Post 5: Who is a person / expert in your field that you admire?

 

Ignacio Martin Baro SJ, (Valladolid, November 7, 1942 - San Salvador, November 16, 1989), was a Spanish Jesuit psychologist, philosopher and priest who dedicated most of his life to the investigation of social and political reality From El Salvador. 

He fought for Human Rights, equality and social justice in El Salvador. He was a follower of Liberation Theology, father of liberation social psychology and the main reference in Latin American critical social psychology and, especially in community psychology and political psychology. I like the criticism he makes of the negative impact of US policy on his country and of traditional hegemonic psychology and I agree with his thesis where he states that psychology must be related to the social and historical context of the territory where the study takes place.

Baró is an inspiration for me within my career, since I share a lot his psychological and political point of view, his interest in the resistance of the peoples to dictatorships and civil wars, his opposition to neoliberalism and the ruling political class. He was assassinated by the military with orders from the Salvadoran government, considering him a threat.