The silence in a radical field

Document Type

Article

Source of Publication

American Journal of Community Psychology

Publication Date

9-29-2026

Abstract

This first-person account interrogates the silence of mainstream community psychology in the face of the ongoing genocide in Gaza. We confront the gap between the field's stated commitments to social justice, prevention, and liberation, and its complicity through inaction. Silence is not neutrality but alignment with power, reflecting the colonial foundations and whiteness that structure mainstream psychology. Drawing on the tradition of bearing witness as a critical research methodology, we came together through a conference session and developed this account through collective dialogue, iterative exchange, and transnational solidarity. Organized thematically, the article asks four central questions: (1) What does mainstream community psychology's silence on Palestine say about our commitments, values, and usefulness?; (2) Why is Palestinian resistance pathologized as deviance rather than recognized as dignity?; (3) What is the purpose of theory if not applied in moments of urgent crisis?; and (4) What will mainstream community psychology claim it stood for when genocide was broadcast in real time? We ground our critique in lived realities across West Asia, Africa, Europe, and exile. The account is a refusal of complicity, a challenge to measure the field's worth not by rhetoric but by courage and solidarity in the struggle for liberation.

ISSN

0091-0562

Publisher

Wiley

Disciplines

Social and Behavioral Sciences

Keywords

community psychology, decoloniality, liberation, Palestine, silence and complicity

Scopus ID

105052017195

Indexed in Scopus

yes

Open Access

no

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