The influence of Gregory Bateson: legacy or vestige?

Abstract

Purpose

To assess the recent influence of Gregory Bateson on publication within the field of psychotherapy.

Design/methodology/approach

Literature survey of all accessible literature from 1996 to 2006, utilizing citation search engines for identification purposes followed by reading and evaluating the most relevant publications.

Findings

Research that investigates Bateson's ideas is promising but scarce, and theoretical development that builds on his constructs is rare. Apart from frequency in citation, his contributions seem to be more durable than generative.

Research limitations/implications

Owing to the volume of data, a complete survey of literature was impossible, focusing our work on psychotherapy for this paper. Other projects surveying fields such as management and sociology should be undertaken to assess Bateson's influence.

Practical implications

Practice should be tied to theory‐building and ongoing research rather than nostalgia, myopic commitment to ideals, or myth. Purposeful commitment to cybernetic theory and practice development is needed.

Originality/value

Few literature reviews have attempted to conduct a survey this broad. It is believed this has been successful in addressing actual publication practices.

Citation

Thomas, F.N., Waits, R.A. and Hartsfield, G.L. (2007), "The influence of Gregory Bateson: legacy or vestige?", Kybernetes, Vol. 36 No. 7/8, pp. 871-883. https://doi.org/10.1108/03684920710777397