ABSTRACT

The concept of counterresistance was introduced by Racker. The phenomenon of counterresistance in groups becomes more complex, since the clinician can establish unconscious pacts with part or with the totality of the group. The psychotherapeutic group can still make use of premature or pacifying interventions that would be at the service of a repressive act, preventing the free flowing course of group psychotherapy. Utilizing the concept of counterresistance as a base, this chapter attempts to describe, in a clinical vignette, how the perception of this phenomenon and the accompanying clarifying intervention within the group can move the group process forward. The counterresistance works exactly as a resistance on the part of the therapist: resistance to intervening, to interpreting, to creating meaning, since it opposes the recommended therapeutic attitude expected of the group leader. The group therapist's attention to the counterresistance phenomena is crucial when facilitating group psychotherapy with an analytic approach.