Who am I in a traumatized and traumatizing society? - Franz Ruppert

How perpetrator-victim dynamics shape our lives and how we can free ourselves from them

In this book, trauma expert Franz Ruppert challenges the reader with the compelling question of how the endless cycle of psychological pain and violence can perpetuate itself. Based on his therapeutic work worldwide, he concludes that unresolved perpetrator-victim dynamics within individuals and between individuals continually create new perpetrators and victims.

Adults who were not welcome as children and not protected from violence often repeat their traumatic experiences with their children and in other relationships. A child who feels unwanted inevitably experiences damage to their identity. The experience is stored in the body's memory, laying the groundwork for further traumatization, often culminating in their own perpetration, which is traumatic for both themselves and others.

Ruppert demonstrates how this perpetrator-victim dynamic of individual members continues to expand the vicious cycle of violence, traumatizing a community. Entire societies can be permeated by trauma in this way, engaging in overt or covert violence, with far-reaching consequences for politics, the economy, climate, health, and world peace.

The most important question, however, is: who am I in a traumatized society that, with its perpetrator-victim dynamics, traumatizes me and others? None of us can save "the world." But we can begin to see through our own victim-perpetrator attitudes and live from our true identity, thus contributing to a society as trauma-free as possible.

Franz Ruppert
Dr. Franz Ruppert lectures in psychology at the Catholic Foundation School in Munich and works as a freelance psychotherapist. His identity-oriented psychotrauma theory and therapy (IoPT) is internationally renowned. He gives seminars worldwide, including annually in the Netherlands and Belgium. His numerous books on psychotrauma have been translated into many languages.

Dutch | 9789463160223 | 224 pages