ABSTRACT
This chapter highlights the points of controversy which rage around the nature of scientific enquiry, the value of a dialectical critique and the fundamental importance of ideology affecting philosophy as well as every other discipline. At the other end of the spectrum, Blackwell would surely deny that social and political matters are outside the scope of the small group, and Powell's grand picture of the matrix informs his way of understanding small groups. The issue of systems theory and its relevance or compatibility with group analysis is taken up by Dick Blackwell and Harold Behr. Colin James's chapter makes a strong claim for the integration of group analytic with object relations theory, using Bion and Winnicott as his main exemplars of that theory, challenging the usually held view that there is a great gulf between Foulkes' and Bion's group theories.
