Introduction to Special Issue on Community Psychology and the Hermeneutics of Love

In this introduction to the special issue on humanistic community psychology and the hermeneutics of love, a context is provided for the emergence of a community psychology founded on a hermeneutics love. The origins of the concept are traced to the development of a humanistic community psychology program at Point Park University. The introduction also provides a basic overview of hermeneutics and its relevance and importance for humanistic psychology, especially as informed by the phenomenological and existential tradition of continental philosophy. The hermeneutics of love is shown to be especially indebted to Paul Ricoeur who identified a hermeneutics of suspicion as a common, interpretive style in thinkers including Marx, Freud, and Nietzsche. The hermeneutics of love is contrasted with the hermeneutics of suspicion and forms the basis for charitable interpretation in research that is in the service of social justice and the marginalized sociopolitical other.