The Plancherel formula for countable groups

Abstract

We discuss a Plancherel formula for countable groups, which provides a canonical decomposition of the regular representation of such a group Γ into a direct integral of factor representations. Our main result gives a precise description of this decomposition in terms of the Plancherel formula of the FC-center Γfc of Γ (that is, the normal subgroup of Γ consisting of elements with a finite conjugacy class); this description involves the action of an appropriate totally disconnected compact group of automorphisms of Γfc. As an application, we determine the Plancherel formula for linear groups. In an appendix, we use the Plancherel formula to provide a unified proof for Thoma’s and Kaniuth’s theorems which respectively characterize countable groups which are of type I and those whose regular representation is of type II.