Lois Shawver's Notes and Overview of  
Signs of Struggle in the Postmodern Era 
by  Jeffrey Guterman 

Jeffrey Guterman is a PMTH member who is writing prolifically.  These are my notes on a paper titled "Signs of Struggle in the Postmodern Era," available at: http://www.gate.net/~rational/struggle.html. 

Let me caution you that my reading is critical, but I have tried to give a fair rendition of his ideas, and this overview is not intended to give an accounting of my criticism of the paper.  It is just that I hope that my criticism does not cause me to write my overview in an unfair way.  Jeffrey is obviously an open-minded theorist who has the remarkable and precious ability to change his mind. Please let my words introduce you to this paper, but let him correct my misconceptions in discussion as he introduces you to himself. 

This paper begins with the  standard distinction between social constructionism and constructivism.  The author says that: 
 

constructivism ... contends that knowledge is the result of our own (i.e., subjective) cognitive processes" 
and, in contrast, 
 
social constructionism ...holds that we create our ideas in conversations with other people and, hence, knowledge is an intersubjective phenomena.
But Guterman, nevertheless, lumps constructivism and social constructionism together calling them both subjectivist epistemologies that are are self-contradictory, at least as far as therapy theories are concerned.  For example, they are self-contradictory, Guterman holds, in that they propose to offer a more effective therapy for clients even though they do not believe in an objective reality. 

He says: 
 

Contradictions can ... be found insofar as some proponents of constructivism and social constructionism, despite their subjectivist positions about the nature and limits of knowledge, have claimed that their clinical 
theories are more effective than so-called traditional models. 
So, what does Guterman want us to do?  I think that his  thesis is that Albert Ellis's theories are more valid than much of the more "subjectivist" theories such as SFT and CLS because Ellis's work is not not internally contradictory in a way these subjectivist theories are. 

What are Ellis' theories?   We are told, that unlike SFT and other postmodern therapies, Ellis generally defines the client's problems from the therapist's framework (using "formal" rather than "informal" characterizations of the problem).   Behaviors that are "self-defeating" are simply labeled "irrational."  Behaviors that are "self-helping" are labeled "rational."  The client, reasonably enough, is encouraged to become "more rational." 

Although Guterman favors Ellis over more "subjectivist" schools today, this has not always been the case .  In the past, Guterman, too, talked of co-constructing clinical realities (Guterman, 1994).  More recently, however, Guterman sees that Ellis has an epistemology that allows for both subjectivism and an independent reality, and this agrees with Guterman's sense of things Guterman, 1996).  In fact,  Guterman now feels he is guilty of having misrepresented Ellis thinking. 

Today, Guterman feels that Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy (i.e., REBT) is preferable to postmodern theories such as SFT because REBT  is more solution focused and more elegant.  Guterman says: 
 

If we endorse the REBT theory that problems  are largely caused by irrational beliefs, then 
the solution-focused approach of deferring  to clients' informal content is inelegant. 
References 

 Guterman, J. T. (1994). A social constructionist position for mental health counseling.  Journal of Mental Health Counseling, 16, 226-244. 

 Guterman, J. T. (1996). Reconstructing social constructionism: A reply to Albert Ellis. Journal of Mental Health Counseling, 18, 29-40. 
 
 
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