The Crowd

The rise of mass media has changed the way societies think, and that they can think as a whole. French psychologist and sociologist GUSTAVE LE BON (1841-1931) recognized that late in the 19th century when he wrote what would become a foundational work of the study of the psychology of the masses. From criminal juries to parliamentary assemblies, religious sects to economic classes, Le Bon explores the nature of the many and varied collective consciousnesses that impact the very functioning of modern civilization. First published in French in 1895 and in English in 1896, The Crowd was a profound influence on Freud, Hitler, and Mussolini, and it is a must read for anyone who wants to understand everything from the power of advertising to the sway of propaganda, from the functioning of elections to the influence of the grass roots ALSO FROM COSIMO: Le Bon's The Psychology of Revolution

Gustave Le Bon (7 May 1841 – 13 December 1931) was a French social psychologist, sociologist, and amateur physicist. He was the author of several works in which he expounded theories of national traits, racial superiority, herd behavior and crowd psychology. His work on crowd psychology became important during the first half of the twentieth century when it was used by media researchers such as Hadley Cantril and Herbert Blumer to describe the reactions of subordinate groups to media. He also contributed to controversy about the nature of matter and energy. His book The Evolution of Matter was very popular in France (having twelve editions), and though some of its ideas—notably that all matter was inherently unstable and was constantly and slowly transforming into luminiferous ether—were used by some physicists of the time (including Henri Poincaré), his specific formulations were not given much consideration. In 1896 he reported observing a new kind of radiation, which he termed "black light" (not the same as what modern people call black light today), though it was later discovered not to exist.