This book examines social processes and institutions from a psychoanalytic perspective. Drawing on the work of major analytic thinkers such as Klein, Winnicott, Fairbairn and Bion, it offers a framework for thinking about the way social processes and institutions form part of the individual¿s inner world, and how the imperatives of our inner worlds in turn shape our social and political lives. This allows us to gain an understanding of the role of the self in driving social conflict, and how social institutions can either force the hiding of the true self, or facilitate creative living.