Our mission is to understand, and thereby help to overcome, the psychological barriers to peaceful resolution of conflict between communities, nations and cultures. The IDI facilitates reflective dialogues between representatives of groups in conflict, with the aim of learning about the historical and emotional basis for these troubled relationships, including the effect of past trauma on large group identity. We develop concepts and interventions aimed toward understanding emotionally-charged large group differences, and offer education, training and consultation to others engaged in this work.

Founded by its current President Emeritus, Vamık D. Volkan, in 2007, the IDI has since met once or twice a year to discuss topics and examine processes related to international tensions, especially between the Middle East and the West. The IDI began as a project of the Erikson Institute of the Austen Riggs Center. Erik Erikson, a renowned humanist psychoanalyst and former member of the Riggs staff, pioneered the interdisciplinary, psychologically-informed study of cultural differences and national leadership. Now an independent organization, with charitable status in the United States, the IDI is grateful to have received support from various organizations and private donors. The IDI is a fully independent interest group, however, with no institutional obligations.

Meetings of the IDI focus on current issues and events related to international conflict. Examples of those topics and discussions can be found in our reports. The work of the meetings begins with members, and sometimes invited guests, presenting informally but with first-hand information about the two or three central foci of a given meeting. This is followed by in-depth discussion, which develops understandings of the issues by exploring the key stories surrounding a given incident from a psychodynamic point of view.

By design, we also take note of our own group process. During discussion, participants, sometimes without realizing it, become, or are seen as, representatives of their own countries. Each member thus becomes an informal spokesperson for his or her large group, while at the same time maintaining individuality. This process allows group sentiments to be expressed more authentically.

The ensuing reflective dialogue may then provide insights into the emotional relationships between those countries, as they are perceived by the group at this moment in time. This level of understanding – informed by the study of group and organizational dynamics – adds new hypotheses and potential layers of meaning to the conceptual discussion and narrative understandings emerging so far.

IDI meetings have four broad outcomes. First, they develop psychological insights, concepts, narrative understandings and language that are useful in making sense of the emotional dynamics of international relationships and events. Examples of this include the ideas of “chosen trauma,” linking objects, the inability to mourn, large group identity dynamics and the inter-generational transmission of trauma.

Second, the group develops a common language between psychologically trained participants and those who are diplomats, politicians or from other disciplines. This provides a model for transferring psychological insights in understandable ways to those who are responsible for diplomatic communications.

Third, the IDI functions as a conceptual sounding board and support group for those members currently engaged in consulting to governments and other societal groups. It also provides a forum for learning from and refining group interventions carried out by members outside the meeting.

Finally, the IDI functions as a platform for its members to engage the broader public in dialogue. This occurs in various ways: through dissemination of books and papers, presentations, summaries of meeting discussions, and our Blog. We also organize dialogues and public events, sometimes associated with that year’s meeting.