ABSTRACT
As group therapists, neither W. Bion nor S. Foulkes regarded their role in the transference as central to their technique. Bion makes group-centred interpretations about shared phantasies, often in relation to himself, but avoids working with the transference of each individual. Bion’s group technique has proved itself, over time, to be a useful educative procedure for helping people become acquainted with unconscious processes in groups. Omnipotent oedipal phantasies depend psychically upon a denial of the sexual relationship between the parents, and a denial of the difference between the parent’s relationship with each other and their relationship with the child. The Foulkesian tradition advocates that the interpretations should come from the group itself. The group should be allowed to function—unimpeded by the therapist—and, wherever possible, the therapist’s activity should be directed to liberating the group from passivity and dependence. The chapter concludes with a consideration of the appropriateness of different types of group technique for different types of patient.
