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Title: Groupthink: Psychological studies of policy decisions and fiascoes by Irving Lester Janis ISBN: 0-395-33189-7 Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Pub. Date: 1983 Format: Unknown Binding

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Average Customer Rating: 5 (6 reviews)

Rating: 5
Summary: Needs Updating to Include the Iraq War
Comment: I studied this book 17 years ago and as I think about it, it should have been required reading for the Bush administration. Clearly, a discussion of the Iraq War should be added to the book under the "fiascos" section.

Rating: 5
Summary: Particularly relevant now in America
Comment: To put it simply, this book is about what can happen when people get together in insular groups to make decisions: the "groupthink" phenomenon can take hold of the members of the group, making the group and its consensus take control over the people in it. In a way, it's kind of like the riot mentality: the group becomes a mind of its own.

When making important decisions, the worst thing you can do is create an insular group who only listen to and reinforce each other. To make intelligent decisions, one needs to seriously consult with people outside the core "groupthink" group, and otherwise touch base with the reality outside the group.

I have been a victim of groupthink. I was on a group design project, 10 years after reading this book, when I suddenly realized groupthink had taken control. We worked well together and the project started off wonderfully. We started agreeing on everything and suddenly anything any group member had to say was great. It went overboard: talking about anything, especially how great our group project was going, became more important than actually making progress, or listening to critiques. As a result, we were cut off from reality, and fed each other on our desire to believe that what we were doing was great.

I am a very intelligent person, and I fell victim to it, until I recognized it, which was ONLY because I had read this book 10 years before. I think it is something everyone should be aware of, in order to prevent, especially in this let's-hold-another-meeting-about-it culture in large American corporations.

Today, I think this book, like the Bay of Pigs incident the book goes into details about, explains why Geroge W and his "group" attacked Iraq. There was NO evidence to support it... BUT, by purposely excluding those with different perspectives, like Colin Powell, Bush and crew generated an extremeely insular groupthink environment, convincing and reinforcing each other's assesment of the situation, without contact with reality. And thus we pissed off everyone else in the world, except those officials corrupt enough to blindly follow American cash, for a time at least.

Even if you disagree with my last paragraph for political reasons, you should read the book to be able to discuss it.

Rating: 5
Summary: I agree with the others
Comment: Although I haven't read the book, I am confident it deserves five stars because that's what all the other reviewers gave it.