Community Counselling Circles
Taking part in a Community Counselling Circles group led by the unorthodox Freudian analyst John Southgate is an enlivening experience. It is the most dynamic advance in working with large groups since Foulkes:
Community Counselling Circles is a new design for training large groups. The main problem in large groups normally is the lack of a feeling of safety and mutual support. Here the atmosphere in the group is improved by sitting in four concentric circles.
'The innermost circle is treated as a single person 'client', and this group free associates, with all the other circles as its therapists'
The innermost circle is treated as a single person 'client', and this group free associates, with all the other circles as its therapists - the second circle concentrating on noticing the emotional climate; the third circle on any material that might be to do with parental and family relationships; and the fourth circle on organisational problems in life and work.
The whole group resembles an individual's psychical world, and the members learn about the innermost dynamics of individual people, at the same time as being educated in group dynamics and the way communities operate.
Community Counselling Circles are being developed and used in area health authorities, social work training and in universities and polytechnics. Settings where they have been tried include group and management training, amongst psychiatric workers, district nurses, cooperatives and communities, local government groups, women's and ethnic groups.
'The whole group resembles an individual's psychical world, and the members learn about the innermost dynamics of individual people'
John Southgate, 12 Nassington Road, London NW3 (tel 071 794 4306). A book, 'Community Counselling Circles' by John Southgate, published by the Institute for Social Inventions (20 Heber Road, London NW2 6AA, tel 081 208 2853; fax 081 452 6434) - at L6-95 including post and packing, or L9-95 to libraries and institutions - makes the approach available to group leaders and teachers, using over 260 diagrams and looking at its roots in Zen writings and in the works of Paulo Freire, Lacan, Freud and others, ISBN 0 948826 00 2.
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