How can we work with the unconscious dynamics that sustain destructive fantasies—without simply negating or moralising them?
BETWEEN TRANSGRESSION AND PROHIBITION: A LACANIAN FRAMEWORK
Our paper explores how the structure of negation—both linguistic and symbolic—can offer a way to reframe limits as something that is not only necessary but also enjoyable. Drawing on Lacan’s theory of the four discourses, we analyse how different social formations (authority, knowledge, desire, and analytic listening) position the subject in relation to prohibition and enjoyment.
In each discourse, we find a different strategy for dealing with the drive: from mastering it, to rationalising it, to questioning it endlessly, or—to put it in psychoanalytic terms—allowing it to speak.
We argue that negation can function as a compromise formation, one that offers the subject an imaginary satisfaction while simultaneously enforcing symbolic boundaries. Classic public campaigns—such as “Don’t Litter” or “No Smoking”—already employ this strategy, staging a transgressive image and then withdrawing it through prohibition, creating a momentary satisfaction in the act of refusal itself.
In this sense, the ecological limit need not appear as deprivation—but as a shared site of symbolic identification, a way to inscribe boundaries into the social bond through a new libidinal economy.
JUSTICE, PLEASURE, AND THE WORK OF DESIRE
From a psychoanalytic point of view, justice cannot simply be about laws and policies. It must also address the distribution of enjoyment—who gets to transgress, who must restrain, who suffers the consequences. Freud and Lacan have both shown that desire does not align neatly with morality or rationality; it requires symbolic work.
Our paper proposes that the work of climate justice must take this symbolic dimension seriously. Not only by setting external limits, but by reshaping the fantasies that surround them. By allowing the subject to recognise—and perhaps enjoy—the limit, we may be able to foster a more sustainable and ethical relation to collective life.
We look forward to the exchange in Philadelphia and to conversations with colleagues across disciplines. For those who are interested in how psychoanalysis can contribute to questions of sustainability, justice, and organisational transformation: we hope this paper offers a useful lens.
If you’d like to learn more, you are welcome to contact me directly—or attend our session at ISPSO AM2025.
ISPSO Annual Meeting 2025
Theme: Justice, Organisations, and Psychoanalysis
🗓 Saturday, June 28, 2025 – 9:30 a.m.
📍 Philadelphia, USA