The Structure and Dynamics of Organizations and Groups

by Eric Berne

Dr Berne published this book in 1963, after Transactional Analysis in Psychotherapy but before the popular Games People Play. In the preface, he states the book's objective as: "to offer a systematic framework for the therapy of ailing groups & organizations." He discusses the structure & dynamics of groups, classification of groups, the analysis of transactions, an overview of games, group psychotherapy & other subjects.
Berne doesn't treat games in great detail--that would come next year in Games People Play. This book is recommended for those interested in an introduction to the application of Transactional Analysis to groups. For a more detailed discussion, readers are recommended to consult Principles of Group Treatment.

Genres: Psychology, Nonfiction, Management, Business, Sociology

338 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1963

About the author

Eric Berne was a Canadian-born psychiatrist best known as the creator of transactional analysis. Eric was born on May 10, 1910 as Eric Lennard Bernstein in Montreal, Canada.He and his sister Grace, who was five years younger than Eric, were the children of a physician and a writer, David and Sara Gordon Bernstein.David Bernstein died in 1921, and the children were raised by their mother.

Bernstein attended Montreal's McGill University, graduating in 1931 and earning his M.D., C.M. in 1935.While at McGill he wrote for several student newspapers using pseudonyms. He followed graduation with a residency in psychiatry at Yale University, where he studied psychoanalysis under Paul Federn.

In 1943 he changed his legal name to Eric Berne.He continued to use pseudonyms, such as Cyprian St. Cyr ("Cyprian Sincere"), for whimsical articles in the Transactional Analysis Bulletin.

Berne's training was interrupted by World War II and his service in the Army Medical Corps, where he was promoted to the rank of Major. After working at Bushnell Army Hospital in Ogden, Utah, he was discharged in 1945.

Reviews

[Michael David · Rating 4 out of 5]

A group has three essential forces, which Berne labeled as the major external group process, the major internal group process, and the minor internal group process. The major external group process is what is often evident in times of war or pandemics(my country against COVID-19). The major internal group process is what foments revolutions: internal discord between the aristocracy and the proletariat, for example, threaten the internal cohesion of a country. Finally, the minor internal process is what manifests in intrigues: gossip against fellow workers is a great example. The minor internal process can still be used to destabilize countries: this is what was beautifully illustrated in The Rise of Phoenixes. Intrigues properly utilized can snowball into a major internal group process.

A group consists of three leaders: the responsible, the effective, and the psychological leader. The responsible leader is the group's front man; the effective leader may be the one who pulls the strings. The psychological leader, on the other hand, is the man or woman people rally around. While they may sometimes be only one person, most of the time two or three people perform its roles. The better the leaders are, the stronger the group becomes, and the longer it survives. In a group, "each of the members resigns part of his individual proclivities in favor of cohesion, so that the group can become an effective force." (p. 130)

A group is regulated by its Constitution, laws, and culture. For a group to survive, it must fulfill five provisions: existential (reason for its existence), teleologic (goal), structural, regulatory, and autotelic (legislative). The best leaders are often willing to kill to defend the group's constitution. These leaders are known as primal leaders. These leaders establish customs within the group that become traditions after his death (Lincoln abolished slavery, and America stayed that way).

Just like the individual has the Parent-Adult-Child component, the culture within a group also reflects this dynamic. However, instead of Parent, it becomes group etiquette - or the rules that individuals within the group follow; instead of Adult, it becomes technical culture, or how the group manipulates itself around reality; instead of Child, it becomes group character.

People wish to belong in groups because of their needs: a biologic need for stimulation; a psychological need for time-structuring; a social need for intimacy; a nostalgic need for patterning transactions; and, a provisional set of expectations based on past experience. (p. 221) However, the ultimate goal of human relationships, intimacy, is "not suited in public situations." (p. 217)

Intimacy is threatening for various reasons, partly because it requires independent structuring and personal responsibility; also, as already noted, it is not suited in public situations. Hence, most people in groups settle for whatever satisfactions they can get from games, and the more timid ones may not go beyond pastimes. (p. 217)

This quote is particularly enlightening to me because I have always eschewed being in a large group. I enjoy sincere friendships with a few people, and most of these have been founded on a tete-a-tete. Besides, my anancasm is intellectual competence, which is also a private activity. That said, most of the reasons why groups are joined by people do not apply to me: I often can fulfill my psychological need for time-structuring, and have found myself to be productive in spite of the pandemic; my biological need for stimulation is addressed by my running, which is a private activity; and, my social need for intimacy is fulfilled in a genuine conversation between me and the person I care about. This said, I have little reason to participate in most groups.

In the few groups I do participate in, I tend to serve as a responsible leader or a psychological leader. As I am an ER physician, I have the final say when it comes to attending to cases, and I think I have fulfilled that role honorably. I am in concordance with most of my staff, and we function well as a unit. I do not fulfill the role of a euhemerus, or primal leader, and I have no wish to become one.

Although this book was insightful to me, the cases at the end of the book are no longer as useful nowadays.

[Erik Graff · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some time after reading Berne's popular 'Games People Play', I went back to the Park Ridge Public Library and picked out this other, earlier title by him. Being active in politics both in my hometown and in college, I was interested in practical reflection about group dynamics. This book was relevant, but the prose was dry and really there isn't all that much to Berne's TA. Once you get the basic concepts, the rest can be easily inferred. Interestingly, however, one of the examples given by Berne is that of a seance.

[Steven H · Rating 5 out of 5]

BERNE APPLIES TRANSACTIONAL ANALYSIS TO MANY "GROUP" SITUATIONS

Eric Berne (1910-1970; born as Eric Bernstein, he changed his name in 1943) was a Canadian-born psychiatrist, who wrote many popular (even "trendy," in the 1960s) books such as 'A Layman's Guide to Psychiatry and Psychoanalysis,' 'Transactional Analysis in Psychotherapy,' 'Games People Play,' 'Principles of Group Treatment,' etc.

He wrote in the Preface to this 1963 book, "The object of ... this book is to offer a systematic framework for the therapy of ailing groups and organizations... This study is based on a schedule of leading, observing and participating in groups over a period of 19 years, as well as teaching and supervising group therapists and acting as consultant to leaders of ailing groups and organizations of various kinds... The ideas presented here have been under almost continuous critical review since their first presentation in 1953..." (Pg. vii) He begins the first chapter with the statement, "This book is for people concerned with groups and with what can go wrong with organizations and groups. But it is intended to be a scientific work and not a kind of handy manual for leaders." (Pg. 1)

He suggests, "The individual joins a personal group because of the people in it. He is not so much concerned with his role in the organizational structure as with his place in the individual structure. A personal group consists of people of his own psychological class... A constrained group is one that the individual joins... because there is a slot for him, and he needs the advantages that go with the slot... The personal group is a social problem; the constrained group is an 'existential' one... The obligatory group such as a prison, is neither; it is primarily a problem in individual survival." (Pg. 121-122)

He says, "The special characteristics of each type of ego state will now be reviewed in more detail... A Parental ego state is a set of feelings, attitudes and behavior patterns that resemble those of a parental figure... [and] is especially apt to be aroused by childlike behavior on the part of someone else in the group... The Adult ego state is ... adapted to the current reality and [is] not affected by Parental prejudices or archaic attitudes left over from childhood... The Child ego state ... are relics of the individual's own childhood." (Pg. 136-137)

He introduces one of his key concepts: "In infants, the withholding of caresses and normal human contact... results directly or indirectly in physical as well as mental deterioration... these findings are summarized in the ... slogan, 'If the infant is not stroked, his spinal cord shrivels up.' As the individual grows up, he learns to accept symbolic forms of stroking instead of the actual touch, until the mere act of recognition serves the purpose. That is why the elements of greeting rituals are called 'strokes'... people are offering the social contact which is necessary for the preservation of health." (Pg. 157)

He argues, "The script is the most important item and... the most difficult to investigate of all the items of equipment which the individual brings with him when he enters a group... The original drama, the protocol, is usually completed in the early years of childhood... Since some scripts may take years of even a whole lifetime to play out, they are not easily studied in experimental situations or in groups of short duration. They are most efficiently unmasked by a careful review of the life history or in long term psychotherapy groups..." (Pg. 166-167)

Group treatment was very important to Berne (see his later "Principles" book), but this book has a greater degree of application of his ideas to "workplace"-types of settings.

[Al · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very comprehensive knowledge on groups. Highly recommended for those trying to understand how the individual intersects with groups. Highly practical knowledge on improving ailing groups at the end of the book, too.

[RickyTicky · Rating 3 out of 5]

Сократить бы до 30 страниц, была б прекраснейшая книга.

[Alexander · Rating 3 out of 5]

boring

[Lars Hellberg]

I didn't actually read this book, but tagged it by mistake. Unfortunately, on Goodreads it is completely impossible to undo something.