From Negative Mirroring to Tradition, Creativity, and Innovation: Group as Pharmakós

In ancient Greek mythology, Pharmakós suggests both remedy and poison. Pharmakós is both the instrument of change, the remedy, and at the same time the entity destroyed or poisoned by that change. Pharmakós has the power to transform. Negative mirroring is a characteristic of Pharmakós and could be seen as one of the sources of difficulties the world is embroiled in. In this sense, Pharmakós reflects the current social crisis. How can the symbolic meaning of Pharmakós be elevated into a creative spark, from a negative mirror into a messenger of positive change?

Pharmakós stands at the boundary between margin and centre, between exclusion and integration. Group participation can be both harmful and beneficial. Relationships can nourish and/or injure. Words can constrain and/or enhance understanding. Binary distinctions between, among other polarities, good and evil, positive and negative, constructive and destructive, collapse under the paradox-embracing grasp of Pharmakós.

Delegates are invited to explore the idea that the group can shift from being a passive observer to becoming an active site of tradition, creativity, and innovation. The same forces that isolate or stigmatize the group can become the very ground for transformation and renewal, personally, socially, and culturally.

The Symposium offers us an opportunity to consider the contradictions, paradoxes and inherent duality in many aspects of our lives in general, and of our Group Analytic endeavors in particular. How can these dualities be negotiated? In this symposium, we are invited to transcend linear thinking and explore the idea that the group is often simultaneously the site of psychic injury and the space of potential healing.

Symposium Scientific committee

The ambiguous figure of Pharmakós is a representation of the hidden dangers that threatened the community. Social and spiritual insecurity during period of extremely uncertainty leads to the prevalence of the dynamic of social mistrust, which is embodied in the rituals of Pharmakós.

The Pharmakós rituals are also connected to the notion of some impurity to be expelled from the community or something dangerous to be neutralized. A lack of secure knowledge - both for others and for oneself, perpetuates a constant state of risk in which impurity emerges. Trustworthy social connections can be developed and rebuilt within the community.

We invite you to join us in Athens as we explore the complex interplay between tradition and innovation, between the forces that perpetuate division and those that offer the potential for collective healing.

We look forward to your participation in this important conversation.

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To support bursaries and promote broader participation in the symposium, donations to the Symposium Bursary Fund are gratefully welcomed.

To make a donation, please click on the following button. You will be directed to the GASi website, where you should select “Symposium Bursary” option when choosing how to allocate your donation.

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Latest Updates

31 January, 2026 - Registration for the Pre-Symposium Experiential Community is open. For more information on timetable and registration, visit the pre-symposium page.

24 January, 2026 - Bursary applications are open. Full details are available on the registration page, with applications due by the end of February.

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30 December, 2025 - Abstract submission via website is open

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