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Article Excerpt
Circles of Recovery: Self-Help Organizations for Addictions, by Keith Humphreys (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2004), 228 pp., $85 hardcover.
It is nearly impossible to discuss self-help/mutual-aid societies without reference to Alcoholics Anonymous (AA). With its more than two million members, international growth, organizational longevity, and adaptation to nearly every conceivable human problem, AA has become the standard with which all other mutual-aid groups are compared. AA's dominance obscures awareness of the large number of mutual-aid societies that preceded it (White, 2001) and the growing number of adjuncts and alternatives to AA.
There are four significant trends within the recent literature on addiction recovery mutual-aid societies: 1) the emergence of backlash literature attacking the principles and practices of AA and other Twelve Step programs from both ideological perspectives (Bufe, 1991; Ragge, 1998; Peele & Bufe, 2000) and personal perspectives (Gilliam, 1998; Fransway, 2001); 2) a new body of literature detailing alternatives to AA (Kirkpatrick, 1978, 1981, 1986; Christopher, 1988, 1989, 1992; Trimpey, 1989; Kishline, 1994; Volpicelli & Szalavitz, 2000); 3) growing interest in addiction recovery mutual-aid groups as an international phenomenon (Makela et al., 1996; Special Issue, Contemporary Drug Problems, Volume 23, 1996; Room, 1998; White, in press); and 4) scientific studies evaluating the effectiveness of AA and its alternatives (e.g., Emrick, 1989; Ruzek, 1987; Kaskutas, 1992; Galanter, Egelko & Edwards, 1993; Connors & Dermen, 1996; Humphreys & Klaw, 2001). Two noteworthy texts detail the inner workings of self-help/mutual-aid societies, document what is known of their effectiveness, and outline how helping professionals and government bodies can best work with such groups. The first is Linda Farris Kurtz's Self-Help and Support Groups: A Handbook for Practitioners, and the second, the subject of this review, is Keith Humphreys' just-released Circles of Recovery: Self-Help Organizations for Addictions. Where Kurtz's text focuses on a broad spectrum of self-help societies...
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