ABSTRACT

The chapter examines mutual suggestion, mutual imitation, and mutual induction among the factors of a unifying nature. The general conclusion common to all of these studies is that the mere gathering of individuals into a crowd is conducive to mutual contagion, which is precisely what leads to collective action. The chapter deals with those forms of impact within a crowd where individual persons act as mutual resonators, as it were. The main condition for crowd suggestibility in the restriction of free movement, as well as in narrowed consciousness and monoideism, or mental preoccupation with one idea. The chapter deals with blood or tribal ties that maintain "spiritual" kinship and form a familial or tribal collective. Due to mediators, a collective association may evolve irrespective of spatial and temporal conditions: a society may be dispersed all over the world and still preserve a certain unity of its members.