reading list from Sociology 137, Spring 1986 or so,
I forget the name of the course, something about Coersive Persuasion and Cults
University of California, Berkeley.
Prof. Richard Ofshe (co-author with Watters of Making Monsters: False Memory, Satanic Cult Abuse, and Sexual Hysteria. [He seems to maybe have changed his mind about the McMartin case.])

This was the supplementary reading for the course. It is not intended to be a bibliography of relevant works, just the expected reading; a stack of photocopies 3" thick. The course required research and paper on a particular group, plus exam. Since then there has come even more relevant material (Heaven's Gate, Swiss cult, WACO-BATF, etc).

I recommend this course.

Communist Interrogation and Indoctrination of "Enemies of the States": Analysis of Methods Used by the Communist State Police (A Special Report)
Lawrence E. Hinkle Jr., M.D. and Harold G. Wolff, M.D.
A.M.A. Archives of Neurology and Psychiatry submitted May 31, 1956,
"The information contained in this paper was assembled at a time when the authors were serving as consultants to the Department of Defense."

Small Groups and Political Rituals in China
[no data at hand about author]
"hsiao-tsu"

Thought Reform and The Psychology of Totalism,
Robert J. Lifton, 1961

Coercive Persuasion
Edgar H Schein, 1961

Relgious Totalism: Gentle and Ungentle Persuasion Under the First Amendment
Richard Delgado
Report The Los Angeles Daily Journal reprinted from Southern California Law Review , volume 51, Nov 1977 no 1

The Social Development of the Synanon Cult: The Managerial Strategy of Organizational Transformation
Richard Ofshe
Sociological Analysis, 1980 , 41, 2:109-127

Social Structure and Social Control in Synannon
Richard Ofshe, 1974

In the United States District Court for the District of Columbia
The Synanon Church, Plaintiff v. USA defendant; civil action no. 82-2303

Self-Reconstitution Processes: A Preliminary Report
Theodore R. Sarbin and Nathan Adler
Psychoanalytic Review v57, n4 1970-71
theme: "conduct reorganization". Cites "a world literature on conduct and personality alteration:"

• William James, Varieties of Religious Experience, on the web
• J. T. McNeill, History of the Cure of Souls , NY: Harper and Row, 1951
  
• St. Ignatius of Loyola , Spiritual Exercises,
  death and rebirth theme, on the web at CCEL
• Soren Kierkegaard [I don't know which books he meant]
• [another reference mentioned also of interest:] Arthur [ ? illegible photocopy] N
  The Antinomian Personality: The Hippie Character Type
  Psychiatry, 31 4 1968
  

My Life with Charles Manson
Paul Watkins with Guillermo Soledad (pen name for anonymous UCSB professor), 1979, Bantam
[Watkins quit the group before the Family did the thing for which they are most known.]

"Rajneeshpuram"
New Yorker, Sep 22-29, 1982
Frances FitzGerald

Walled In
Robert Conner (pseudonym)
born into a religious commune, out as adult; ("The Boston Heresy Case"), 1979

Psychological Induction Into the Large-Group: Findings from a Modern Religious Sect
Marc Galanter, M.D.
Am J Psychiatry , 137: 12 Dec 1980

The "Moonies": A Psychological Study of Conversion and Membership in a Contemporary Relgious Sect
Marc Galanter MD, Richard Rabkin FM, Judith Rabkin PhD, Alexander Deutsch MD
Am J Psychiatry, 136:2 Feb 1979

"Moonie" Dropouts; Psychological Readjustment After Membership in a Charismatic Large-Group
Marc Galanter MD

Evangelical Religion and Meditation: Psychotherapeutic Effects
Marc Galanter MD and Peter Buckley MB
J of Nervous and Mental Disease v166, 10 oct 1978 serial 1151
[re Divine Light Mission]

Psychiatric Disturbances Associated with Erhard Seminars Training: I. A Report of Cases
Leonard Glass, Michael Kirsch , Frederick Parruis
Am J Psychiatry 134:3 March 1977; part II Nov 1977

Large Group Awareness Training
Peter Finkelstein, Grant Wenegrat, and Irvin Yalom
Ann Rev Psychol. 1982 33:515-39

Pathology as "Personal Growth": A Participant-Observation Study of Lifespring Training
Janice Haaken and Richard Adams

A Study of Encounter Group Casualties
Irvin D Yalom MD, Morton Liebermann PhD
Arch Gen Psychiat , v25, July 1971

Psychotherapy Cults: An Iatrogenic Perversion
Maurice K. Temerlin and Jande W.Temerlin
Psychotherapy: Theory, Research and Practice, vol 19, no 2 summer 1982

Iatrogenic Symptoms Associated with a Therapy Cult: Examination of an Extinct "New Psychotherapy" with Respect to Psychiatric Deterioration and "Brainwashing"
John Hochman
Psychiatry, v47, 4, Nov 1984

Scientology: To Be Perfectly Clear
William Sims Bainbridge, Rodney Stark
Sociological Analysis 1980, 41,2:128-136

Every Secret Thing
Patricia Campbell Hearst with Alvin Moscow,
1982, Doubleday and Company, Inc., Garden City, NY, New title: Patty Hearst: Her Own Story. New York: Avon, 1982. ISBN 0-380-70651-2. Patty chez Symbionese Liberation Army. first few chapters