Lebanon: A Living Example of Learned Helplessness
Opinion Analysis by Fadi Salahedin, Contributor
February 15th, 2021
According to the American Psychological Association learned helplessness is “a phenomenon in which repeated exposure to uncontrollable stressors results in individuals failing to use any control options that may later become available.” This concept can be applied in the psychoanalysis of many social and political situations especially in the contexts of continuous popular distress and hierarchical complexities. As we know the political/ social/ economic exposures shape the psyche of the human being and alter the collective consciousness of the population. This phenomenon can be observed in precarious situations in which the economy, political stability, and socio-ethnic relations are collectively imposing continuous anguish on the majority of the population. The constant setbacks and perceived power differences and uncontrollability correlate with the occurrence and reinforcement of collective learned helplessness. This creates a vicious cycle of passivity and pervasive refusal to act on the stressor which increases the duration and intensity of it feeding back into the cycle of learned helplessness. In this article. I will be tackling the subject in the context of Lebanon, the predisposition of the country and the population to develop such a phenomenon, the living examples of it, and how this condition can be tackled through civic, humanitarian, and social activism and the role of online platforms in responding to it.
Lebanon, a country shaped and shattered with trauma, has endured a civil war lasting from 1975 to 1990 resulting in deaths, destruction, and collective and personal trauma beyond measure. This sectarian-division-fueled civil war has left a lasting impact on the mental state of the population. According to Farhood, et. al (1993) the stress factors experienced in the Lebanese population during the civil war range between direct exposure to violence including armed clashes, destruction of properties, etc. Another aspect was the displacement experiences by almost 30% of the Lebanese families. Moreover, the other indirect stressors were the daily struggles and hassles, uncertainty, cuts in electricity, food, water, and other essential needs. Another important stressor was the economic collapse and inflation that reached 700% in 1987 which resulted in families lacking the ability to accommodate themselves with their basic needs and the abrupt changes of social classes bringing about more distress. Leaving the population with numerous mental health issues ranging from depression to anxiety and PTSD, the war has tainted the individual and collected spirits of the people who experiences it, and even those who came afterwards to experience its outcomes that ranged from a shattered unsustainable economy, a sectarian government, an uncertainty of the future of the country to a constant fear from a potential-civil-war monster that roams about the country every now and then. Leaving the people a feeling of weakness and emotional exhaustion. Another major event in the history of Lebanon is the Israeli invasion to Lebanon in 1982 which traumatized and shattered a country that was already in pieces. Having had the same expected results from a war on the psychological wellbeing of a population, after the end of this conflict the Lebanese population has been living in a state of uncertainty and indirect (and sometimes direct) war with Israel. Sharing borders with a country that keeps breaking treatises and violating the air and land of Lebanon has been a major stressor in weakening the will and breaking the spirit of the population.
Furthermore, other conditions have participated in increasing the stress and have disabled the efforts to make changes. The authoritarian, kleptocratic, sectarian, and excluding approach to authority which has been providing a contradictory and complex discourse and striving to weaken the people’s will. Using such tools as giving sectarian narratives for Lebanon (past, present, and future), delaying the formation of government, ensuring continuous external interference has been shunning the people from making their own decisions and shattering the country into pieces that are interdependent yet extremely externally dependent. Furthermore, a de facto culture of unemployment, refugee crisis, widespread corruption over different state agencies has led the Lebanese citizen into a spiral of consecutive disappointments and failures.
After the start of the nationwide protests on the 17th of October 2019, the Lebanese people began to regain hope. The protests demand a secular state, a new government, investigations about the long lasting and deeply rooted corruption and serious accountability, better living conditions, civil rights, and many more demands. The protests despite what many might say were a solid uprising powered by the youth in pursuit of a multifaceted revolution that takes no lies, no hypocrisy, and driven with the genuine desire for change. However, according to Amnesty International “the largely peaceful protests since October 2019 have been met by the Lebanese military and security forces with beatings, teargas, rubber bullets, and at times live ammunition and pellets.” After that the population was profoundly exhausted with a continuously deteriorating economy and a nation spread health crisis that accompanied the covid-19 pandemic leaving the country with more than 2500 deaths and a tarnished health sector. This has take a great toll on the spirit of the population, the youth in particular pushing the revolution backwards and increased the sense of powerlessness and diminishing the perceived ability and potential of change.
The most recent hit was in the Beirut Blast on the 4th of August which according to Amnesty had “killed at least 190 people, injured more than 6,500, and left an around 300,000 people homeless.” This explosion (caused by the obvious governmental incompetence and corruption) shocked what was left of the people’s faith. All these conditions have created the perfect recipe for a population with a majority that feels the need to be led, that feels helpless and hopeless. As all the previous efforts have been faced with extreme events ranging from war to economic collapse to an explosion rendering the people more psychologically fragile than ever. It is important to note that all the times the people have tried to change their lives in their own country they were faced with extreme and violent force be it psychological or physical that was beyond their control and much bigger than their ability to respond. It is worthwhile to note that Lebanon is one of the countries that are most dependent on humanitarian aid and nongovernmental organizations, and the funds provided by the UN and the World Bank. This has moved the general trend of the Lebanese population into a behavior of consumption and passivity. Noting that “the ways in which humanitarian assistance is provided, …, may foster what is known as a dependency syndrome,” which was noted by Bosankić, N. (2019) in Bosnia and Herzegovina in which the transition that this country is going through after the war is “characterized by dependence on humanitarian aid and by major challenges regarding employment.”
In Lebanon, after these multiple disastrous events and the unparalleled care with which the political regime has been devaluing the people, depriving them from exposure and participation in the future-making of their country, and carefully nurturing a sense of desperation. The people started (although this has been going for a long time now) manifesting the symptoms of learned helplessness ranging from continuous pessimism and lack of belief in change to passivity (reinforced with the continuous external aid) and disengagement. This might be argued against with the relief efforts by the people after the explosion, however, in terms of political engagement, the people are yet to believe they are capable of changing the current political regime and being effectively engaged in the government. Another important symptom of this phenomenon is the constant and increasing immigration of the Lebanese people into more developed countries, and this was noticed especially after the Beirut blast and the Covid-19 crisis that led the people into giving up and leaving for a better life and a better future that they cannot guarantee themselves and they children with in Lebanon.
In conclusion, after discussing this phenomenon and touching on the risk factors for developing it, it can only be said that the people need to be aware of this phenomenon and take proactive effort to fight against it. We need to address the causes and proactively and collectively tackle them, for example, we need to ask yourself is the humanitarian aid received from various sources what Lebanon and the Lebanese people need as the seemingly perpetual dependence on it has done nothing but prolong the status quo and amend the collective behaviour into passivity and inactiveness? Such issues need to be combated at the root level starting from reshaping the consciousness of the people and the popular mentalities and trends and most importantly make profound behavioural changes on the individual and population levels. It is also important to address the role of social media in breaking the reinforcement cycle of learned helplessness through exposure and highlighting the incidents where people of the same background and the same condition managed to act and participate. Yet, the most important remedy is to effectively engage the people in the future planning and future-shaping governmental efforts. The people need to make the decisions and need to see these decisions being enacted in order to break the monotonous cycle.
References
Bosankić, N., Mešić, E., & Šošić, B. (2019). The floating pumpkin syndrome: Forced migration, humanitarian aid, and the culture of learned helplessness. Journal of Balkan and Near Eastern Studies, 21(1), 61-73. doi:10.1080/19448953.2018.1532685
Farhart, C. E. (2017). Look who is disaffected now: Political causes and consequences of learned helplessness in the U.S (Order No. 10624394). Available from ProQuest Central; ProQuest Dissertations & Theses Global. (2305842129). Retrieved from https://search-proquest-com.ezproxy.aub.edu.lb/dissertations-theses/look-who-is-disaffected-now-political-causes/docview/2305842129/se-2?accountid=8555
Farhood, L., Zurayk, H., Chaya, M., Saadeh, F., Meshefedjian, G., & Sidani, T. (1993). The impact of war on the physical and mental health of the family: The lebanese experience. Social Science & Medicine (1982), 36(12), 1555-1567. doi:10.1016/0277-9536(93)90344-4
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https://maps.moph.gov.lb/portal/apps/opsdashboard/index.html#/d19be998323548278e088076d46d24f8