ABSTRACT
The purpose of this chapter is to build for the reader a step-by-step foundation for a theory of cultural complexes. Through a hundred years of clinical experience, Jungians have come to know well and accept that complexes are powerful forces in the lives of individuals. Most simply, we define a complex as an emotionally charged group of ideas and images that cluster around an archetypal core. The basic premise of this chapter is that another level of complexes exists within the psyche of the group (and within the individual at the group level of their psyche). We call these group complexes “cultural complexes” and they, too, can be defined as an emotionally charged aggregate of ideas and images that cluster around an archetypal core.
