From Crowd Psychology to the Dynamics of Large Groups

Historical, Theoretical and Practical Considerations

Carla Penna

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2022
• Print ISBN: 9780367024505
• eBook ISBN: 9780429679827
• Topic: Psychology
• Subtopic: Mental Health in Psychology
• Index: Psychology

From Crowd Psychology to the Dynamics of Large Groups offers transdisciplinary research on the history of the study of social formations, ranging from nineteenth-century crowd psychology in France and twentieth-century Freudian mass psychology, including the developments in critical theory, to the study of the psychodynamics of contemporary large groups.

Carla Penna presents a unique combination of sociology, psychoanalysis, and group analysis in the study of social formations. This book revisits the epistemological basis of group analysis by introducing and discussing its historical path, especially in connection with the study of large groups and investigations of the social unconscious in persons, groups, and societies. It also explores early work on group relations and contemporary research on the basic-assumption group in England, particularly Hopper's theory of Incohesion as a fourth basic assumption. From Crowd Psychology to the Dynamics of Large Groups enables the reader to map out the field of the unconscious life of crowds illuminating the darkness of twenty-first century collective movements.

The reflections in this book present new perspectives for psychologists, psychoanalysts, group analysts, sociologists, and historians to investigate the psychodynamics of contemporary crowds, masses, and social systems.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Endorsements
• Half Title
• Series Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Table of Contents
• List of tables
• Acknowledgements
• Foreword
• Introduction
• 1. Nineteenth-century crowd psychology
• 2. Twentieth-century Freudian mass psychology
• 3. Twentieth-century left-wing mass psychology
• 4. Reflections on a society of individuals
• 5. The Northfield experiments The cradle of group work in England
• 6. Group relations and Bion’s legacy
• 7. Towards new basic assumptions in groups
• 8. Foulkes and group analysis The development of the theory of the social unconscious
• 9. Large-group psychodynamics in group analysis
• 10. Traumatic experience in the unconscious life of social systems Earl Hopper’s theory of the fourth basic assumption of Incohesion: Aggregation/Massification or (ba) I: A/M
• Epilogue
• References
• Index