Reflexivity, Self-organisation and Emergence in the Group Matrixs

Abstract

In this article the concept of the group matrix as a self-organizing process of intersubjective narrative themes that organize the experience of being together is developed, discussing how Foulkes dealt with the problem of the part and the whole, the individual and the group in three different ways without holding the paradox. It is argued that if we see the self-referential nature of the group matrix we are able to hold the paradox of it fortuning and being formed by itself at the same time; also that the notion of the group matrix as a group mind is a reification that sustains the Cartesian duality and unnecessarily mystifies the notion of matrix. When the matrix is thought of as a self- referential process that self-organizes to produce its own evolution in an emergent way we can dispense with notions of group minds and work with an experience-near concept