by Louisa Diana Brunner – Conference Director
PCCA Conference 2018
30th August – 3rd September
The Netherlands
The European Union was built in the shadow of the Holocaust in the aftermath of the war, partly to avoid a repetition of that past tragedy. Was it only a dream or an ideal? Today Europe as it has been conceived is deeply threatened and at risk of a breaking up. Old paradigms for understanding society are being challenged by phenomena such as Brexit, mass migration, financial instability and terrorist attacks. Feelings of exclusion and inclusion have become dominating dynamics. Resentment against real and imagined injustices is manifesting itself in populism and authoritarianism. Paranoia and fear permeate the individual and collective psyche, identity and culture. It is also a time of the return of the repressed, of national and racial myths and hatreds.
PCCA has a long standing tradition in applying Group Relations methods to study societal issues – German and Israeli, Palestinians, West and East Europeans and others globally – through the experience of conference participants, assisted by experienced international staff. This conference is to be a continuation of this stream. It will explore not only what is immediately manifest above the surface, but also affects and fantasies, sources of what is going on in Europe beneath the surfacefrom the past into the present, in an increasingly globalized world.