This paper seeks to provide a history and a prehistory of the therapeutic community movement, and a series of questions still debated in the field.
The paper discusses the factors which favour the creation of therapeutic communities, drawing on Winnicott's views on democracy and the history of therapeutic community innovations. Some key factors are identified and their implications discussed.
The paper suggests that the therapeutic community impulse takes root where a number of individuals, with what Winnicott has called the “democratic tendency”, come together in response to a community's need for psychological care and support, and this can happen anywhere.
The paper offers a history and a prehistory of the therapeutic community movement, and draws out some of the implications for the future development of therapeutic communities and the nurturing of the therapeutic community impulse.
