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THE INTERNATIONAL PSYCHO-ANALYTICAL LIBRARY
No. 6
GROUP PSYCHOLOGY
AND
THE ANALYSIS OF THE EGO
BY
SIGM. FREUD, M. D., LL. D.
AUTHORIZED TRANSLATION
BY
JAMES STRACHEY
[Illustration: colophon]
THE INTERNATIONAL PSYCHO-ANALYTICAL PRESS
LONDON MCMXXII VIENNA
Copyright 1922
TRANSLATOR'S NOTE
A comparison of the following pages with the German original
(_Massenpsychologie und Ich-Analyse_, Internationaler Psychoanalytischer
Verlag, Vienna, 1921) will show that certain passages have been
transferred in the English version from the text to the footnotes. This
alteration has been carried out at the author's express desire.
All technical terms have been translated in accordance with the Glossary
to be published as a supplement to the _International Journal of
Psycho-Analysis_.
J. S.
CONTENTS
Page
I Introduction 1
II Le Bon's Description of the Group Mind 5
III Other Accounts of Collective Mental Life 23
IV Suggestion and Libido 33
V Two Artificial Groups: the Church and the Army 41
VI Further Problems and Lines of Work 52
VII Identification 60
VIII Being in Love and Hypnosis 71
IX The Herd Instinct 81
X The Group and the Primal Horde 90
XI A Differentiating Grade in the Ego 101
XII Postscript 110
GROUP PSYCHOLOGY AND THE ANALYSIS OF THE EGO
I
INTRODUCTION
The contrast between Individual Psychology and Social or Group[1]
Psychology, which at a first glance may seem to be full of significance,
loses a great deal of its sharpness when it is examined more closely. It
is true that Individual Psychology is concerned with the individual man
and explores the paths by which he seeks to find satisfaction for his
instincts; but only rarely and under certain exceptional conditions is
Individual Psychology in a position to disregard the relations of this
individual to others. In the individual's mental life someone else is
invariably involved, as a model, as an object, as a helper, as an
opponent, and so from the very first Individual Psychology is at the
same time Social Psychology as well--in this extended but entirely
justifiable sense of the words.
The relations of an individual to his parents and to his brothers and
sisters, to the object of his love, and to his physician--in fact all
the relations which have hitherto been the chief subject of
psycho-analytic research--may claim to be considered as social
phenomena; and in this respect they may be contrasted with certain other
processes, described by us as 'narcissistic', in which the satisfaction
of the instincts is partially or totally withdrawn from the influence of
other people. The contrast between social and narcissistic--Bleuler
would perhaps call them 'autistic'--mental acts therefore falls wholly
within the domain of Individual Psychology, and is not well calculated
to differentiate it from a Social or Group Psychology.
The individual in the relations which have already been mentioned--to
his parents and to his brothers and sisters, to the person he is in love
with, to his friend, and to his physician--comes under the influence of
only a single person, or of a very small number of persons, each one of
whom has become enormously important to him. Now in speaking of Social
or Group Psychology it has become usual to leave these relations on one
side and to isolate as the subject of inquiry the influencing of an
individual by a large number of people simultaneously, people with whom
he is connected by something, though otherwise they may in many respects
be strangers to him. Group Psychology is therefore concerned with the
individual man as a member of a race, of a nation, of a caste, of a
profession, of an institution, or as a component part of a crowd of
people who have been organised into a group at some particular time for
some definite purpose. When once natural continuity has been severed in
this way, it is easy to regard the phenomena that appear under these
special conditions as being expressions of a special instinct that is
not further reducible, the social instinct ('herd instinct', 'group
mind'), which does not come to light in any other situations. But we may
perhaps venture to object that it seems difficult to attribute to the
factor of number a significance so great as to make it capable by itself
or arousing in our mental life a new instinct that is otherwise not
brought into play. Our expectation is therefore directed towards two
other possibilities: that the social instinct may not be a primitive one
and insusceptible of dissection, and that it may be possible to discover
the beginnings of its development in a narrower circle, such as that of
the family.
Although Group Psychology is only in its infancy, it embraces an immense
number of separate issues and offers to investigators countless
problems which have hitherto not even been properly distinguished from
one another. The mere classification of the different forms of group
formation and the description of the mental phenomena produced by them
require a great expenditure of observation and exposition, and have
already given rise to a copious literature. Anyone who compares the
narrow dimensions of this little book with the extent of Group
Psychology will at once be able to guess that only a few points chosen
from the whole material are to be dealt with here. And they will in fact
only be a few questions with which the depth-psychology of
psycho-analysis is specially concerned.
II
LE BON'S DESCRIPTION OF THE GROUP MIND
Instead of starting from a definition, it seems more useful to begin
with some indication of the range of the phenomena under review, and to
select from among them a few specially striking and characteristic facts
to which our inquiry can be attached. We can achieve both of these aims
by means of quotation from Le Bon's deservedly famous work _Psychologie
des foules_.[2]
Let us make the matter clear once again. If a Psychology, concerned with
exploring the predispositions, the instincts, the motives and the aims
of an individual man down to his actions and his relations with those
who are nearest to him, had completely achieved its task, and had
cleared up the whole of these matters with their inter-connections, it
would then suddenly find itself confronted by a new task which would lie
before it unachieved. It would be obliged to explain the surprising
fact that under a certain condition this individual whom it had come to
understand thought, felt, and acted in quite a different way from what
would have been expected. And this condition is his insertion into a
collection of people which has acquired the characteristic of a
'psychological group'. What, then, is a 'group'? How does it acquire the
capacity for exercising such a decisive influence over the mental life
of the individual? And what is the nature of the mental change which it
forces upon the individual?
It is the task of a theoretical Group Psychology to answer these three
questions. The best way of approaching them is evidently to start with
the third. Observation of the changes in the individual's reactions is
what provides Group Psychology with its material; for every attempt at
an explanation must be preceded by a description of the thing that is to
be explained.
I will now let Le Bon speak for himself. He says: 'The most striking
peculiarity presented by a psychological group[3] is the following.
Whoever be the individuals that compose it, however like or unlike be
their mode of life, their occupations, their character, or their
intelligence, the fact that they have been transformed into a group puts
them in possession of a sort of collective mind which makes them feel,
think, and act in a manner quite different from that in which each
individual of them would feel, think, and act were he in a state of
isolation. There are certain ideas and feelings which do not come into
being, or do not transform themselves into acts except in the case of
individuals forming a group. The psychological group is a provisional
being formed of heterogeneous elements, which for a moment are combined,
exactly as the cells which constitute a living body form by their
reunion a new being which displays characteristics very different from
those possessed by each of the cells singly.' (p. 29.)[4]
We shall take the liberty of interrupting Le Bon's exposition with
glosses of our own, and shall accordingly insert an observation at this
point. If the individuals in the group are combined into a unity, there
must surely be something to unite them, and this bond might be precisely
the thing that is characteristic of a group. But Le Bon does not answer
this question; he goes on to consider the alteration which the
individual undergoes when in a group and describes it in terms which
harmonize well with the fundamental postulates of our own
depth-psychology.
'It is easy to prove how much the individual forming part of a group
differs from the isolated individual, but it is less easy to discover
the causes of this difference.
'To obtain at any rate a glimpse of them it is necessary in the first
place to call to mind the truth established by modern psychology, that
unconscious phenomena play an altogether preponderating part not only in
organic life, but also in the operations of the intelligence. The
conscious life of the mind is of small importance in comparison with its
unconscious life. The most subtle analyst, the most acute observer, is
scarcely successful in discovering more than a very small number of the
conscious[5] motives that determine his conduct. Our conscious acts are
the outcome of an unconscious substratum created in the mind in the main
by hereditary influences. This substratum consists of the innumerable
common characteristics handed down from generation to generation, which
constitute the genius of a race. Behind the avowed causes of our acts
there undoubtedly lie secret causes that we do not avow, but behind
these secret causes there are many others more secret still, of which we
ourselves are ignorant.[6] The greater part of our daily actions are the
result of hidden motives which escape our observation.' (p. 30.)
Le Bon thinks that the particular acquirements of individuals become
obliterated in a group, and that in this way their distinctiveness
vanishes. The racial unconscious emerges; what is heterogeneous is
submerged in what is homogeneous. We may say that the mental
superstructure, the development of which in individuals shows such
dissimilarities, is removed, and that the unconscious foundations, which
are similar in everyone, stand exposed to view.
In this way individuals in a group would come to show an average
character. But Le Bon believes that they also display new
characteristics which they have not previously possessed, and he seeks
the reason for this in three different factors.
'The first is that the individual forming part of a group acquires,
solely from numerical considerations, a sentiment of invincible power
which allows him to yield to instincts which, had he been alone, he
would perforce have kept under restraint. He will be the less disposed
to check himself from the consideration that, a group being anonymous,
and in consequence irresponsible, the sentiment of responsibility which
always controls individuals disappears entirely.' (p. 33.)
From our point of view we need not attribute so much importance to the
appearance of new characteristics. For us it would be enough to say that
in a group the individual is brought under conditions which allow him to
throw off the repressions of his unconscious instincts. The apparently
new characteristics which he then displays are in fact the
manifestations of this unconscious, in which all that is evil in the
human mind is contained as a predisposition. We can find no difficulty
in understanding the disappearance of conscience or of a sense of
responsibility in these circumstances. It has long been our contention
that 'dread of society [_soziale Angst_]' is the essence of what is
called conscience.[7]
'The second cause, which is contagion, also intervenes to determine the
manifestation in groups of their special characteristics, and at the
same time the trend they are to take. Contagion is a phenomenon of which
it is easy to establish the presence, but that it is not easy to
explain. It must be classed among those phenomena of a hypnotic order,
which we shall shortly study. In a group every sentiment and act is
contagious, and contagious to such a degree that an individual readily
sacrifices his personal interest to the collective interest. This is an
aptitude very contrary to his nature, and of which a man is scarcely
capable, except when he makes part of a group.' (p. 33.)
We shall later on base an important conjecture upon this last statement.
'A third cause, and by far the most important, determines in the
individuals of a group special characteristics which are quite contrary
at times to those presented by the isolated individual. I allude to that
suggestibility of which, moreover, the contagion mentioned above is only
an effect.
'To understand this phenomenon it is necessary to bear in mind certain
recent physiological discoveries. We know to-day that by various
processes an individual may be brought into such a condition that,
having entirely lost his conscious personality, he obeys all the
suggestions of the operator who has deprived him of it, and commits acts
in utter contradiction with his character and habits. The most careful
investigations seem to prove that an individual immersed for some length
of time in a group in action soon finds himself--either in consequence
of the magnetic influence given out by the group, or from some other
cause of which we are ignorant--in a special state, which much resembles
the state of fascination in which the hypnotised individual finds
himself in the hands of the hypnotiser.... The conscious personality has
entirely vanished; will and discernment are lost. All feelings and
thoughts are bent in the direction determined by the hypnotiser.
'Such also is approximately the state of the individual forming part of
a psychological group. He is no longer conscious of his acts. In his
case, as in the case of the hypnotised subject, at the same time that
certain faculties are destroyed, others may be brought to a high degree
of exaltation. Under the influence of a suggestion, he will undertake
the accomplishment of certain acts with irresistible impetuosity. This
impetuosity is the more irresistible in the case of groups than in that
of the hypnotised subject, from the fact that, the suggestion being the
same for all the individuals of the group, it gains in strength by
reciprocity.' (p. 34.)
'We see, then, that the disappearance of the conscious personality, the
predominance of the unconscious personality, the turning by means of
suggestion and contagion of feelings and ideas in an identical
direction, the tendency to immediately transform the suggested ideas
into acts; these, we see, are the principal characteristics of the
individual forming part of a group. He is no longer himself, but has
become an automaton who has ceased to be guided by his will.' (p. 35.)
I have quoted this passage so fully in order to make it quite clear that
Le Bon explains the condition of an individual in a group as being
actually hypnotic, and does not merely make a comparison between the two
states. We have no intention of raising any objection at this point, but
wish only to emphasize the fact that the two last causes of an
individual becoming altered in a group (the contagion and the heightened
suggestibility) are evidently not on a par, since the contagion seems
actually to be a manifestation of the suggestibility. Moreover the
effects of the two factors do not seem to be sharply differentiated in
the text of Le Bon's remarks. We may perhaps best interpret his
statement if we connect the contagion with the effects of the individual
members of the group upon one another, while we point to another source
for those manifestations of suggestion in the group which are put on a
level with the phenomena of hypnotic influence. But to what source? We
cannot avoid being struck with a sense of deficiency when we notice that
one of the chief elements of the comparison, namely the person who is to
replace the hypnotist in the case of the group, is not mentioned in Le
Bon's exposition. But he nevertheless distinguishes between this
influence of fascination which remains plunged in obscurity and the
contagious effect which the individuals exercise upon one another and by
which the original suggestion is strengthened.
Here is yet another important consideration for helping us to understand
the individual in a group: 'Moreover, by the mere fact that he forms
part of an organised group, a man descends several rungs in the ladder
of civilisation. Isolated, he may be a cultivated individual; in a
crowd, he is a barbarian--that is, a creature acting by instinct. He
possesses the spontaneity, the violence, the ferocity, and also the
enthusiasm and heroism of primitive beings.' (p. 36.) He then dwells
especially upon the lowering in intellectual ability which an individual
experiences when he becomes merged in a group.[8]
Let us now leave the individual, and turn to the group mind, as it has
been outlined by Le Bon. It shows not a single feature which a
psycho-analyst would find any difficulty in placing or in deriving from
its source. Le Bon himself shows us the way by pointing to its
similarity with the mental life of primitive people and of children (p.
40).
A group is impulsive, changeable and irritable. It is led almost
exclusively by the unconscious.[9] The impulses which a group obeys may
according to circumstances be generous or cruel, heroic or cowardly, but
they are always so imperious that no personal interest, not even that of
self-preservation, can make itself felt (p. 41). Nothing about it is
premeditated. Though it may desire things passionately, yet this is
never so for long, for it is incapable of perseverance. It cannot
tolerate any delay between its desire and the fulfilment of what it
desires. It has a sense of omnipotence; the notion of impossibility
disappears for the individual in a group.[10]
A group is extraordinarily credulous and open to influence, it has no
critical faculty, and the improbable does not exist for it. It thinks in
images, which call one another up by association (just as they arise
with individuals in states of free imagination), and whose agreement
with reality is never checked by any reasonable function
[_Instanz_].[11] The feelings of a group are always very simple and very
exaggerated. So that a group knows neither doubt nor uncertainty.[12]
It goes directly to extremes; if a suspicion is expressed, it is
instantly changed into an incontrovertible certainty; a trace of
antipathy is turned into furious hatred (p. 56).[13]
Inclined as it itself is to all extremes, a group can only be excited by
an excessive stimulus. Anyone who wishes to produce an effect upon it
needs no logical adjustment in his arguments; he must paint in the most
forcible colours, he must exaggerate, and he must repeat the same thing
again and again.
Since a group is in no doubt as to what constitutes truth or error, and
is conscious, moreover, of its own great strength, it is as intolerant
as it is obedient to authority. It respects force and can only be
slightly influenced by kindness, which it regards merely as a form of
weakness. What it demands of its heroes is strength, or even violence.
It wants to be ruled and oppressed and to fear its masters.
Fundamentally it is entirely conservative, and it has a deep aversion
from all innovations and advances and an unbounded respect for tradition
(p. 62).
In order to make a correct judgement upon the morals of groups, one must
take into consideration the fact that when individuals come together in
a group all their individual inhibitions fall away and all the cruel,
brutal and destructive instincts, which lie dormant in individuals as
relics of a primitive epoch, are stirred up to find free gratification.
But under the influence of suggestion groups are also capable of high
achievements in the shape of abnegation, unselfishness, and devotion to
an ideal. While with isolated individuals personal interest is almost
the only motive force, with groups it is very rarely prominent. It is
possible to speak of an individual having his moral standards raised by
a group (p. 65). Whereas the intellectual capacity of a group is always
far below that of an individual, its ethical conduct may rise as high
above his as it may sink deep below it.
Some other features in Le Bon's description show in a clear light how
well justified is the identification of the group mind with the mind of
primitive people. In groups the most contradictory ideas can exist side
by side and tolerate each other, without any conflict arising from the
logical contradiction between them. But this is also the case in the
unconscious mental life of individuals, of children and of neurotics, as
psycho-analysis has long pointed out.[14]
A group, further, is subject to the truly magical power of words; they
can evoke the most formidable tempests in the group mind, and are also
capable of stilling them (p. 117). 'Reason and arguments are incapable
of combating certain words and formulas. They are uttered with solemnity
in the presence of groups, and as soon as they have been pronounced an
expression of respect is visible on every countenance, and all heads are
bowed. By many they are considered as natural forces, as supernatural
powers.' (p. 117.) It is only necessary in this connection to remember
the taboo upon names among primitive people and the magical powers which
they ascribe to names and words.[15]
And, finally, groups have never thirsted after truth. They demand
illusions, and cannot do without them. They constantly give what is
unreal precedence over what is real; they are almost as strongly
influenced by what is untrue as by what is true. They have an evident
tendency not to distinguish between the two (p. 77).
We have pointed out that this predominance of the life of phantasy and
of the illusion born of an unfulfilled wish is the ruling factor in the
psychology of neuroses. We have found that what neurotics are guided by
is not ordinary objective reality but psychological reality. A
hysterical symptom is based upon phantasy instead of upon the repetition
of real experience, and the sense of guilt in an obsessional neurosis is
based upon the fact of an evil intention which was never carried out.
Indeed, just as in dreams and in hypnosis, in the mental operations of a
group the function for testing the reality of things falls into the
background in comparison with the strength of wishes with their
affective cathexis.[16]
What Le Bon says on the subject of leaders of groups is less exhaustive,
and does not enable us to make out an underlying principle so clearly.
He thinks that as soon as living beings are gathered together in certain
numbers, no matter whether they are a herd of animals or a collection of
human beings, they place themselves instinctively under the authority
of a chief (p. 134). A group is an obedient herd, which could never live
without a master. It has such a thirst for obedience that it submits
instinctively to anyone who appoints himself its master.
Although in this way the needs of a group carry it half-way to meet the
leader, yet he too must fit in with it in his personal qualities. He
must himself be held in fascination by a strong faith (in an idea) in
order to awaken the group's faith; he must possess a strong and imposing
will, which the group, which has no will of its own, can accept from
him. Le Bon then discusses the different kinds of leaders, and the means
by which they work upon the group. On the whole he believes that the
leaders make themselves felt by means of the ideas in which they
themselves are fanatical believers.
Moreover, he ascribes both to the ideas and to the leaders a mysterious
and irresistible power, which he calls 'prestige'. Prestige is a sort of
domination exercised over us by an individual, a work or an idea. It
entirely paralyses our critical faculty, and fills us with astonishment
and respect. It would seem to arouse a feeling like that of fascination
in hypnosis (p. 148). He distinguishes between acquired or artificial
and personal prestige. The former is attached to persons in virtue of
their name, fortune and reputation, and to opinions, works of art, etc.,
in virtue of tradition. Since in every case it harks back to the past,
it cannot be of much help to us in understanding this puzzling
influence. Personal prestige is attached to a few people, who become
leaders by means of it, and it has the effect of making everything obey
them as though by the operation of some magnetic magic. All prestige,
however, is also dependent upon success, and is lost in the event of
failure (p. 159).
We cannot feel that Le Bon has brought the function of the leader and
the importance of prestige completely into harmony with his brilliantly
executed picture of the group mind.
III
OTHER ACCOUNTS OF COLLECTIVE MENTAL LIFE
We have made use of Le Bon's description by way of introduction, because
it fits in so well with our own Psychology in the emphasis which it lays
upon unconscious mental life. But we must now add that as a matter of
fact none of that author's statements bring forward anything new.
Everything that he says to the detriment and depreciation of the
manifestations of the group mind had already been said by others before
him with equal distinctness and equal hostility, and has been repeated
in unison by thinkers, statesmen and writers since the earliest periods
of literature.[17] The two theses which comprise the most important of
Le Bon's opinions, those touching upon the collective inhibition of
intellectual functioning and the heightening of affectivity in groups,
had been formulated shortly before by Sighele.[18] At bottom, all that
is left over as being peculiar to Le Bon are the two notions of the
unconscious and of the comparison with the mental life of primitive
people, and even these had naturally often been alluded to before him.
But, what is more, the description and estimate of the group mind as
they have been given by Le Bon and the rest have not by any means been
left undisputed. There is no doubt that all the phenomena of the group
mind which have just been mentioned have been correctly observed, but it
is also possible to distinguish other manifestations of the group
formation, which operate in a precisely opposite sense, and from which a
much higher opinion of the group mind must necessarily follow.
Le Bon himself was prepared to admit that in certain circumstances the
morals of a group can be higher than those of the individuals that
compose it, and that only collectivities are capable of a high degree of
unselfishness and devotion. 'While with isolated individuals personal
interest is almost the only motive force, with groups it is very rarely
prominent.' (p. 65.) Other writers adduce the fact that it is only
society which prescribes any ethical standards at all for the
individual, while he as a rule fails in one way or another to come up to
its high demands. Or they point out that in exceptional circumstances
there may arise in communities the phenomenon of enthusiasm, which has
made the most splendid group achievements possible.
As regards intellectual work it remains a fact, indeed, that great
decisions in the realm of thought and momentous discoveries and
solutions of problems are only possible to an individual, working in
solitude. But even the group mind is capable of genius in intellectual
creation, as is shown above all by language itself, as well as by
folk-song, folk-lore and the like. It remains an open question,
moreover, how much the individual thinker or writer owes to the
stimulation of the group in which he lives, or whether he does more than
perfect a mental work in which the others have had a simultaneous share.
In face of these completely contradictory accounts, it looks as though
the work of Group Psychology were bound to come to an ineffectual end.
But it is easy to find a more hopeful escape from the dilemma. A number
of very different formations have probably been merged under the term
'group' and may require to be distinguished. The assertions of Sighele,
Le Bon and the rest relate to groups of a short-lived character, which
some passing interest has hastily agglomerated out of various sorts of
individuals. The characteristics of revolutionary groups, and
especially those of the great French Revolution, have unmistakably
influenced their descriptions. The opposite opinions owe their origin to
the consideration of those stable groups or associations in which
mankind pass their lives, and which are embodied in the institutions of
society. Groups of the first kind stand in the same sort of relation to
those of the second as a high but choppy sea to a ground swell.
McDougall, in his book on _The Group Mind_,[19] starts out from the same
contradiction that has just been mentioned, and finds a solution for it
in the factor of organisation. In the simplest case, he says, the
'group' possesses no organisation at all or one scarcely deserving the
name. He describes a group of this kind as a 'crowd'. But he admits that
a crowd of human beings can hardly come together without possessing at
all events the rudiments of an organisation, and that precisely in these
simple groups many of the fundamental facts of Collective Psychology can
be observed with special ease (p. 22). Before the members of a random
crowd of people can constitute something in the nature of a group in the
psychological sense of the word, a condition has to be fulfilled; these
individuals must have something in common with one another, a common
interest in an object, a similar emotional bias in some situation or
other, and ('consequently', I should like to interpolate) 'some degree
of reciprocal influence' (p. 23). The higher the degree of 'this mental
homogeneity', the more readily do the individuals form a psychological
group, and the more striking are the manifestations of a group mind.
The most remarkable and also the most important result of the formation
of a group is the 'exaltation or intensification of emotion' produced in
every member of it (p. 24). In McDougall's opinion men's emotions are
stirred in a group to a pitch that they seldom or never attain under
other conditions; and it is a pleasurable experience for those who are
concerned to surrender themselves so unreservedly to their passions and
thus to become merged in the group and to lose the sense of the limits
of their individuality. The manner in which individuals are thus carried
away by a common impulse is explained by McDougall by means of what he
calls the 'principle of direct induction of emotion by way of the
primitive sympathetic response' (p. 25), that is, by means of the
emotional contagion with which we are already familiar. The fact is that
the perception of the signs of an emotional state is calculated
automatically to arouse the same emotion in the person who perceives
them. The greater the number of people in whom the same emotion can be
simultaneously observed, the stronger does this automatic compulsion
grow. The individual loses his power of criticism, and lets himself slip
into the same emotion. But in so doing he increases the excitement of
the other people, who had produced this effect upon him, and thus the
emotional charge of the individuals becomes intensified by mutual
interaction. Something is unmistakably at work in the nature of a
compulsion to do the same as the others, to remain in harmony with the
many. The coarser and simpler emotions are the more apt to spread
through a group in this way (p. 39).
This mechanism for the intensification of emotion is favoured by some
other influences which emanate from groups. A group impresses the
individual with a sense of unlimited power and of insurmountable peril.
For the moment it replaces the whole of human society, which is the
wielder of authority, whose punishments the individual fears, and for
whose sake he has submitted to so many inhibitions. It is clearly
perilous for him to put himself in opposition to it, and it will be
safer to follow the example of those around him and perhaps even 'hunt
with the pack'. In obedience to the new authority he may put his former
'conscience' out of action, and so surrender to the attraction of the
increased pleasure that is certainly obtained from the removal of
inhibitions. On the whole, therefore, it is not so remarkable that we
should see an individual in a group doing or approving things which he
would have avoided in the normal conditions of life; and in this way we
may even hope to clear up a little of the mystery which is so often
covered by the enigmatic word 'suggestion'.
McDougall does not dispute the thesis as to the collective inhibition of
intelligence in groups (p. 41). He says that the minds of lower
intelligence bring down those of a higher order to their own level. The
latter are obstructed in their activity, because in general an
intensification of emotion creates unfavourable conditions for sound
intellectual work, and further because the individuals are intimidated
by the group and their mental activity is not free, and because there is
a lowering in each individual of his sense of responsibility for his own
performances.
The judgement with which McDougall sums up the psychological behaviour
of a simple 'unorganised' group is no more friendly than that of Le Bon.
Such a group 'is excessively emotional, impulsive, violent, fickle,
inconsistent, irresolute and extreme in action, displaying only the
coarser emotions and the less refined sentiments; extremely suggestible,
careless in deliberation, hasty in judgment, incapable of any but the
simpler and imperfect forms of reasoning; easily swayed and led,
lacking in self-consciousness, devoid of self-respect and of sense of
responsibility, and apt to be carried away by the consciousness of its
own force, so that it tends to produce all the manifestations we have
learnt to expect of any irresponsible and absolute power. Hence its
behaviour is like that of an unruly child or an untutored passionate
savage in a strange situation, rather than like that of its average
member; and in the worst cases it is like that of a wild beast, rather
than like that of human beings.' (p. 45.)
Since McDougall contrasts the behaviour of a highly organised group with
what has just been described, we shall be particularly interested to
learn in what this organisation consists, and by what factors it is
produced. The author enumerates five 'principal conditions' for raising
collective mental life to a higher level.
The first and fundamental condition is that there should be some degree
of continuity of existence in the group. This may be either material or
formal; the former, if the same individuals persist in the group for
some time; and the latter, if there is developed within the group a
system of fixed positions which are occupied by a succession of
individuals.
The second condition is that in the individual member of the group some
definite idea should be formed of the nature, composition, functions and
capacities of the group, so that from this he may develop an emotional
relation to the group as a whole.
The third is that the group should be brought into interaction (perhaps
in the form of rivalry) with other groups similar to it but differing
from it in many respects.
The fourth is that the group should possess traditions, customs and
habits, and especially such as determine the relations of its members to
one another.
The fifth is that the group should have a definite structure, expressed
in the specialisation and differentiation of the functions of its
constituents.
According to McDougall, if these conditions are fulfilled, the
psychological disadvantages of the group formation are removed. The
collective lowering of intellectual ability is avoided by withdrawing
the performance of intellectual tasks from the group and reserving them
for individual members of it.
It seems to us that the condition which McDougall designates as the
'organisation' of a group can with more justification be described in
another way. The problem consists in how to procure for the group
precisely those features which were characteristic of the individual and
which are extinguished in him by the formation of the group. For the
individual, outside the primitive group, possessed his own continuity,
his self-consciousness, his traditions and customs, his own particular
functions and position, and kept apart from his rivals. Owing to his
entry into an 'unorganised' group he had lost this distinctiveness for a
time. If we thus recognise that the aim is to equip the group with the
attributes of the individual, we shall be reminded of a valuable remark
of Trotter's,[20] to the effect that the tendency towards the formation
of groups is biologically a continuation of the multicellular character
of all the higher organisms.
IV
SUGGESTION AND LIBIDO
We started from the fundamental fact that an individual in a group is
subjected through its influence to what is often a profound alteration
in his mental activity. His emotions become extraordinarily intensified,
while his intellectual ability becomes markedly reduced, both processes
being evidently in the direction of an approximation to the other
individuals in the group; and this result can only be reached by the
removal of those inhibitions upon his instincts which are peculiar to
each individual, and by his resigning those expressions of his
inclinations which are especially his own. We have heard that these
often unwelcome consequences are to some extent at least prevented by a
higher 'organisation' of the group; but this does not contradict the
fundamental fact of Group Psychology--the two theses as to the
intensification of the emotions and the inhibition of the intellect in
primitive groups. Our interest is now directed to discovering the
psychological explanation of this mental change which is experienced by
the individual in a group.
It is clear that rational factors (such as the intimidation of the
individual which has already been mentioned, that is, the action of his
instinct of self-preservation) do not cover the observable phenomena.
Beyond this what we are offered as an explanation by authorities upon
Sociology and Group Psychology is always the same, even though it is
given various names, and that is--the magic word 'suggestion'. Tarde
calls it 'imitation'; but we cannot help agreeing with a writer who
protests that imitation comes under the concept of suggestion, and is in
fact one of its results.[21] Le Bon traces back all the puzzling
features of social phenomena to two factors: the mutual suggestion of
individuals and the prestige of leaders. But prestige, again, is only
recognizable by its capacity for evoking suggestion. McDougall for a
moment gives us an impression that his principle of 'primitive induction
of emotion' might enable us to do without the assumption of suggestion.
But on further consideration we are forced to perceive that this
principle says no more than the familiar assertions about 'imitation' or
'contagion', except for a decided stress upon the emotional factor.
There is no doubt that something exists in us which, when we become
aware of signs of an emotion in someone else, tends to make us fall into
the same emotion; but how often do we not successfully oppose it, resist
the emotion, and react in quite an opposite way? Why, therefore, do we
invariably give way to this contagion when we are in a group? Once more
we should have to say that what compels us to obey this tendency is
imitation, and what induces the emotion in us is the group's suggestive
influence. Moreover, quite apart from this, McDougall does not enable us
to evade suggestion; we hear from him as well as from other writers that
groups are distinguished by their special suggestibility.
We shall therefore be prepared for the statement that suggestion (or
more correctly suggestibility) is actually an irreducible, primitive
phenomenon, a fundamental fact in the mental life of man. Such, too, was
the opinion of Bernheim, of whose astonishing arts I was a witness in
the year 1889. But I can remember even then feeling a muffled hostility
to this tyranny of suggestion. When a patient who showed himself
unamenable was met with the shout: 'What are you doing? _Vous vous
contresuggestionnez!_', I said to myself that this was an evident
injustice and an act of violence. For the man certainly had a right to
counter-suggestions if they were trying to subdue him with suggestions.
Later on my resistance took the direction of protesting against the view
that suggestion, which explained everything, was itself to be preserved
from explanation. Thinking of it, I repeated the old conundrum:[22]
Christoph trug Christum,
Christus trug die ganze Welt,
Sag' wo hat Christoph
Damals hin den Fuss gestellt?[23]
Christophorus Christum, sed Christus sustulit orbem:
Constiterit pedibus dic ubi Christophorus?
Now that I once more approach the riddle of suggestion after having kept
away from it for some thirty years, I find there is no change in the
situation. To this statement I can discover only a single exception,
which I need not mention, since it is one which bears witness to the
influence of psycho-analysis. I notice that particular efforts are being
made to formulate the concept of suggestion correctly, that is, to fix
the conventional use of the name.[24] And this is by no means
superfluous, for the word is acquiring a more and more extended use and
a looser and looser meaning, and will soon come to designate any sort of
influence whatever, just as in English, where 'to suggest' and
'suggestion' correspond to our _nahelegen_ and _Anregung_. But there has
been no explanation of the nature of suggestion, that is, of the
conditions under which influence without adequate logical foundation
takes place. I should not avoid the task of supporting this statement by
an analysis of the literature of the last thirty years, if I were not
aware that an exhaustive inquiry is being undertaken close at hand which
has in view the fulfilment of this very task.
Instead of this I shall make an attempt at using the concept of _libido_
for the purpose of throwing light upon Group Psychology, a concept which
has done us such good service in the study of psycho-neuroses.
Libido is an expression taken from the theory of the emotions. We call
by that name the energy (regarded as a quantitative magnitude, though
not at present actually mensurable) of those instincts which have to do
with all that may be comprised under the word 'love'. The nucleus of
what we mean by love naturally consists (and this is what is commonly
called love, and what the poets sing of) in sexual love with sexual
union as its aim. But we do not separate from this--what in any case
has a share in the name 'love'--on the one hand, self-love, and on the
other, love for parents and children, friendship and love for humanity
in general, and also devotion to concrete objects and to abstract ideas.
Our justification lies in the fact that psycho-analytic research has
taught us that all these tendencies are an expression of the same
instinctive activities; in relations between the sexes these instincts
force their way towards sexual union, but in other circumstances they
are diverted from this aim or are prevented from reaching it, though
always preserving enough of their original nature to keep their identity
recognizable (as in such features as the longing for proximity, and
self-sacrifice).
We are of opinion, then, that language has carried out an entirely
justifiable piece of unification in creating the word 'love' with its
numerous uses, and that we cannot do better than take it as the basis of
our scientific discussions and expositions as well. By coming to this
decision, psycho-analysis has let loose a storm of indignation, as
though it had been guilty of an act of outrageous innovation. Yet
psycho-analysis has done nothing original in taking love in this 'wider'
sense. In its origin, function, and relation to sexual love, the
'_Eros_' of the philosopher Plato coincides exactly with the love force,
the libido, of psycho-analysis, as has been shown in detail by
Nachmansohn and Pfister;[25] and when the apostle Paul, in his famous
epistle to the Corinthians, prizes love above all else, he certainly
understands it in the same 'wider' sense.[26] But this only shows that
men do not always take their great thinkers seriously, even when they
profess most to admire them.
Psycho-analysis, then, gives these love instincts the name of sexual
instincts, a _potiori_ and by reason of their origin. The majority of
'educated' people have taken their revenge by retorting upon
psycho-analysis with the reproach of 'pan-sexualism'. Anyone who
considers sex as something mortifying and humiliating to human nature is
at liberty to make use of the more genteel expressions 'Eros' and
'erotic'. I might have done so myself from the first and thus have
spared myself much opposition. But I did not want to, for I like to
avoid concessions to faint-heartedness. One can never tell where that
road may lead one; one gives way first in words, and then little by
little in substance too. I cannot see any merit in being ashamed of sex;
the Greek word 'Eros', which is to soften the affront, is in the end
nothing more than a translation of our German word _Liebe_ [love]; and
finally, he who knows how to wait need make no concessions.
We will try our fortune, then, with the supposition that love
relationships (or, to use a more neutral expression, emotional ties)
also constitute the essence of the group mind. Let us remember that the
authorities make no mention of any such relations. What would correspond
to them is evidently concealed behind the shelter, the screen, of
suggestion. Our hypothesis finds support in the first instance from two
passing thoughts. First, that a group is clearly held together by a
power of some kind: and to what power could this feat be better ascribed
than to Eros, who holds together everything in the world? Secondly, that
if an individual gives up his distinctiveness in a group and lets its
other members influence him by suggestion, it gives one the impression
that he does it because he feels the need of being in harmony with them
rather than in opposition to them--so that perhaps after all he does it
'_ihnen zu Liebe_'.[27]
V
TWO ARTIFICIAL GROUPS: THE CHURCH AND THE ARMY
We may recall from what we know of the morphology of groups that it is
possible to distinguish very different kinds of groups and opposing
lines in their development. There are very fleeting groups and extremely
lasting ones; homogeneous ones, made up of the same sorts of
individuals, and unhomogeneous ones; natural groups, and artificial
ones, requiring an external force to keep them together; primitive
groups, and highly organised ones with a definite structure. But for
reasons which have yet to be explained we should like to lay particular
stress upon a distinction to which the authorities have rather given too
little attention; I refer to that between leaderless groups and those
with leaders. And, in complete opposition to the usual practice, we
shall not choose a relatively simple group formation as our point of
departure, but shall begin with highly organised, lasting and artificial
groups. The most interesting example of such structures are
churches--communities of believers--and armies.