ABSTRACT
Of late, person-centred theorists have returned to the centrality of relationship to the nature of human beings. This is at the heart of what has become known as a dialogical approach, a primary advocate of this way of being in a therapeutic relationship is Peter Schmid (see Point 31). Schmid (2003: 110) emphasises the ‘fundamental We’ as a basic characteristic of the person-centred approach. He states that each of us only exists as part of a ‘We’ and (p. 111) ‘we are unavoidably part of the world’ and that:
This We includes our history and our culture. It is not an undifferentiated mass, nor is it an accumulation of ‘Mes’; it includes commonality and difference, valuing both equally. Only a common esteem for diversity constitutes and accepts a We.
