Gemeinschaftsgefühl - zur näheren Bestimmung eines individualpsychologischen Leitbegriffes und dessen ethischer Implikation

Abstract

»Gemeinschaftsgefühl«: On the Ethical Dimension of a Key Term in Adlerian Psychology Within the community of individual psychologists, »Gemeinschaftsgefühl« is one of the most controversial concepts. The term sometimes oscillates between being meaningful and being meaningless, making it even harder to work with. While in Adlers later writing the action theory aspect of »Gemeinschaftsgefühl « in the sense of being useful for society becomes more important, occasionally with strongly moralising connotations, the question of how ethical imperatives receive their defining force becomes less and less his focus of attention. If psychic health and ethical behaviour come together in the concept of »Gemeinschaftsgefühl«, this correlation is of vital importance in the sense of its developmental psychology dimension. This paper investigates these correlations.