My Basket 0 item - £0.00

The Tavistock Century: 2020 Vision

Editor : Margot Waddell, Editor : Sebastian Kraemer

Reviews and Endorsements

The “Tavi” – a name that is instantly recognisable wherever people get together to reflect on what makes us tick as people, institutions, and society. This delightful mixture of homage and history is a witty and wise tribute to the first hundred years of a remarkable place.
Professor Sir Simon Wessely, Regius Chair of Psychiatry, Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience, King’s College London.

There is much individual and collective wisdom between the lines of this thought-provoking collection, which charts the scope and evolution of the Tavistock’s pioneering and often controversial work, illustrates its influence on social policy, and tracks its innovative and often revelatory explorations of the human condition. For decades, the Tavistock’s work has helped shape how we see ourselves, as persons and as a society. Much thinking that has entered the mainstream emerged from its challenging, interdisciplinary research and practice, and this book shows stage by stage how a self-questioning approach generates new knowledge, and how theory can be humanely applied.
Dame Hilary Mantel, Booker Prize winner.

Some institutions make their contribution not just by discharging duties or doing jobs, but by creating a culture. The impact of the Tavistock on our social assumptions, its impact on education, business, the understanding of the family, the life of the arts and, of course, therapy, demonstrates beyond any doubt that it has genuinely been a culturally defining presence. It has educated the listening and the noticing of generations; and in that sense has enlarged the personal and the social world for all of us. It is right that the hundred years of its remarkable life should be marked and celebrated in this welcome book.
Dr Rowan Williams, 104th Archbishop of Canterbury.

… a splendid publication that vividly portrays aspects of a remarkable institution’s history over the past 100 years. … It is such a highly enjoyable book that I read it end to end in one sitting, and since then I have repeatedly and selectively dipped into its forty-four chapters. … the editors and contributors have given us a brilliant and inspiring 2020 vision.
Andrew Briggs, International Journal of Infant Observation and Its Applications 23(3), 2020

Reviewing this extensive volume with the close and meticulous attention it deserves might take the next century of its existence! … Every chapter is a personal story with typically a degree of historical narrative, difficulties in the development of a now standard idea and then a flourishing outcome. … It is a book for browsing, for reminding oneself of the astonishing and comprehensive services from babies and mothers, through childhood and adolescence, to adults, marriages and couples, and taking in, on the way, court work, the TV series, the publication of introductory books, plus those for professionals, and not forgetting the legendary Tavistock pantomimes. … It does deserve this celebratory publication.
Bob Hinshelwood, British Journal of Psychotherapy 37,2 (2021) 327–349