29 Axel Munthe, (1857-1949) physician, psychiatrist, and writer, was born in
Oskarshamn, Sweden. He was educated at the University of Uppsala and at
90
THE HYSTEROIDAL CYCLE
tive of historical time, it would be harder to examine the re-
gression of the ability and correctness of reasoning or the in-
tensity of “Austrian talk”, although these approximate the crux
of the matter better and more directly.
In spite of above-mentioned qualitative differences, the du-
ration of these time-cycles tends to be similar. If we assume
that the extreme of European hysteria occurred around 1900
and returns not quite every two centuries, we find similar con-
ditions. Such cyclical isochronicity may embrace a civilization
and cross into neighboring countries, but it would not swim
oceans or penetrate into faraway and far different civilizations.
When the First World War broke out, young officers danced
and sang on the streets of Vienna: “Krieg, Krieg, Krieg! Es
wird ein schoener Krieg ...”. While visiting Upper Austria in
1978, I decided to drop in on the local parson, who was in his
seventies by then. When I told him about myself, I suddenly
realized he thought I was lying and inventing pretty stories. He
subjected my statements to psychological analysis, based on
this unassailable assumption and attempted to convince me that
his morals were lofty. When I complained to a friend of mine
about this, he was amused: “As a psychologist, you were ex-
tremely lucky to catch the survival of authentic Austrian talk
( die oesterreichische Rede). We young ones have been incapa-
ble of demonstrating it to you even if we wanted to simulate
it.”
In the European languages, “Austrian talk” has become the
common descriptive term for paralogistic30 discourse. Many
people using this term nowadays are unaware of its origin.
Within the context of maximum hysterical intensity in Europe
Montpellier in Paris where he received his M.D. He studied the work of the
French neurologist Jean Martin Charcot and used hypnosis in his own work
with the physical and psychological symptoms of his patients. He later be-
came physician to the Swedish Royal family. He became known as “the
modern St. Francis of Assissi” because he financed sanctuaries for birds. As a
writer Munthe recounted his own experiences as a physician and psychiatrist.
He is most famous for the autobiographical work The Story of San Michele
which was published in 1929. [Editor’s note.]
30 Paralogism: n. illogical or fallacious deduction. paralogical, paralogistic, a.
paralogize, v.i. be illogical; draw unwarranted conclusions. paralogist, n.
[Editor’s note.]
POLITICAL PONEROLOGY
91
at the time, the authentic article represented a typical product of
conversive thinking: subconscious selection and substitution of
data leading to chronic avoidance of the crux of the matter. In
the same manner, the reflex assumption that every speaker is
lying is an indication of the hysterical anti-culture of mendac-
ity, within which telling the truth becomes “immoral”.
That era of hysterical regression gave birth to the great war
and the great revolution which extended into Fascism, Hitler-
ism, and the tragedy of the Second World War. It also pro-
duced the macrosocial phenomenon whose deviant character
became superimposed upon this cycle, screening and destroy-
ing its nature. Contemporary Europe is heading for the opposite
extreme of this historical sine curve. We could thus assume that
the beginning of the next century will produce an era of opti-
mal capability and correctness of reason, thus leading to many
new values in all realms of human discovery and creativity. We
can also foresee that realistic psychological understanding and
spiritual enrichment will be features of this era.
At the same time, America, especially the U.S.A., has
reached a nadir for the first time in its short history. Grey-
haired Europeans living in the U.S. today are struck by the
similarity between these phenomena and the ones dominating
Europe at the times of their youth. The emotionalism dominat-
ing individual, collective and political life, as well as the sub-
conscious selection and substitution of data in reasoning, are
impoverishing the development of a psychological world view
and leading to individual and national egotism. The mania for
taking offense at the drop of a hat provokes constant retaliation,
taking advantage of hyper-irritability and hypo-criticality on
the part of others.31 This can be considered analogous to the
European dueling mania of those times. People fortunate
enough to achieve a position higher than someone else are con-
temptuous of their supposed inferiors in a way highly reminis-
cent of czarist Russian customs. Turn-of-the-century Freudian
psychology finds fertile soil in this country because of the simi-
larity in social and psychological conditions.
America’s psychological recession drags in its wake an im-
paired socio-professional adaptation of this country’s people,
31 The litigious nature of Americans is known the world over. [Editor’s note.]
92
THE HYSTEROIDAL CYCLE
leading to a waste of human talent and an involution of societal
structure. If we were to calculate this country’s adaptation cor-
relation index, as suggested in the prior chapter, it would
probably be lower than the great majority of the free and civi-
lized nations of this world, and possibly lower than some coun-
tries which have lost their freedom.
A highly talented individual in the USA finds it ever more
difficult to fight his way through to self-realization and a so-
cially creative position. Universities, politics, and businesses
ever more frequently demonstrate a united front of relatively
untalented persons and even incompetent persons. The word
“overeducated” is heard more and more often. Such “overquali-
fied” individuals finally hide out in some foundation laboratory
where they are allowed to earn the Nobel prize as long as they
don’t do anything really useful. In the meantime, the country as
whole suffers due to a deficit in the inspirational role of highly
gifted individuals.
As a result, America is stifling progress in all areas of life,
from culture to technology and economics, not excluding po-
litical incompetence. When linked to other deficiencies, an
egotist’s incapability of understanding other people and nations
leads to political error and the scapegoating of outsiders.
Slamming the brakes on the evolution of political structures
and social institutions increases both administrative inertia and
discontent on the part of its victims.
We should realize that the most dramatic social difficulties
and tensions occur at least ten years after the first observable
indications of having emerged from a psychological crisis.
Being a sequel, they also constitute a delayed reaction to the
cause or are stimulated by the same psychological activation
process. The time span for effective countermeasures is thus
rather limited.
Is Europe entitled to look down on America for suffering
from the same sickness the former has succumbed to several
times in the past? Is America’s feeling of superiority toward
Europe derived from these past events and their inhuman and
tragic results? If so, is this attitude anything more than a harm-
fless anachronism? It would be most useful if the European
nations took advantage of their historical experience and more
POLITICAL PONEROLOGY
93
modern psychological knowledge so as to help America most
effectively.
East Central Europe, now under Soviet domination,32 is part
of the European cycle, albeit somewhat delayed; the same ap-
plies to the Soviet empire, especially to the European portion.
There, however, tracking these changes and isolating them
from more dramatic phenomena eludes the possibilities of ob-
servation, even if it is only a matter of methodology. Even
there, however, there is progressive growth in the grass-roots
resistance of the regenerative power of healthy common sense.
Year by year, the dominant system feels weaker vis-a-vis these
organic transformations. May we add to this a phenomenon the
West finds totally incomprehensible, and which shall be dis-
cussed in greater detail: namely, the growing specific, practical
knowledge about the governing reality within countries whose
regimes are similar. This facilitates individual resistance and a
reconstruction of social links. Such processes shall, in the final
analysis, produce a watershed situation, although it will proba-
bly not be a bloody counter-revolution.
The question suggests itself: Will the time ever come when
this eternal cycle rendering the nations almost helpless can be
conquered? Can countries permanently maintain their creative
and critical activities at a consistently high level? Our era con-
tains many exceptional moments; our contemporary Macbeth
witches’ cauldron holds not only poisonous ingredients, but
also progress and understanding such as humanity has not seen
in millennia.
Upbeat economists point out that humanity has gained a
powerful slave in the form of electric energy and that war, con-
quest, and subjugation of other countries is becoming increas-
ingly unprofitable in the long run. Unfortunately, as we shall
see later in this work, nations can be pushed into economically
irrational desires and actions by other motives whose character
is meta-economic. That is why overcoming these other causes
and phenomena which give rise to evil is a difficult, albeit at
least theoretically attainable, task. However, in order to master
it, we must understand the nature and dynamics of said phe-
32 At the time of writing, 1984.
94
THE HYSTEROIDAL CYCLE
nomena: an old principle of medicine that I will repeat again
and again is: “Ignota, nulla curatio morbi. ”
One accomplishment of modern science, contributing to the
destruction of these eternal cycles, is the development of com-
munication systems which have linked our globe into one huge
“village”. The time cycles sketched herein used to run their
course almost independently in various civilizations at different
geographical locations. Their phases neither were, nor are,
synchronized. We can assume that the American phase lags 80
years behind the European. When the world becomes an inter-
related structure from the viewpoint of communicating both
information and news, different social contents and opinions
caused by unlike phases of said cycles, inter alia, will overflow
all boundaries and information security systems. This will give
rise to pressures which can change the causative dependencies
herein. A more plastic psychological situation thus emerges,
which increases the possibilities for pinpointed action based on
an understanding of the phenomena.
At the same time, in spite of many difficulties of a scien-
tific, social and political nature, we see the development of a
new community of factors which may eventually contribute to
the liberation of mankind from the effects of uncomprehended
historical causation. The development of science, whose final
goal is a better understanding of man and the laws of social
life, could, in the long run, cause public opinion to accept the
essential knowledge about human nature and the development
of the human personality, which will enable the harmful proc-
esses to be controlled. Some forms of international cooperation
and supervision will be needed for this.
The development of human personality and its capacity for
proper thinking and accurate comprehension of reality entails a
certain amount of risk and demands overcoming comfortable
laziness and applying the efforts of special scientific work un-
der conditions quite different from those under which we have
been raised.
Under such conditions, an egotistic personality, accustomed
to a comfortably narrow environment, superficial thinking, and
uncontrolled emotionalism, will experience very favorable
changes, which cannot be induced by anything else. Specially
POLITICAL PONEROLOGY
95
altered conditions will cause such a personality to begin disin-
tegrating, thus giving rise to intellectual and cognitive efforts
and moral reflection.
One example of such a program of experience is the Ameri-
can Peace Corps. Young people travel to many poor develop-
ing countries in order to live and work there, often under primi-
tive conditions. They learn to understand other nations and
customs, and their egotism decreases. Their world view devel-
ops and becomes more realistic. They thus lose the characteris-
tic defects of the modern American character.
In order to overcome something whose origin is shrouded in
the mists of time immemorial, we often feel we must battle the
ever-turning windmills of history. However, the end goal of
such effort is the possibility that an objective understanding of
human nature and its eternal weaknesses, plus the resulting
transformation of societal psychology, may enable us effec-
tively to counteract or prevent the destructive and tragic results
sometime in the not too distant future.
Our times are exceptional, and suffering now gives rise to
better comprehension than it did centuries ago. This under-
standing and knowledge fit better into the total picture, since
they are based on objective data. Such a view therefore be-
