Carl Jung on the German Collective Conscious

Below is Carl Jung’s reflection on group thought forms and the possibility that a whole collective can be possessed by them.

As early as 1918 he noticed the dreams and preoccupations of his many German patients. He noticed that there was a disturbance of the German-collective unconscious.

Jung felt Hitler’s rise was made possible by an upheaval of forces lying dormant in the unconscious, ready to break through all moral barriers.

He believed that both Hitler and the collective mind of the Germans had been possessed. He explained the phenomena in his 1936 paper titled “Woton”, named after the Teutonic hunter-god who drives men crazy. He believed there was a psychic evil that took possession of Germany.