PSYCHOLOGY OF CROWDS - Le Bon E-Book

Gustave Le Bon

• Herausgeber: Lebooks Editora
• Kategorie: Geisteswissenschaft
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2024

Seitenzahl: 280

Beschreibung

Gustave Le Bon (1841-1931) was a French thinker, considered the founder of Social Psychology. Le Bon was a polymath, a scholar who traversed diverse areas, but became famous for his approach to social psychology. He wrote numerous works on the subject, among which stand out: "Psychology of Crowds: A Study of the Popular Mind" and "The Opinions and Beliefs." It would be hardly possible to study topics related to mass behavior without studying and relying on Gustave Le Bon's studies.  In "Psychology of Crowds:" Le Bon suggests that crowds are like a servile herd and, therefore, they could not exist without the presence of a leader with a strong personality, well-defined beliefs, and a powerful will. The history of humanity shows, up to the present day, how masses prefer leaders with a strong personality over a consistent ideology, lucidity, management skills, among other qualities rare in politicians. Originally published in 1911, "Psycology of Crowd: A Study of the Popular Mind" is an incredibly relevant work that helps the reader interpret much of what is happening in the USA politics, and many other countries, nowdays.

Leseprobe

Gustave Le Bon

PSYCHOLOGY OF CROWDS

Original Title:

Psychologie des Foules

Contents

INTRODUCTION

PSYCHOLOGY OF CROWDS

INTRODUCTION - THE ERA OF CROWDS.

BOOK I - THE MIND OF CROWDS

BOOK II - THE OPINIONS AND BELIEFS OF CROWDS

BOOK III - THE CLASSIFICATION AND DESCRIPTION OF THE DIFFERENT KINDS OF CROWDS

INTRODUCTION

Gustave Le Bon

Gustave Le Bon (May 7, 1841 – December 13, 1931) was a French polymath whose areas of interest included anthropology, psychology, sociology, medicine, and physics, among others. He is best known for his 1895 work, "The Crowd: A Study of the Popular Mind," considered one of the seminal works in crowd psychology.

Born in Nogent-le-Rotrou, Le Bon graduated in medicine from the University of Paris in 1866, the same year he began his writing career. He published a series of medical books and articles before joining the French army after the outbreak of the Franco-Prussian War. The defeat in the war, along with witnessing the Paris Commune of 1871, strongly shaped Le Bon's worldview. He then traveled extensively, visiting Europe, Asia, and North Africa, analyzing peoples and civilizations and developing an essentialist view of humanity.

In the 1890s, he turned to psychology and sociology, fields in which he produced his most successful works. Le Bon developed the view that crowds are not the sum of their individual parts, proposing that within crowds a new psychological entity is formed, whose characteristics are determined by the crowd's "collective unconscious."

While developing his psychological and sociological theories, he conducted experiments in physics and published popular books on the subject, studying mass-energy equivalence and prophesying the Atomic Age. Le Bon maintained his eclectic interests until his death in 1931.

Ignored by the French academic establishment during his lifetime due to his politically conservative views, Le Bon criticized democracy and socialism. His works influenced various figures such as Theodore Roosevelt, Benito Mussolini, Sigmund Freud, José Ortega y Gasset, Adolf Hitler, Lenin, and Monteiro Lobato.

Childhood

Charles-Marie Gustave Le Bon was born in Nogent-le-Rotrou, in the Centre-Val de Loire region, on May 7, 1841, to a family of Breton ancestry. At the time of Le Bon's birth, his mother, Annette Josephine Eugénic Tétiot Desmarlinais, was twenty-six years old, and his father, Jean-Marie Charles Le Bon, forty-one years old. His father was a provincial government official in France.

When Le Bon was eight years old, his father obtained a new position in the French government, and the family, including Gustave's younger brother Georges, left Nogent-le-Rotrou never to return. Subsequently, the city, proud of Le Bon's accomplishments, named a street after him. Little else is known about Le Bon's childhood, except for his studies at a high school in Tours, where he performed exceptionally well.

In 1860, he began his medical studies at the University of Paris. He completed his internship at the Hôtel-Dieu de Paris and received his doctorate in 1866, although he never formally worked as a physician. During his university years, Le Bon wrote articles on a variety of medical subjects. His initial focus was on the ailments afflicting those living in swamp-like regions. He published several other articles on filariasis and asphyxia before releasing his first complete book in 1866, "La mort apparente et inhumations prématurées" (Apparent Death and Premature Burials). This work dealt with the definition of death, preceding the legal debates of the 20th century on the issue.

Life in Paris

After his graduation, Le Bon remained in Paris, where he learned English and German by reading Shakespeare's works in different languages. He maintained his passion for writing and published several articles on physiological studies, as well as a book in 1868 on sexual reproduction, before joining the French army as a medical officer after the outbreak of the Franco-Prussian War in July 1870. During the war, Le Bon organized a division of military ambulances. On this occasion, he observed the behavior of soldiers under the worst possible conditions and wrote about his reflections on military discipline, leadership, and human behavior in a state of stress and suffering. These reflections were praised by generals and later studied at Saint-Cyr and other military academies in France. At the end of the war, Le Bon was appointed a Knight of the Legion of Honor.

Le Bon also witnessed the Paris Commune of 1871, which profoundly affected his worldview. Le Bon, then thirty years old, watched as revolutionary crowds in Paris set fire to the Tuileries Palace, the Louvre library, the Hôtel de Ville, the Manufacture des Gobelins, the Palais de Justice, and other irreplaceable works.

From 1871 onwards, Le Bon became a declared opponent of socialism.

Travels around the World

Le Bon became interested in the emerging field of anthropology in the 1870s and traveled through Europe, Asia, and North Africa. Influenced by Charles Darwin, Herbert Spencer, and Ernst Haeckel, Le Bon supported biological determinism and a hierarchical view of races and sexes; after extensive field research, he postulated a correlation between cranial capacity and intelligence in "Recherches anatomiques et mathématiques sur les variations de volume du cerveau et sur leurs relations avec l'intelligence" (Anatomical and Mathematical Research on Brain Volume Variations and Their Relationships with Intelligence) (1879), which earned him the Godard Prize from the French Academy of Sciences. During his research, he invented a portable cephalometer to help measure the physical characteristics of peoples from remote regions, and in 1881, he published an article, "The Pocket Cephalometer, or Coordinate Compass," detailing his invention and its application.

In 1884, he was hired by the French government to travel through Asia, study, and report on his studies of the civilizations there. The results of his travels were a series of books and a development in Le Bon's thinking that came to see culture as primarily influenced by hereditary factors, such as the unique racial characteristics of the people. The first book, titled "La Civilisation des Arabes" (The Civilization of the Arabs), was released in 1884. In this work, Le Bon greatly praised the Arabs for their contributions to civilization but criticized Islam as a factor of stagnation.

He also described their culture as superior to that of the Turks who ruled them, and translations of this work were inspirational to early Arab nationalists. Afterward, he embarked on a journey to Nepal, becoming the first Frenchman to visit the country. This experience yielded the book "Voyage au Népal" (Journey to Nepal) in 1886.

Le Bon then published "Les Civilizations de l'Inde" (The Civilizations of India) (1887), in which he revered Indian architecture, art, and religion but argued that Indians were comparatively inferior to Europeans in scientific advancements, which facilitated British domination. In 1889, he released "Les Premières Civilisations de l'Orient" (The First Civilizations of the East), where he wrote about an overview of Mesopotamian, Indian, Chinese, and Egyptian civilizations. In the same year, he delivered a speech at the International Colonial Congress criticizing colonial policies that included attempts at cultural assimilation, stating, "Let the natives keep their customs, their institutions, and their laws." Le Bon released the final book on the subject of his travels, titled "Les monuments de l'Inde" (The Monuments of India), in 1893, once again praising the architectural achievements of the Indian people.

Development of His Theories

During his travels, Le Bon mainly traveled on horseback and noticed that the techniques used by horse breeders and trainers varied depending on the region. He returned to Paris in 1892, and while riding a rebellious horse, he was thrown from the saddle and narrowly escaped death. Curious about what led him to be thrown off the horse, he decided to investigate what he had done wrong in handling the animal. The result of his study was "L'Équitation actuelle et ses principes. Recherches expérimentales" (Contemporary Horsemanship and its Principles. Experimental Research) (1892), which consisted of numerous photographs of horses in action combined with Le Bon's analysis. This work became a respected cavalry manual.

Le Bon's behavioral study of horses also sparked his interest in psychology. In 1894, he released "Lois psychologiques de l'évolution des peuples" (Psychological Laws of the Evolution of Peoples). This work was dedicated to his friend Charles Richet, although it drew heavily from the theories of Théodule-Armand Ribot, to whom Le Bon dedicated the work "Psychologie des Foules" (The Crowd: A Study of the Popular Mind) (1895). "The Crowd" was, in part, a summary of Le Bon's 1881 work, "L'Homme et les sociétés" (Man and Societies) – cited by Émile Durkheim in his doctoral dissertation "De la division du travail social" (The Division of Labor in Society).

Both became bestsellers. "The Crowd" was translated into nineteen languages within a year of its appearance. Le Bon released two more books on psychology, "Psychologie du Socialisme" (The Psychology of Socialism) and "Psychologie de l'Éducation" (The Psychology of Education), in 1896 and 1902, respectively. These works annoyed the predominantly socialist academic establishment in France.

Incursions into Physics Studies

In "L'Évolution de la Matière" (The Evolution of Matter) (1905), Le Bon anticipated mass-energy equivalence and, in a letter from 1922 to Albert Einstein, complained about his lack of recognition. Einstein responded and admitted that mass-energy equivalence had been proposed before his, but only the theory of relativity proved it convincingly.

In "L'Évolution des Forces" (The Evolution of Forces) (1907), Le Bon prophesied the Atomic Age. He wrote about "the manifestation of a new force – namely, intra-atomic energy – which surpasses all others by its colossal magnitude," and stated that a scientist who discovered a way to rapidly dissociate a gram of any metal "would not witness the results of his experiments... the explosion produced would be so formidable that his laboratory and all neighboring houses, with their inhabitants, would be instantly pulverized."

Le Bon interrupted his physics research in 1908 and returned to psychology. He published "La Psychologie politique et la défense sociale" (Political Psychology and Social Defense), "Les Opinions et les croyances" (Opinions and Beliefs), "La Révolution Française et la Psychologie des Révolutions" (The French Revolution and the Psychology of Revolutions), "Aphorismes du temps présent" (Aphorisms of the Present Time), and "La Vie des vérités" (The Life of Truths) from 1910 to 1914, works that laid out his views on affective and rational thought, race psychology, and the history of civilization.

Mature Life and Death

Le Bon continued writing throughout World War I, publishing "Essais Psychologiques de la Guerre Européenne" (Psychological Essays of the European War) (1915), "Premières conséquences de la guerre: transformation mentale des peuples" (First Consequences of the War: Mental Transformation of Peoples) (1916), and "Hier et demain. Pensées brèves" (Yesterday and Tomorrow. Brief Thoughts) (1918) during the war.

He then released "Psychologie des Temps Nouveaux" (Psychology of the New Times) (1920) before resigning from his position as professor of psychology and related sciences at the University of Paris and retiring to his home. He further released "Le Déséquilibre du Monde" (The Imbalance of the World), "Les Incertitudes de l'heure présente" (The Uncertainties of the Present Hour), and "L'évolution actuelle du monde, illusions et réalités" (The Current Evolution of the World, Illusions and Realities) in 1923, 1924, and 1927, respectively, detailing his views of the world during the volatile interwar period.

Le Bon became a Grand-Croix of the Legion of Honor in 1929. He published his last work, titled "Bases scientifiques d'une philosophie de l'histoire" (Scientific Foundations of a Philosophy of History), in 1931, and on December 13, he died in Marnes-la-Coquette, Île-de-France, at the age of ninety.

In putting an end to Gustave Le Bon's long, diverse, and fruitful activity, death deprived our culture of a truly remarkable man. He was a man of exceptional intelligence; he sprang entirely from within himself; he was his own master, his own initiator... Science and philosophy suffered a cruel loss.

Psychological of crowds

Le Bon detailed three central processes that create the psychological crowd: I) Anonymity, II) Contagion, and III) Suggestibility. Anonymity provides rational individuals with a sense of invincibility and loss of personal responsibility. An individual becomes primitive, irrational, and emotional. This lack of self-control allows individuals to "give in to instincts" and accept the instinctive impulses of their racial influence.

Contagion refers to the spread within the crowd of particular behaviors and individuals sacrifice their personal interest for the collective interest. Suggestibility is the mechanism by which contagion is achieved; as the crowd coalesces into a singular mind, suggestions made by strong voices in the crowd create space for the racial unconscious to come forward and guide their behavior.

At this stage, the psychological crowd becomes homogeneous and malleable to suggestions from its strongest members. "The leaders we speak of," says Le Bon, "are generally men of action and not of words. They are not endowed with keen foresight... They are especially recruited from the ranks of those half-disturbed, nervous, and morbid individuals who are on the verge of madness."

PSYCHOLOGY OF CROWDS

INTRODUCTION - THE ERA OF CROWDS.

The evolution of the present age — The great changes in civilization are the consequence of changes in National thought — Modern belief in the power of crowds—It transforms the traditional policy of the European states — How the rise of the popular classes comes about, and the manner in which they exercise their power — The necessary consequences of the power of the crowd — Crowds unable to play a part other than destructive — The dissolution of worn-out civilizations is the work of the crowd — General ignorance of the psychology of crowds — Importance of the study of crowds for legislators and statesmen.

The great upheavals which precede changes of civilizations such as the fall of the Roman Empire and the foundation of the Arabian Empire, seem at first sight determined more especially by political transformations, foreign invasion, or the overthrow of dynasties. But a more attentive study of these events shows that behind their apparent causes the real cause is generally seen to be a profound modification in the ideas of the peoples. The true historical upheavals are not those which astonish us by their grandeur and violence. The only important changes whence the renewal of civilizations results, affect ideas, conceptions, and beliefs. The memorable events of history are the visible effects of the invisible changes of human thought. The reason these great events are so rare is that there is nothing so stable in a race as the inherited groundwork of its thoughts.

The present epoch is one of these critical moments in which the thought of mankind is undergoing a process of transformation.

Two fundamental factors are at the base of this transformation. The first is the destruction of those religious, political, and social beliefs in which all the elements of our civilization are rooted. The second is the creation of entirely new conditions of existence and thought as the result of modern scientific and industrial discoveries.

The ideas of the past, although half destroyed, being still very powerful, and the ideas which are to replace them being still in process of formation, the modern age represents a period of transition and anarchy.

It is not easy to say as yet what will one day be evolved from this necessarily somewhat chaotic period. What will be the fundamental ideas on which the societies that are to succeed our own will be built up? We do not at present know. Still it is already clear that on whatever lines the societies of the future are organized, they will have to count with a new power, with the last surviving sovereign force of modern times, the power of crowds. On the ruins of so many ideas formerly considered beyond discussion, and to-day decayed or decaying, of so many sources of authority that successive revolutions have destroyed, this power, which alone has arisen in their stead, seems soon destined to absorb the others. While all our ancient beliefs are tottering and disappearing, while the old pillars of society are giving way one by one, the power of the crowd is the only force that nothing menaces, and of which the prestige is continually on the increase. The age we are about to enter will in truth be the ERA OF CROWDS.

Scarcely a century ago the traditional policy of European states and the rivalries of sovereigns were the principal factors that shaped events. The opinion of the masses scarcely counted, and most frequently indeed did not count at all. To-day it is the traditions which used to obtain in politics, and the individual tendencies and rivalries of rulers which do not count; while, on the contrary, the voice of the masses has become preponderant. It is this voice that dictates their conduct to kings, whose endeavor is to take note of its utterances. The destinies of nations are elaborated at present in the heart of the masses, and no longer in the councils of princes.

The entry of the popular classes into political life — that is to say, in reality, their progressive transformation into governing classes — is one of the most striking characteristics of our epoch of transition. The introduction of universal suffrage, which exercised for a long time but little influence, is not, as might be thought, the distinguishing feature of this transference of political power. The progressive growth of the power of the masses took place at first by the propagation of certain ideas, which have slowly implanted themselves in men's minds, and afterwards by the gradual association of individuals bent on bringing about the realization of theoretical conceptions. It is by association that crowds have come to procure ideas with respect to their interests which are very clearly defined if not particularly just and have arrived at a consciousness of their strength. The masses are founding syndicates before which the authorities capitulate one after the other; they are also founding labor unions, which in spite of all economic laws tend to regulate the conditions of labor and wages. They return to assemblies in which the Government is vested, representatives utterly lacking initiative and independence, and reduced most often to nothing else than the spokesmen of the committees that have chosen them.

To-day the claims of the masses are becoming more and more sharply defined, and amount to nothing less than a determination to utterly destroy society as it now exists, with a view to making it hark back to that primitive communism which was the normal condition of all human groups before the dawn of civilization. Limitations of the hours of labor, the nationalization of mines, railways, factories, and the soil, the equal distribution of all products, the elimination of all the upper classes for the benefit of the popular classes, &c., such are these claims.

Little adapted to reasoning, crowds, on the contrary, are quick to act. As the result of their present organization their strength has become immense. The dogmas whose birth we are witnessing will soon have the force of the old dogmas; that is to say, the tyrannical and sovereign force of being above discussion. The divine right of the masses is about to replace the divine right of kings.

The writers who enjoy the favor of our middle classes, those who best represent their rather narrow ideas, their somewhat prescribed views, their rather superficial scepticism, and their at times somewhat excessive egoism, display profound alarm at this new power which they see growing; and to combat the disorder in men's minds they are addressing despairing appeals to those moral forces of the Church for which they formerly professed so much disdain. They talk to us of the bankruptcy of science, go back in penitence to Rome, and remind us of the teachings of revealed truth. These new converts forget that it is too late. Had they been really touched by grace, a like operation could not have the same influence on minds less concerned with the preoccupations which beset these recent adherents to religion. The masses repudiate to-day the gods which their admonishers repudiated yesterday and helped to destroy. There is no power, Divine or human, that can oblige a stream to flow back to its source.

There has been no bankruptcy of science, and science has had no share in the present intellectual anarchy, nor in the making of the new power which is springing up in the midst of this anarchy. Science promised us truth, or at least a knowledge of such relations as our intelligence can seize: it never promised us peace or happiness. Sovereignly indifferent to our feelings, it is deaf to our lamentations. It is for us to endeavor to live with science, since nothing can bring back the illusions it has destroyed.

Universal symptoms, visible in all nations, show us the rapid growth of the power of crowds, and do not admit of our supposing that it is destined to cease growing at an early date. Whatever fate it may reserve for us, we shall have to submit to it. All reasoning against it is a mere vain war of words. Certainly it is possible that the advent to power of the masses marks one of the last stages of Western civilization, a complete return to those periods of confused anarchy which seem always destined to precede the birth of every new society. But may this result be prevented?

Up to now these thoroughgoing destructions of a worn-out civilization have constituted the most obvious task of the masses. It is not indeed to-day merely that this can be traced. History tells us, that from the moment when the moral forces on which a civilization rested have lost their strength, its final dissolution is brought about by those unconscious and brutal crowds known, justifiably enough, as barbarians. Civilizations as yet have only been created and directed by a small intellectual aristocracy, never by crowds. Crowds are only powerful for destruction. Their rule is always tantamount to a barbarian phase. A civilization involves fixed rules, discipline, a passing from the instinctive to the rational state, forethought for the future, an elevated degree of culture—all of them conditions that crowds, left to themselves, have invariably shown themselves incapable of realizing. In consequence of the purely destructive nature of their power crowds act like those microbes which hasten the dissolution of enfeebled or dead bodies. When the structure of a civilization is rotten, it is always the masses that bring about its downfall. It is at such a juncture that their chief mission is plainly visible, and that for a while the philosophy of number seems the only philosophy of history.

Is the same fate in store for our civilization? There is ground to fear that this is the case, but we are not as yet in a position to be certain of it.

However this may be, we are bound to resign ourselves to the reign of the masses, since want of foresight has in succession overthrown all the barriers that might have kept the crowd in check.

We have a very slight knowledge of these crowds which are beginning to be the object of so much discussion. Professional students of psychology, having lived far from them, have always ignored them, and when, as of late, they have turned their attention in this direction it has only been to consider the crimes crowds are capable of committing. Without a doubt criminal crowds exist, but virtuous and heroic crowds, and crowds of many other kinds, are also to be met with. The crimes of crowds only constitute a particular phase of their psychology. The mental constitution of crowds is not to be learnt merely by a study of their crimes, any more than that of an individual by a mere description of his vices.

However, in point of fact, all the world's masters, all the founders of religions or empires, the apostles of all beliefs, eminent statesmen, and, in a more modest sphere, the mere chiefs of small groups of men have always been unconscious psychologists, possessed of an instinctive and often very sure knowledge of the character of crowds, and it is their accurate knowledge of this character that has enabled them to so easily establish their mastery. Napoleon had a marvelous insight into the psychology of the masses of the country over which he reigned, but he, at times, completely misunderstood the psychology of crowds belonging to other races;{1} and it is because he thus misunderstood it that he engaged in Spain, and notably in Russia, in conflicts in which his power received blows which were destined within a brief space of time to ruin it. A knowledge of the psychology of crowds is to-day the last resource of the statesman who wishes not to govern them — that is becoming a very difficult matter— but at any rate not to be too much governed by them.

It is only by obtaining some sort of insight into the psychology of crowds that it can be understood how slight is the action upon them of laws and institutions, how powerless they are to hold any opinions other than those which are imposed upon them, and that it is not with rules based on theories of pure equity that they are to be led, but by seeking what produces an impression on them and what seduces them. For instance, should a legislator, wishing to impose a new tax, choose that which would be theoretically the most just? By no means. In practice the most unjust may be the best for the masses. Should it at the same time be the least obvious, and apparently the least burdensome, it will be the most easily tolerated. It is for this reason that an indirect tax, however exorbitant it be, will always be accepted by the crowd, because, being paid daily in fractions of a farthing on objects of consumption, it will not interfere with the habits of the crowd, and will pass unperceived. Replace it by a proportional tax on wages or income of any other kind, to be paid in a lump sum, and were this new imposition theoretically ten times less burdensome than the other, it would give rise to unanimous protest. This arises from the fact that a sum relatively high, which will appear immense, and will in consequence strike the imagination, has been substituted for the unperceived fractions of a farthing. The new tax would only appear light had it been saved farthing by farthing, but this economic proceeding involves an amount of foresight of which the masses are incapable.

The example which precedes is of the simplest. Its appositeness will be easily perceived. It did not escape the attention of such a psychologist as Napoleon, but our modern legislators, ignorant as they are of the characteristics of a crowd, are unable to appreciate it. Experience has not taught them as yet to a sufficient degree that men never shape their conduct upon the teaching of pure reason.

Many other practical applications might be made of the psychology of crowds. A knowledge of this science throws the most vivid light on a great number of historical and economic phenomena totally incomprehensible without it. I shall have occasion to show that the reason why the most remarkable of modern historians, Taine, has at times so imperfectly understood the events of the great French Revolution is, that it never occurred to him to study the genius of crowds. He took as his guide in the study of this complicated period the descriptive method resorted to by naturalists; but the moral forces are almost absent in the case of the phenomena which naturalists have to study. Yet it is precisely these forces that constitute the true mainsprings of history.

In consequence, merely looked at from its practical side, the study of the psychology of crowds deserved to be attempted. Were its interest that resulting from pure curiosity only, it would still merit attention. It is as interesting to decipher the motives of the actions of men as to determine the characteristics of a mineral or a plant. Our study of the genius of crowds can merely be a brief synthesis, a simple summary of our investigations. Nothing more must be demanded of it than a few suggestive views. Others will work the ground more thoroughly. To-day we only touch the surface of a still almost virgin soil.

BOOK I - THE MIND OF CROWDS

CHAPTER I - GENERAL CHARACTERISTICS OF CROWDS.—PSYCHOLOGICAL LAW OF THEIR MENTAL UNITY.

What constitutes a crowd from the psychological point of view — A numerically strong agglomeration of individuals does not suffice to form a crowd — Special characteristics of psychological crowds — The turning in a fixed direction of the ideas and sentiments of individuals composing such a crowd, and the disappearance of their personality — The crowd is always dominated by considerations of which it is unconscious — The disappearance of brain activity and the predominance of medullar activity — The lowering of the intelligence and the complete transformation of the sentiments — The transformed sentiments may be better or worse than those of the individuals of which the crowd is composed — A crowd is as easily heroic as criminal.

In its ordinary sense the word "crowd" means a gathering of individuals of whatever nationality, profession, or sex, and whatever be the chances that have brought them together. From the psychological point of view the expression "crowd" assumes quite a different signification. Under certain given circumstances, and only under those circumstances, an agglomeration of men presents new characteristics very different from those of the individuals composing it. The sentiments and ideas of all the persons in the gathering take one and the same direction, and their conscious personality vanishes. A collective mind is formed, doubtless transitory, but presenting very clearly defined characteristics. The gathering has thus become what, in the absence of a better expression, I will call an organized crowd, or, if the term is considered preferable, a psychological crowd. It forms a single being and is subjected to the LAW OF THE MENTAL UNITY OF CROWDS.

It is evident that it is not by the mere fact of a number of individuals finding themselves accidentally side by side that they acquire the character of an organized crowd. A thousand individuals accidentally gathered in a public place without any determined object in no way constitute a crowd from the psychological point of view. To acquire the special characteristics of such a crowd, the influence is necessary of certain predisposing causes of which we shall have to determine the nature.

The disappearance of conscious personality and the turning of feelings and thoughts in a definite direction, which are the primary characteristics of a crowd about to become organized, do not always involve the simultaneous presence of a number of individuals on one spot. Thousands of isolated individuals may acquire at certain moments, and under the influence of certain violent emotions, such, for example, as a great national event, the characteristics of a psychological crowd. It will be sufficient in that case that a mere chance should bring them together for their acts to at once assume the characteristics peculiar to the acts of a crowd. At certain moments half a dozen men might constitute a psychological crowd, which may not happen in the case of hundreds of men gathered together by accident. On the other hand, an entire nation, though there may be no visible agglomeration, may become a crowd under the action of certain influences.

A psychological crowd once constituted, it acquires certain provisional but determinable general characteristics. To these general characteristics there are adjoined particular characteristics which vary according to the elements of which the crowd is composed and may modify its mental constitution. Psychological crowds, then, are susceptible of classification; and when we come to occupy ourselves with this matter, we shall see that a heterogeneous crowd, that is, a crowd composed of dissimilar elements, presents certain characteristics in common with homogeneous crowds, that is, with crowds composed of elements more or less akin (sects, castes, and classes) and side by side with these common characteristics particularities which permit of the two kinds of crowds being differentiated.

But before occupying ourselves with the different categories of crowds, we must first of all examine the characteristics common to them all. We shall set to work like the naturalist, who begins by describing the general characteristics common to all the members of a family before concerning himself with the particular characteristics which allow the differentiation of the genera and species that the family includes.

It is not easy to describe the mind of crowds with exactness, because its organization varies not only according to race and composition, but also according to the nature and intensity of the exciting causes to which crowds are subjected. The same difficulty, however, presents itself in the psychological study of an individual. It is only in novels that individuals are found to traverse their whole life with an unvarying character. It is only the uniformity of the environment that creates the apparent uniformity of characters. I have shown elsewhere that all mental constitutions contain possibilities of character which may be manifested in consequence of a sudden change of environment. This explains how it was that among the most savage members of the French Convention were to be found inoffensive citizens who, under ordinary circumstances, would have been peaceable notaries or virtuous magistrates. The storm past, they resumed their normal character of quiet, law-abiding citizens. Napoleon found amongst them his most docile servants.

It being impossible to study here all the successive degrees of organization of crowds, we shall concern ourselves more especially with such crowds as have attained to the phase of complete organization. In this way we shall see what crowds may become, but not what they invariably are. It is only in this advanced phase of organization that certain new and special characteristics are superposed on the unvarying and dominant character of the race; then takes place that turning already alluded to of all the feelings and thoughts of the collectivity in an identical direction. It is only under such circumstances, too, that what I have called above the PSYCHOLOGICAL LAW OF THE MENTAL UNITY OF CROWDS comes into play.