Landmark Education Corporation (LEC), founded in 1991, is the lineal descendant of Erhard Seminars Training (est) and Werner Erhard and Associates (WEA). Common usage also refers to the organisation as The Forum or Landmark Forum. It characterises itself as a business selling "transformation" and "access to possibility" or "ontological distinctions". Landmark Education LLC filed as a limited liability company in February 2003.
Some former participants and outside critics have categorised Landmark as a large group awareness training (LGAT) and attributed multi-level marketing or cult-like characteristics to it, mentioning terms such as brainwashing, hypnotism, parasitism or "business cult."
Operation
Landmark comprises an international employee-owned corporation. More than half its offices are in North America. Landmark promotes the work and technology of Werner Erhard, though without stressing his name, his ideological forebears (people have cited Heidegger, Scientology — of which he was a member — Fernando Flores and Zen) or his sometimes controversial reputation.
Landmark operates by inviting guests of seminar participants to attend the Landmark Forum, encouraging them to transform their lives and to recruit their family members, friends and acquaintances by word-of-mouth. Landmark Forums have taken place in 26 countries -
- Asia - Japan, Israel, India, the Philippines, Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand, Hong Kong
- Europe - Romania, Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Netherlands, Sweden, United Kingdom
- Africa - South Africa, Kenya
- North America - Jamaica, US, Canada
- Latin America - Mexico
- Australia and New Zealand
Many participants become 'assistants' for the corporation, with the status of volunteer unpaid workers. People who assist work with the staff and and receive further training in Landmark practices and (what are marketed as) general leadership skills.
Stated attitudes of Landmark
Landmark presents itself as "not therapy" and opposes psychoanalysis, an attitude shared with or inherited from Scientology.
At one time Landmark marketed its new methods of training as "non-linear learning". More recent changes in fashion have seen it associate its work with the concept of emotional intelligence.
Criticisms of Landmark
Despite Landmark presenting itself as "not therapy", some participants claim that some of its practices or exercises resemble psychotherapy.
Landmark attempts to forestall potential criticism by setting up (or 'creating') an atmosphere of trust and by disparaging reasoned questioning as "cynical".
Effects
Landmark jargon may seem pervasive and confusing. Some participants' confusion/enthusiasm has allegedly led to mental illness issues and legal action. (See Das Forum: Protokoll einer Gehirnwäsche: Der Psycho-Konzern Landmark Education by Martin Lell, Deutscher Taschenbuch Verlag, Munich, 1997, ISBN 3423360216.)
Most graduates of Landmark programs express a commitment to "the work", at least initially.
A study commissioned by Werner Erhard and Associates suggests that attending a Landmark Forum has minimal lasting effect on participants' self-perception. (J.D. Fisher, R. C. Silver, J. M. Chinsky, B. Goff and Y. Klar Evaluating a Large Group Awareness Training: A Longitudinal Study of Psychosocial Effects Springer-Verlag, 1990, ISBN 0387973206.)
Academic, peer-reviewed long-term studies of effects of attendance do not appear to exist.
Prominent members of Landmark
- Harry Rosenberg, brother of Werner Erhard, heads Landmark Education.
- Art Schreiber functions in the important role of legal representative: Landmark has issued legal threats against media expressing anti-Landmark publicity.
- Charlene Afremow has conducted courses from the earliest appearances of Werner Erhard in the training field.
External links
- Landmark Education official website
- Usenet group: alt.fan.landmark
- Delphi discussion group
- Landmark Education registration as a Limited Liability Company