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Beyond words
492
BCOKbMEWS
is viewed as establishing a secular religion (ritualistic and experimental). It is a faith rich with the teaching of science and capable of imbuing education with an emotional and sacred character. His is, indeed, a compelling presentation. In the service of his discussion on encounter groups and sensitivity training as a social movement, the author discusses the relationship of these techniques to therapy, organizational development and education. The chapters addressed to these relationships are alone worth the price of the book. Back also identifies Gestalt Theraov. .-. Transactional Analysis, Psychodrama and Rational Therapy as treatment forms that are influenced by and influence encounter techniques. He focuses on the responsibility of clinicians for clarifying the confusions over the boundaries between groups conducted for recreation, spiritual regeneration or therapeutic reconstruction. Repeatedly, he illuminates the ambivalent behavior of some group leaders who claim that individuals can be held totally responsibk, while the leader promotes the intense, powerful influence for change that is characteristic of these groups. Thus, change in the direction promulgated by the group leaders is due to group htfluences while individual change which is hurtful is seen as the responsibility of the individual. Group leaders who deny their responsibility he identitks as tiling the role of shaman or priest in earlier societies. Yet they are not subject to the control that most societies impose upon such “magic” individuals as Gften the examination of sensitivity training and encounter techniques as a social movement slights differences among various types of groups. Throughout this book, Dr. Back is careful to identify the varying theoWILSON retical positions and practice orientations of those involved in group training. However, most summary Shmtte Schoalof Management statements treat groups as part of a group movement and Mamxhusetts Institute of Technology minimixe important distinctions in theory and uractice. Back, too, suffers seemingly endemic oversimplitIcation. Beyood Words by KURT W. BACK. Russell Sage FoundThe major weakness of the book is its emphasis of the ation, 1972. 266 pp. $7.95. social movement thesis which leads to the author’s identification of much of the scientific work on group and DR. BACK has written a refreshingly readable and schoorganizational dynamics as being outside the movement. larly tteatise identifying sensitivity training and encounter The use of groups to fuhill deep seated needs for relatedgroups as a discrete social movement. By delineating a ness or to be rituals for symbolic meaning does not, in any constellation of conditions in contemporary society sense, vitiate the utility of group settings for learning or leading many of us to feel rootless and bereft of meaning, of group experiences for enhancing understandiig about he sets the stage for the development of the encounter group dynamics. phenomenon. Convincingly, he describes life in a nation For over a decade, ‘group training has had many of the where mobility is typical and aifluence and secularization characteristics of a social movement. Dr. Rack has common-a nation productive of strains with which clearly identified that movement for us, describing its traditional institutions cannot cope. history and development, its scientific antecedents, Back views the encounter movement as an attempt to religious function and social context, and examines the fill a void, to provide meaning where meaning is lacking. interaction of the movement with psychotherapy, organiYet the movement is a paradox. It utilizes the language of zational development and education. The book would science but in the pursuit of immediate and intense have benefited from a more extensive discussion of the experience; it aims at a spiritual regeneration of man but interpenetration of the movement with the academic only by ritualizing scientific work that is non-spiritual; social sciences. Psychology, sociology, history, anthropoit promotes pragmatic social change and participatory logy have all been influenced by, and in turn, have influleadership while advocating utopian social possibilities enced sensitivity training. Yet why carp? Dr. Back has and individual ful6lhuent. Dr. Back skillfully weaves written a book well worth reading. together his experience from interviews with many of the leaders of this movement, and carefully reviews the literRoarsM. &TRACHAN ature to buttress his argument. He sees sensitivity training Department of Psychiatry as appropriate to a scientific age ln which a generation, Yale University School of Medicine its ancestors and heirs, have lost trust in religion. Training
signiticant aspects of the substantial amount of organixational msearch done in health institutions in the 1960’s. The book is a compilation of the working papers presented at a conference sponsored by the Institute for Social Research in May, 1970. Contributors to the conference (and therefore to the book) were asked to review the current state of organizational knowledge in their own area and to outline the direction in which future research should proceed. Areas of rmearch covered in this volume include the hospital as a problem-solving system, social control of general hospitals, and stmctmalcomparative studies of hospitals. The review of the literature is comprehensive, the bibliographies included with each chapter are extensive. For this reason the organization researcher will 6nd this a valuable addition to his library. However, the health care professional is more likely to be impressed by the book’s omissions than its inclusions. For example, important organizational issues in health care today, health.teams and community participation, to mention but two, have just a combined seven pages of the book’s 418 total. Ambulatory care is completely ignored. Neither hospital clinics, neighborhood health centers, nor the group practice of medicine are discussed ln their own right at a time when they represent the most innovative forms for such studies. In short. the editor has so narrowly defined his subject
BCOKbMEWS
is viewed as establishing a secular religion (ritualistic and experimental). It is a faith rich with the teaching of science and capable of imbuing education with an emotional and sacred character. His is, indeed, a compelling presentation. In the service of his discussion on encounter groups and sensitivity training as a social movement, the author discusses the relationship of these techniques to therapy, organizational development and education. The chapters addressed to these relationships are alone worth the price of the book. Back also identifies Gestalt Theraov. .-. Transactional Analysis, Psychodrama and Rational Therapy as treatment forms that are influenced by and influence encounter techniques. He focuses on the responsibility of clinicians for clarifying the confusions over the boundaries between groups conducted for recreation, spiritual regeneration or therapeutic reconstruction. Repeatedly, he illuminates the ambivalent behavior of some group leaders who claim that individuals can be held totally responsibk, while the leader promotes the intense, powerful influence for change that is characteristic of these groups. Thus, change in the direction promulgated by the group leaders is due to group htfluences while individual change which is hurtful is seen as the responsibility of the individual. Group leaders who deny their responsibility he identitks as tiling the role of shaman or priest in earlier societies. Yet they are not subject to the control that most societies impose upon such “magic” individuals as Gften the examination of sensitivity training and encounter techniques as a social movement slights differences among various types of groups. Throughout this book, Dr. Back is careful to identify the varying theoWILSON retical positions and practice orientations of those involved in group training. However, most summary Shmtte Schoalof Management statements treat groups as part of a group movement and Mamxhusetts Institute of Technology minimixe important distinctions in theory and uractice. Back, too, suffers seemingly endemic oversimplitIcation. Beyood Words by KURT W. BACK. Russell Sage FoundThe major weakness of the book is its emphasis of the ation, 1972. 266 pp. $7.95. social movement thesis which leads to the author’s identification of much of the scientific work on group and DR. BACK has written a refreshingly readable and schoorganizational dynamics as being outside the movement. larly tteatise identifying sensitivity training and encounter The use of groups to fuhill deep seated needs for relatedgroups as a discrete social movement. By delineating a ness or to be rituals for symbolic meaning does not, in any constellation of conditions in contemporary society sense, vitiate the utility of group settings for learning or leading many of us to feel rootless and bereft of meaning, of group experiences for enhancing understandiig about he sets the stage for the development of the encounter group dynamics. phenomenon. Convincingly, he describes life in a nation For over a decade, ‘group training has had many of the where mobility is typical and aifluence and secularization characteristics of a social movement. Dr. Rack has common-a nation productive of strains with which clearly identified that movement for us, describing its traditional institutions cannot cope. history and development, its scientific antecedents, Back views the encounter movement as an attempt to religious function and social context, and examines the fill a void, to provide meaning where meaning is lacking. interaction of the movement with psychotherapy, organiYet the movement is a paradox. It utilizes the language of zational development and education. The book would science but in the pursuit of immediate and intense have benefited from a more extensive discussion of the experience; it aims at a spiritual regeneration of man but interpenetration of the movement with the academic only by ritualizing scientific work that is non-spiritual; social sciences. Psychology, sociology, history, anthropoit promotes pragmatic social change and participatory logy have all been influenced by, and in turn, have influleadership while advocating utopian social possibilities enced sensitivity training. Yet why carp? Dr. Back has and individual ful6lhuent. Dr. Back skillfully weaves written a book well worth reading. together his experience from interviews with many of the leaders of this movement, and carefully reviews the literRoarsM. &TRACHAN ature to buttress his argument. He sees sensitivity training Department of Psychiatry as appropriate to a scientific age ln which a generation, Yale University School of Medicine its ancestors and heirs, have lost trust in religion. Training
signiticant aspects of the substantial amount of organixational msearch done in health institutions in the 1960’s. The book is a compilation of the working papers presented at a conference sponsored by the Institute for Social Research in May, 1970. Contributors to the conference (and therefore to the book) were asked to review the current state of organizational knowledge in their own area and to outline the direction in which future research should proceed. Areas of rmearch covered in this volume include the hospital as a problem-solving system, social control of general hospitals, and stmctmalcomparative studies of hospitals. The review of the literature is comprehensive, the bibliographies included with each chapter are extensive. For this reason the organization researcher will 6nd this a valuable addition to his library. However, the health care professional is more likely to be impressed by the book’s omissions than its inclusions. For example, important organizational issues in health care today, health.teams and community participation, to mention but two, have just a combined seven pages of the book’s 418 total. Ambulatory care is completely ignored. Neither hospital clinics, neighborhood health centers, nor the group practice of medicine are discussed ln their own right at a time when they represent the most innovative forms for such studies. In short. the editor has so narrowly defined his subject