‘The Crowd: A Study of the Popular Mind’ is one of the most influential books ever written on this subject. It is a brilliant treatise on the workings of crowds. Gustave Le Bon examines many different kinds of crowds and how they work. He differentiates between different kinds of crowds such as mobs, juries, elected bodies, and simple crowds.
"The following work is devoted to an account of the characteristics of crowds. The whole of the common characteristics with which heredity endows the individuals of a race constitute the genius of the race. When, however, a certain number of these individuals are gathered together in a crowd for purposes of action, observation proves that, from the mere fact of their being assembled, there result certain new psychological characteristics, which are added to the racial characteristics and differ from them at times to a very considerable degree. —Gustave Le Bon.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Gustave Le Bon (1841-1931) was a French physician who wrote widely on scientific subjects, including anatomy and physiology, anthropology, and history. Many of his writings focused in particular on national traits, crowd behaviour, and racial superiority. His numerous books include ‘The Civilization of Arabs’, ‘The Psychology of Peoples’, and ‘The Crowd’.
