Suggestion and Its Role in Social Life ALDINETRANSACTION A Division of Transaction Publishers New Brunswick (U.S.A.) and London (U.K.) Transaction Publishers New Brunswick (U.S.A.) and London (U.K.) A Center for Urban Policy Research Book Suggestion and Its Role in Social Life V. M. Bekhterev Edited by Lloyd H. Strickland and ALDINETRANSACTION A Division of Transaction Publishers translated by Tzvetanka Dobreva-Martinova New Brunswick (U.S.A.) and London (U.K.) Transaction Publishers New Brunswick (U.S.A.) and London (U.K.) A Center for Urban Policy Research Book First published 1998 by Transaction Publishers Published 2017 by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN 711 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017, USA Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business Copyright © 1998 by Taylor & Francis. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe. Library of Congress Catalog Number: 97-51701 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Bekhterev, Vladimir Mikhailovich, 1857–1927. [Vnushenie i evo rol’ v obshchestvennoĭ zhiani. English] Suggestion and its role in social life / Vladimir M. Bekhterev; Lloyd H. Strickland, editor; Tzvetanka Dobreva-Martinova, translator. p. cm. This work first appeared as a lecture delivered by the author at the Military-Medical Academy, Dec. 1897. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 1-56000-340-5 (alk. paper) 1. Mental suggestion. 2. Mental suggestion—Social aspects. I. Strickland, Lloyd H. II. Title. BF1156.S8B3513 1998 153.8’5—dc21 97-51701 ISBN 13: 978-1-4128-5706-2 (pbk) CIP ISBN 13: 978-1-56000-340-3 (hbk) Contents Preface and Acknowledgments ix Introduction xiii Lloyd H. Strickland Foreword to the Second Edition xxvii V. Bekhterev Foreword to the Third Edition xxix V. Bekhterev 1 Different iewsV on the Nature of Suggestion 1 2 The Definition of Suggestion 11 3 Suggestion and Persuasion 17 4 Suggestion in the Hypnotic State 21 5 Suggestion in the Waking State 25 6 The Importance of Faith 31 7 Unintentional Suggestion and Mutual Suggestion 39 8 Concerning the Suggestion of Thoughts 41 9 Paths of Influencing One Another through Suggestion 47 10 Collective or Mass Illusions and Hallucinations 51 11 Inalterable Hallucinatory Sensations and the Importance of Auto-Suggestion 59 12 Suggestion as a Factor in Mass Self-Destructive Acts of the Russian Sectarians, and Suicide Epidemics 61 13 Murder and Robbery Epidemics 67 14 Epidemics of Convulsions in History 73 15 Witchcraft and Devil-Possession Epidemics 79 16 Hysterical and Nervous Debility Epidemics 89 17 Other Psychopathological Epidemics of a Religious Variety 99 18 The Paranoiac Malevannii as a Culprit in a Distinctive Psychopathological Epidemic 107 19 The Malevannism pidemicE 123 20 The Jehovah sychopathologicalP Epidemic 129 21 The Tatar sychopathologicalP Epidemic in Kazan Province 135 22 The Supanevo sychopathologicalP Epidemic in Orel Province 141 23 The Novogrud pidemicE and the “Pavlovka Slaughter” 145 24 Sectarian Collectivities and Epidemics 147 25 A Chinese Epidemic of the I-Ho-Ch’uan Sect 151 26 A Canadian Psychopathological Epidemic among Russian Dukhobors 153 27 The Epidemic Dissemination of Mystical Doctrines 155 28 A Free Love Epidemic 159 29 Panic among People and Animals 163 30 Psychic Epidemics during Historic People’s Movements 169 31 Financial Speculation Epidemics 173 32 The Importance of People’s Collectivities for the Spread of Psychic Epidemics 175 33 The Importance of Suggestion for Social Groups 183 Index 195 Preface and Acknowledgments Suggestion and its Role in Social Life first appeared as a lecture delivered by Bekhterev at the December 1897 assembly of the Military-Medical Academy. It underwent two subsequent elaborations, still in lecture format. Translation of the third edition of this work is what we have provided; it was originally published as a monograph in St. Petersburg in 1908.1 We suspect that much of Bekhterev’s text remained in its original form as transcribed lectures, and this has affected both its structure and style. Faced with many ambiguities of interpretation, we finally elected to offer as faithful translation as we could to the original Russian. Our models have been the efforts of Murphy & Murphy (Bekhterev, 1933) and of Eugenia Lockwood (see Strickland. 1994, p. vii). Both these translations explicitly addressed the challenge that Bekhterev’s writings offer, particularly those in which he exchanged subject matter, sometimes substituting discussions of mind and society for the more familiar language of physiology, anatomy, and reflexes. We have retained Bekhterev’s paragraphs, although they sometimes appear awkward or unnecessary. We have tried to preserve the richness and complexity of his Russian thought; simplification has led to distor- tion in translations of other Russian psychologists, a point to which even the multilingual Bekhterev was himself sensitive, and so we did not make excessive changes in the sentence length and structure of the original in order to better fit current English language style. Thus, we have retained in the manuscript some long and cumbersome sen- tences; these may sometimes be a challenge for the reader, but coping with them should be worth the effort (see Rumbaugh, 1996; Valsiner, 1994). Responsibility for any absolutely unfathomable passages lies with the editor, who has been working with such material a lot longer than the translator. Bekhterev sometimes seems almost casual in his referencing when judged against modern, particularly American Psychological Association, ix Suggestion and its role in Social life standards. A few Western references provided by Bekhterev in Russian have been impossible to identify; these were simply transliterated from Russian into English. Some of the French, German, and English refer- ences used by Bekhterev appear incomplete or contain abbreviations, but we have kept them as cited by the author. Russian historians may in the future be able to untangle them, but as they are they faithfully convey the working of a far-ranging, complex, brilliant, and argumen- tative mind. Transliteration from Russian has also been used for a few non-Russian proper names and names of obscure geographic locations, and editorial discrepancies in the original (e.g., different abbreviations of the same name or reference in the text and reference sections) have been reproduced. Bekhterev frequently employed lengthy quotations; we view these as attempts to maintain a cautious and high level of authenticity with regard to the ideas referred to and historical events. However, on occasion it is difficult to follow these lengthy quotations and a few times even to understand where they start and where they end. We suspect that his stenographers were equally confused in these few instances. Another distracting technique employed by Bekhterev and his publisher in the original was expanded letter-spacing as a means of indicating varieties of importance or emphasis. In consultation with the publisher, we have elected to eliminate Bekhterev’s letter spacing, and have resorted to italics when appropriate. We have perserved Bekhterev’s gender use for the third person singular; it is ordinarily masculine and on just a few occasions feminine. There are many footnotes in this translation, since Bekhterev pro- vided his references in footnotes. Translator’s footnotes have been added where a clarification or explanation could be of help for the reader. We hope that these preceding paragraphs have not sounded omi- nous, but what amounts in publishing circles to a “found document” should not be treated otherwise in its first translation. Anyone who has ever tried to locate a copy of Suggestion and its Role in Social Life in the original Russian will not cavil at our assignment of this label. We are grateful to a number of people and offices who have been helpful in the preparation of this book. First, Tzvetanka Dobreva- Martinova expresses gratitude to Carleton University and to the Fonds pour la Formation et l’Aide a la Recherche (FCAR) for the funds which sustained her over the year in which her first run (of several!) x Preface and Acknowledgments at Bekhterev was accomplished. She is also thankful to her Bulgarian friend Pavlina Petkova who has been insightful and helpful throughout the whole endeavor. Strickland is, as usual, indebted to the Chair of the Psychology Department, Bill Jones, for his helping the project along in countless small ways. Michael Cole has been a sustaining supporter for years now; it was his enthusiasm for this particular undertaking that kept our own motivation at the level required. Larry Black of Carleton’s Department of History has provided much support and encouragement. We are grateful to Jaan Valsiner, who reviewed the translation and provided many useful suggestions for clarification, corrections, etc. We have been particularly fortunate to have had Laurence Mintz of Transaction Publishers as our editor. His invaluable editorial interjec- tions have been supplemented by scholarly and important suggestions that have strengthened the book in many ways not obvious to the reader. We regret that we cannot with Suggestion and Its Role in Social Life engage the critical mind and authority of our late colleague, Nick Spanos, whose stature in the field of hypnosis and suggestion would surely have made him another target for our indebtedness. His potential contribution to this was in our mind when we undertook the project, and we are aware of his absence as we end it. Finally, we are deeply grateful to our respective spouses, Pat and Petromil, both for their support for this long project and for their forgiveness for our respective, frequent absences from our normal family routines.