Fred Newman

Fred Newman is a philosopher, psychotherapist, playwright and political activist, the creator of therapeutic modality called Social Therapy.

Born in 1935 in the Bronx, New York, Newman grew up in a Jewish, working-class neighborhood. He served in the Army, including a stint in Korea, and later enrolled in The City College of New York on a G.I. Bill scholarship.

Newman received his Ph.D. in analytic philosophy and foundations of mathematics from Stanford University in 1962. Following his graduate work at Stanford, Newman taught at several colleges and universities in the 1960s, including The City College of New York, Knox College, Case Western Reserve University, and Antioch College.

Marxisism, influences, and views
Newman considers himself a Marxist, a philosophy which he incorporated into his therapeutic approach in an attempt to address the alienating effects of societal institutions on human development. In his earliest statement of his attempt to develop a Marxist approach to emotional problems, Newman wrote in 1974:

"Proletarian or revolutionary psychotherapy is a journey which begins with the rejection of our inadequacy and ends in the acceptance of our smallness; it is the overthrow of the rulers of the mind."

In more recent years, Newman (along with his primary collaborator, Lois Holzman) has incorporated other influences, including the 20th century philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein, Aleksey Leontyev's and Sergei Rubinshtein's activity theory, and the work of early Russian psychologist Lev Vygotsky.

Newman and Holzman have challenged what they describe as the "hoax/myth of psychology", the various components of which are "destructive pieces of pseudoscience."

Political roots
Newman founded the collective Centers for Change (CFC) in the late 1960s after the student strikes at Columbia University. CFC was dedicated to 60s-style, radical community organizing and the practice of Newman's evolving form of psychotherapy which he would term (circa 1974) "proletarian therapy", later  "Social Therapy". CFC briefly merged with Lyndon LaRouche's National Caucus of Labor Committees (NCLC) in 1974. Within a few months, however, the alliance fell apart, an event which Newman attributed to LaRouche's increasingly "paranoid", "authoritarian" direction and the NCLC's "capacity to produce psychosis and to opportunistically manipulate it in the name of socialist politics." In August 1974, the CFC went on to found the International Workers Party (IWP), an explicitly Marxist-Leninist revolutionary party.

In the wake of another factional fight in 1976, the IWP publicly disbanded. In 2005, Newman told The New York Times that the IWP had transformed into a "core collective" that continues to function. This claim appears to be consistent with critical allegations, made many years earlier, that the organization had never actually disbanded and remained secretly active.

Throughout the latter part of the '70s, Newman and his core of organizers founded, or assumed control of, a number of small, grassroots organizations, including a local branch of the People's Party known as the New York Working People's Party; the New York City Unemployed and Welfare Council; and the Labor Community Alliance for Change.

Electoral politics
In 1979, Newman became one of the founders of the New Alliance Party (NAP), most notable for getting African American psychologist and activist Lenora Fulani on the ballot in all 50 states during her 1988 presidential campaign (making her the first African American and first woman to do so). Newman served primarily as the party's tactician and campaign manager.

In 1985, Newman ran for Mayor of New York. He also ran for United States Senator in 1985 and for New York State Attorney General in 1990.

Independence Party of New York
After the New Alliance Party was dissolved in 1994, a number of its members and supporters, including Newman and Fulani, became leaders in the Independence Party of New York (IPNY), an offshoot of Ross Perot's Reform Party. In 2005, Fulani would be voted off the Executive Committee and, some months later, be one of over 100 other IPNY members (including Newman) the party sought to disenroll, entirely. (See "Controversy", below)

Playwriting, theater and social therapy
Newman was co-founder (1983), Artistic Director (1989-2005), and Playwright-in-Residence of the Castillo Theatre in New York. The theatre--named for the Guatemalan poet Otto René Castillo, has served as the primary venue for the production of the 30 plays Newman has written since the 1980s, four of which were written for and performed at annual conventions of the American Psychological Association beginning in 1996. Newman has described the Castillo Theatre as a "sister" organization to his social therapy clinics and institutes that also employs Vygotsky's methodological approach. Writing in 2000 in New Therapist, Newman and Holzman discussed the Vygotskian thread that linked these sister organizations:

The entire enterprise - human life and its study - is a search for method. Performance social therapeutics, the name we use to describe our Marxian-based, dialectical practice, originated in our group therapy but is also the basis for a continuously emergent development community. We coined the term tool-and-result methodology for Vygotsky's (and our) practice of method in order to distinguish it from the instrumental tool for result methodology that characterizes the natural and social sciences (Newman and Holzman, 1993). Our community building and the projects that comprise it - the East Side Institute for Short Term Psychotherapy, the East Side Center for Social Therapy and affiliated centers in other cities, the Castillo Theatre, the All Stars Talent Show Network, the Development School for Youth, etc. - are practices of this methodology."

Some of Newman's plays have been cited by the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), which Newman has described as "politically motivated." In his play No Room for Zion (1989), Newman recounts the transition in his own Bronx Jewish community from primarily working class to increasingly middle-class and upwardly mobile, rapidly losing its identity as an immigrant community tied to traditional ideals (represented by the Rabbi Zion of the play's title). In the play, Newman goes on to present his view of the post-war shifts in Jewish political alignments, both domestically and internationally:

"'From the West Bank to the West Side of Manhattan, international Jewry was being forced to face its written-in-blood deal with the capitalist devil. In exchange for an unstable assimilation, Jews under the leadership of Zionism would 'do-unto-others-what-others-had-done-unto-them.' The others to be done unto? People of color. The doing? Ghettoization and genocide. The Jew, the dirty Jew, once the ultimate victim of capitalism's soul, fascism, would become a victimizer on behalf of capitalism, a self-righteous dehumanizer and murderer of people of color, a racist bigot whom in the language of Zionism changed the meaning of 'Never Again' from 'Never Again for anyone' to 'Never again for us--and let the devil take everyone else.'"

The ADL also criticized the Newman's 2004 play Crown Heights, based on the 1991 riots sparked by the accidental death of a black child struck and killed by the motorcade of a prominent local rabbi. The ADL claimed the production "distorts history and refuels hatred", while other reviewers considered the production one which "seeks to unite the city’s diverse youth and heal some of the wounds of past racial violence."

Newman's plays on other topics have received some positive reviews. His musical Sally and Tom: The American Way about the slave-master relationship of Sally Hemings and Thomas Jefferson (with music by Grammy Award nominee Annie Roboff) was described in 1999 as "a diamond in the off-off-Broadway rough" by Christian Science Monitor critic Ward Moorehouse III.

The Castillo and its parent charity, the All Stars Project, Inc., support Newman's therapeutic endeavors, which include a number of supplementary education programs for youth, including the Joseph A. Forgione Development School for Youth.

On December 6, 2005, Newman announced his retirement as the Castillo's Artistic Director in the wake of controversy over a six-part series the previous month on NY1 News (a cable TV news channel). In a letter to the All Stars Project's Board of Directors, the Newman explained that he didn't "want any of the controversy associated with my views and opinions to create unnecessary difficulties for the All Stars Project." The cable program contained segments of an interview in which Newman discussed his long-standing opposition to having his therapeutic approach be governed by the American Psychological Association's ethical guidelines, notably those prohibiting sexual relations with patients. Newman's supporters have called the reaction to his expressed views, "sensationalized."

"Therapy cult"
In 1977, Dennis King, writing for Heights and Valley News, penned an article which alleged Newman was the leader of a "therapy cult." The Public Eye magazine also carried an article in late 1977 making this claim, though it was primarily directed at Lyndon LaRouche's NCLC (with which Newman was no longer affiliated). At the time, Newman responded that "it is of the greatest importance that the entire community of social scientists insist that there be open and critical discussion and dialogue towards the advancement and development of the human sciences; that as scientists and as professionals we do not quiver and shake under the socio-pathological and essentially anti-communist rampages of a Dennis King or others like him." Cult allegations arose again a few years later in the Village Voice.

When political researcher Chip Berlet became editor of The Public Eye magazine in 1984, he first announced that the magazine no longer held to that characterization:

As you will learn from a forthcoming article on Fred Newman and the IWP, the Public Eye no longer feels it is accurate to call Newman's political network a cult. We do feel that at one point in its development it was fair to characterize the group as a cult, and we still have strong criticisms of the group's organizing style and the relationship between Newman's Therapy Institute and his political organizing. (Editor's Note, Public Eye, 1984; Vol. 4, Nos. 3-4)

In 1988, a special issue of Radical America carried a series of articles and essays alleging manipulation, political deceit, and cult-like practices within the NAP. While Berlet, who had contributed to the issue, noted that Fulani “deserves tremendous credit for apparently gaining ballot status in a majority of states,”the editors concluded that there were "dangerous...implications" in failing to confront Newman and his groups: "Painful and unpleasant as it is, the time has come to expose the NAP before it discredits the Left--especially among blacks, gays and those exploring progressive politics for the first time."

A former NAP campaign worker, Loren Redwood, gave a much more critical account of her experiences with the New Alliance Party in a 1989 letter to the editor of Coming Up!, a lesbian and gay newspaper published in San Francisco. In the letter, Redwood describes having fallen in love with a NAP campaign worker and the difficulties she encountered after joining her lover on the road campaigning for Fulani:


 * NAP claims to be a multi-racial, black led, woman led, pro gay, political party, an organization which recognizes and fights against racism, sexism, classism and homophobia--but NAP is a lie. NAP is always using the slogan: "the personal is political" and emphasizing the importance of enacting one's politics into daily life. But this vision and the way their politics are enacted within the organization and life of those working for them is very much in conflict. As a working class lesbian, I thought I had finally found a political movement which included me. What I found instead was an oppressive, disempowering, misogynistic machine. All my decisions were made for me by someone else. I was told where to go, and who to go with.


 * I worked seven days a week -- 16 to 20 hours a day (I had two days off in 2.5 months). There was an incredible urgency which overrode any personal needs or considerations, an urgency that meant complete self-sacrifice. I realize now how sexist that is. As a woman, I have always been taught that self-sacrifice is good and that I must be willing to give up everything for the greater good for all. Traditionally, this has come in the form of a husband and children; NAP is simply a substitute. I felt totally powerless over my life, forced into a very submissive role where all control of my life belonged to someone else.


 * I felt more oppressed by NAP than I have ever felt in the outside world.

In 1989, Newman told The New York Times that his critics were "being sectarian and refusing to recognize the extraordinary accomplishments" of Fulani and the NAP leadership. Interviewed in the Times in 1991, Newman described the criticisms as “absurd” and the product of jealousies on the left, claiming that the majority of social therapy clients don't involve themselves in his political activities. In the Boston Globe in 1992, Fulani claimed "the entire thing is a lie," and cited what she described as Political Research Associates ties to the Democratic Party.

Newman, et al. vs the FBI
FBI documents obtained in 1992 through the Freedom of Information Act showed that, during Fulani's 1998 campaign for president, the Bureau had begun a file which classified her party as a ”political cult” which “should be considered armed and dangerous.” As described by investigative reporter Kelvyn Anderson in the Washington City Paper in 1992, “The 101-page FBI file, freed by an FOIA request, also contains media coverage of Fulani’s 1988 campaign, memos between FBI field offices on the subject of NAP, a letter from an Army Counterintelligence official about NAP, and a copy of Clouds Blur the Rainbow, a report issued in late 1987 by Chip Berlet of Political Research Associates (PRA). PRA, which studies fringe political groups and intelligence agency abuses, is a prominent critic of the NAP, and its research is frequently used to discredit NAP as a psycho-political cult with totalitarian overtones.”

Newman, Fulani and the New Alliance Party challenged the FBI in a 1993 lawsuit asserting the FBI "political cult" labeling had violated their constitutional rights. The plaintiffs asserted that the Bureau was gathering information from private, third-party organizations to evade federal guidelines prohibiting investigations of political organizations in the absence of evidence of criminal activity. In their suit, Newman et al. argued that "'Political intelligence reports like [the ADL’s 1990 report] The New Alliance Party and [PRA's] Clouds Blur the Rainbow, could not constitutionally be funded by the FBI directly. Organizations like the ADL and PRA engage in political intelligence gathering and political attacks on plaintiffs which the defendants are barred from carrying out directly by the Guidelines. The FBI then distributes the results of those “private” studies to its agents, and gives credibility to the “private” findings by incorporating the reports into files that are then obtained through FOIA by journalists and others"

In her ruling on the case, Federal judge Constance Baker Motley ruled that the "political cult" charge "could not be directly traced to the 1988 FBI investigation," and that "any stigmatization which NAP suffers could be traced to a myriad of statements and publications made by private individuals and organizations, many of which preceded the FBI investigation.

Berlet, while upholding the charge of cultism, was critical of the FBI, noting that FBI's investigation was “not a protection of civil liberties but a smear of a group.”

Independence Party seeks to disenroll Newman, Fulani
In September 2005, the New York State Executive Committee of the Independence Party--under the leadership of IPNY State Chairman Frank MacKay--voted to remove Fulani and several other members. In a letter proposing the matter for vote, MacKay stated Fulani et al had created the perception that the IPNY leadership tolerated "bigotry and hatred", having "continually re-affirmed their disturbing social commentary in the state and national press".

A later petition by MacKay to have Fulani and Newman, among others, disenrolled from the party entirely was dismissed by the New York Supreme Court in both Brooklyn and Manhattan. Manhattan Justice Emily Jane Goodman wrote that The statements attributed to Fulani and Newman which many would consider odious and offensive were made by them in 1989 and 1985, respectively, and not in their capacity as Independence Party members or officers in the Party which did nor even exist at the time. and noted the timing of the petitiion appeared "more political than philosophical." More to the point, however, the petitioned grounds for disenrollment were ruled invalid because, "there are no enunciated standards or requirements for persons registering in the Party."

Response by Newman and his supporters
Some of the cult criticisms have been disputed by some of Newman's peers in the therapeutic milieu. According to British psychologist Ian Parker, "Even those [Newman and Holzman] who have been marked by the FBI as a 'cult' may still be a source of useful radical theory and practice. Like a weed, a cult is something that is growing in the wrong place. We would want to ask 'wrong' for who, and whether it might sometimes be right for us. We have no desire to line up with the psychological establishment to rule out of the debate those who offer something valuable to anti-racist, feminist or working-class practice."

Newman (along with Holzman) responded to this ongoing controversy in a 2003 with interview John Söderlund, editor of New Therapist, in a special issue devoted to mind control. In her introduction to the responses, Holzman claimed that the editor's questions "have that “When did you stop beating your wife?” quality," and were unfalsifiable:

"These kinds of attacks are ludicrous in the way that the charge of being a witch was in centuries past. A cult is a made-up thing for which (like the made-up witch) there is no falsifiability. An entire mythology can thus be created, complete with attributes and activities that cannot be proven or disproven. Indeed, that’s the virtue of such made-up things. They paint a picture that holds you captive."

Söderlund asked about the recent focus of the American Psychological Association on the “potential dangers of mind control.” Newman replied that he didn’t quite know what was meant by the term, noting

"The closest association I have to it is what happens between parents and their young children. When children are very young, parents create a very controlled environment where there’s a great level of dependency on the parents. Gradually, as children come to experience other kinds of institutions (day care, school, etc.) their lived environment becomes less controlled and their dependency lessens."

Newman explained that didn’t think this sort of “totally controlled environment” can be imposed on an adult relationship, “outside of the extraordinary circumstances of say, the Manchurian candidate. I don’t see how mind control has any applicability to therapy—therapy of any kind—as it’s a relationship where the clients have control.... They pay, they can not show up, etc.” Newman acknowledged that he believed there were authoritarian and coercive therapists who were likely doing bad therapy, but did not consider this to be mind control.

Söderlund asked Newman to respond to an anonymous former social therapist’s statement that the practice has “the criteria of groups which are considered cults: an authoritarian, charismatic leader, black-and-white thinking, repression of individuality, constant drive for fundraising, control of information, lack of tolerance for opposition within the group, etc.” Newman claimed he didn’t know what a cult was, or even if there was such a thing, and that the use of the cult charge is “hostile, mean-spirited, and destructive.” He denied being “authoritarian,” acknowledged the perception that he was “charismatic,” and considered the claim of “black-and-white thinking” to be “antithetical to everything we do,” citing social therapy’s interactions “with practitioners and theorists across a very wide spectrum of traditions and worldviews.” Newman also countered the charge by insisting “We don’t repress individuality; we critique it. There is a difference!”

Newman commented as well on charges that he “held in contempt” ethical guidelines of professional associations such as the APA: “We don’t look to the APA, CPA or any other institution for ethical standards, he replied. “We’re critical (not contemptuous) of them for being hypocritical and think that depending on them for an ethical standard is ethically unsound.”

Recent controversies and official evaluations
The cult charges appeared again in the 2004 Presidential election, and have extended beyond Newman and Fulani to include other independent political challengers, most recently, 2004 independent presidential candidate Ralph Nader. The Nation magazine, a leading liberal weekly which had supported Nader in 2000, asked, citing Berlet’s report, “what in the world is Ralph Nader doing in bed with the ultrasectarian cult-racket formerly known as the New Alliance Party?” In its introduction to an article later that year by political writer Christopher Hitchens, the magazine Vanity Fair noted, “Democrats are furious that Ralph Nader, whose last presidential bid helped put George W. Bush in office, is running again. Equally dismaying, the author finds, is Nader's backing from a crackpot group with ties to Pat Buchanan, Lyndon LaRouche, and Louis Farrakhan.” Echoing Berlet (who had attacked Nader in 2000 for working with figures like conservative industrialist Roger Millikan), Hitchens charged that “the Newman-Fulani group is a fascistic zombie cult outfit.” Nader also came under fire from the ADL that year for his own Middle East views

These political critiques of Newman's organizations contrast sharply with recent official evaluations of the Newman-founded All Stars Project.

In 2003, the Institute for Minority Education of Columbia University's Teachers College undertook an evaluation of All Stars programs. The 124-page report was based on extensive on-site observation of two of the All Stars programs, which were described as "as an exemplary effort in a field that is bursting with creative activity." The report made a single brief reference to controversies regarding All Stars staff and volunteers being "involved in various political movements, most centrally Independent [sic] Party politics," noting that "while sometimes used as a point of attack by unfriendly media, the political networking has given the All Stars Project access to some halls of power that would have otherwise been closed." [p.9]

The Columbia researchers noted the political character of the All Stars program: "Although political activism is not an explicit part of the All Stars and the DSY curriculum, it is an outcome of the programs. Young people who are empowered to get what they want are also likely to fight for what they think is right." [p.14] The report further added "The participants and staff of the ASTSN/DSY [All Stars Talent Show Network/Development School for Youth] have developed policy approaches to working with youth that are practical, efficient, and successful. That they have also worked to develop some influence in the halls of power is a tremendous asset to the development of the programs—as well as to the political process, which needs all the direction it can get in developing and implementing policy." The report also extensively discussed the employment of social therapy and other approaches in the programs, noting "The guiding theories, which include social therapy, activity theory, identity play, and performance theory, are palpably present in the strategies and goals of the project. The All Stars Project benefits greatly from the compass provided by the strong theoretical and philosophical grounding, both explicit in the vocabulary and implicit in the personalities, of the organization’s founders and directors. Its rich and fertile environment provides the stage on which new organizational ideas can be tested." [p. 104]

In 2006, the New York City Industrial Development Agency performed a review of the All Stars pursuant to an All Stars application for a bond. Several Democratic Party officials expressed strong opposition. Critics of the IDA bond, including New York State Comptroller Alan Hevesi, charged that the All Stars were connected to "leaders who have taken positions that are misogynistic and Anti-Semitic," and questioned whether Newman and Fulani still ran All Stars, despite their having stepped down from official positions. Despite the harsh public criticisms, the IDA board voted 6 to 4 in favor of approving the bond, with all those in favor being mayoral appointees or representatives of ex officio members who were mayoral appointees, and those opposed all representatives of local Democratic Party officials.. After the vote, IDA chairman Joshua J. Sirefman told reporters that, based on the IDA's review of the All Stars Project, "we have determined that the organization is in good standing, we found no evidence of misconduct of any kind by the organization, and we established that the project would benefit New York City," adding, "We are aware that allegations of wrongdoing by individuals associated with the organization existed a number of years ago.”

In subsequent news coverage, Mayor Michael Bloomberg defended the Agency's vote to approve the bonds, noting "“I don't think I heard one argument made that there was something wrong with the All Stars Project and that's what we look at.”

Publications

 * Newman, F. and Holzman, L. (in press). All Power to the Developing. To appear in the Annual Review of Critical Psychology.


 * Holzman, L. and Newman, F. (2004). Power, authority and pointless activity (The developmental discourse of social therapy.)  In T. Strong and D. Paré (Eds.), Furthering talk: Advances in the discursive therapies . Kluwer Academic/Plenum, pp. 73-86.
 * Newman, F. (2003). Undecidable emotions (What is social therapy? And how is it revolutionary?). Journal of Constructivist Psychology, 16: 215-232.


 * Power, authority and pointless activity (The developmental discourse of social therapy).*Newman, F. and Holzman, L. (2001). La relevancia de Marx en la Terapeutica del siglo XXI. Revista Venezolana de Psicologia Clinica Comunitaria, No. 2, 47-55.


 * Newman, F. (2001). Therapists of the world, unite. New Therapist. No. 16.


 * Newman, F. (2001). Rehaciendo el pasado: Unas cuantas historias exitosas en materia de Terapia Social y sus moralejas. Revista Venezolana de Psicologia Clinica Comunitaria, No. 2, 57-70.


 * Newman, F. (2000) Does a story need a theory? (understanding the methodology of narrative therapy). In D. Fee (Ed.) Pathology and the postmodern: mental illness as discourse and experience. London: Sage.


 * Newman F. and Holzman, L. (2000). Against Against-ism. Theory & Psychology, 10(2), 265-270.


 * Newman, F. and Holzman, L. (2000). Engaging the alienation. New Therapist, 10(4).


 * Newman, F. and Holzman, L. (2000). The relevance of Marx to therapeutics in the 21st century. New Therapist, 5, 24-27.


 * Newman, F. (1999). One dogma of dialectical materialism. Annual Review of Critical Psychology, 1. 83-99.


 * Newman, F. and L. Holzman. (1999). Beyond narrative to performed conversation (in the beginning comes much later). Journal of Constructivist Psychology, 12, 1, 23-40.


 * Newman, F. and Holzman, L. (1997). The end of knowing: A new developmental way of learning. London: Routledge.


 * Newman, F. (1996). Performance of a lifetime: A practical-philosophical guide to the joyous life. New York: Castillo.


 * Newman, F. and Holzman, L. (1996). Unscientific psychology: A cultural-performatory approach to understanding human life. Westport, CT: Praeger.


 * Newman, F. (1994). Let's develop! A guide to continuous personal growth. New York: Castillo International.


 * Newman, F. and Holzman, L. (1993). Lev Vygotsky: Revolutionary scientist. London: Routledge.


 * Newman, F. (1992). Surely Castillo is left but is it right or wrong? Nobody knows. The Drama Review. Fall (T135), pp. 24- 27.


 * Newman, F. (1991). The myth of psychology. New York: Castillo International.


 * Holzman, L. and Newman, F. (1979). The practice of method: An introduction to the foundations of social therapy. New York: New York Institute for Social Therapy and Research.


 * Newman, F. (1977). Practical-critical activities. New York: Institute for Social Therapy.


 * Newman, F. (1974). Power and authority: The inside view of the class struggle. New York: Centers for Change.


 * Newman, F. (1968). Explanation by description: An essay on historical methodology. The Hague: Mouton.

Newman-related websites

 * Eastside Institute for Group and Short-term Psychotherapy
 * The Social Therapy Group
 * West Coast Center for Social Therapy
 * Atlanta Center for Social Therapy
 * DC Center for Social Therapy
 * Castillo Theatre
 * All Stars Project
 * Committee for a Unified Independent Party
 * Performing the World

Lois Holzman's website

 * Lois Holzman, PhD

Newman's critics

 * Studies on Newman from Political Research Associates; PRA claims to "expose movements, institutions, and ideologies that undermine human rights". Contains only anti-Newman reports.
 * ex-iwp.org, Former Newman associate Marina J. Ortiz's website. Selective compilation of negative news articles and materials about Newman and associates.
 * dennisking.org, Self-published reports on history of Newman movement by journalist Dennis King, who claims New York City children are "being indoctrinated and exploited by Newman and Fulani with the help of taxpayer support and the mayor's personal fortune."