The Perils of a Public Intellectual

In 1939 George W. Hartmann was Chairman of the Society for the Psychological Study of Social Issues (SPSSI) and a prominent activist-scholar. By the end of World War II, his teaching career and psychological health lay in ruin, and he never reestablished his influence as a psychopolitical expert. Thisarticle traces the rise and fall of Hartmann's career and its unique mixture of Gestalt psychology, socialism, and anti-Communism. Unpublished correspondence, family papers, and files from the FBI and other intelligence agencies are used to recreate Hartmann's political personae—including Socialist electoral candidate, chairman of Peace Now, and leader of the War Resisters League. His life as a public intellectual is used to reflect upon the nature of psychological expertise at midcentury.