540 Professional Organizations
in Argentina (1930) that the first national society of psycholo-
gists in South America was formed. Ecuador (1942) followed,
and by 1981 national organizations had formed in a number
of South and Central American countries, including Brazil
(1949), Mexico (1953), Uruguay (1953), Peru (1954), Venezuela
(1957), Cuba (1964), and Panama (1965), Colombia (1978), and
Nicaragua (1981). Chile and the Dominican Republic also have
national psychological organizations.
Africa
The South African Psychological Association (SAPA) was
formed in 1948. From its beginning, it incorporated both
academic and professional psychologists. Conflict over
apartheid led to a separate Whites only organization in 1961,
the Psychological Institute of the Republic of South Africa
(PIRSA). A new association of psychologists without racial
restrictions was formed when the two groups merged to form
the Psychological Association of South Africa (PASA) in
1983 (Dumont & Louw, 2001). At the beginning of the
twenty-first century, membership in PASA was approxi-
mately 5,000; 90% of PASA’s members were white. Other
national associations of psychologists formed in Africa were
in Zimbabwe (1971), Namibia (1990), and Uganda (1992).
Others
The Canadian Psychological Association was formed in 1938
and held its first annual meeting in 1940 (Dzinas, 2000).
Psychologists in Australia (1966) and New Zealand (1967)
formed independent national organizations after initial mem-
berships as branches of the British Psychological Society.
North America
The development and organization of psychology in the
United States is best viewed against the backdrop of changes
in American life and society. Along with a number of other
disciplines (e.g., economics, political science, biochemistry,
physiology) in the last two decades of the nineteenth century,
the new psychology grew and prospered as it responded to
the needs of American society (Appel, 1988; Kohler, 1982;
Sokal, 1992). The Progressive movement in politics was one
overt response to the calls for a more efficient, less corrupt,
social order, while in academia there was a parallel response
as American universities sought to provide trained personnel
to fill the new professional niches created by the demands for
a more efficient society.
The modern university that emerged after the U.S. Civil
War was both a product and a producer of the increasingly
rationalized society (Veysey, 1965). As Wiebe (1967) points
out, this was the era of the rise of the expert who restricted
himself to a specialized function in order to increase his au-
thority. The new graduate schools, modeled on the German
research university, provided professional training for this
new class of experts (Veysey, 1965). Psychology and other
disciplines emerged as examples of the increasing specializa-
tion of knowledge within the university. The most successful
of these new disciplines were the ones that found a way to use
their specialized knowledge in the practical service of the
larger community. Psychology was among those successful
disciplines.
In July 1892, G. Stanley Hall (1844 –1924) met with a
small group of men to discuss the possibility of organizing a
psychological association (Fernberger, 1932). Although the
details of the meeting are not known, the group elected 31 in-
dividuals, including themselves, to membership, with Hall as
the first president. The first meeting of the new American
Psychological Association (APA) was held in December
1892 at the University of Pennsylvania. The basic gover-
nance of the APA consisted of a council with an executive
committee, a plan that is essentially the same as that of the
beginning of the twenty-first century: a Council of Represen-
tatives with a Board of Directors.
Membership growth of the APA was modest over the first
50 years of its existence. From 31 members in 1892, there
were 125 members in 1899, 308 in 1916, 530 in 1930, and 664
in 1940. In 1926, a new class of nonvoting membership was
formed, associate, and most of the growth occurred in that
class after 1926, so that there were 2,079 associate members in- During World War II, the APA merged with other psy-
chological organizations under a reorganization plan that
broadened the scope of psychology to include professional
practice and the promotion of human welfare. The reorganized
APA was prepared for the postwar boom in psychology.
The greatest growth in APA membership came after World
War II. Returning servicemen, with federal education
benefits (e.g., the GI bill), filled the psychology graduate pro-
grams of American universities. Many of them were inter-
ested in the new clinical psychology training programs.
Training mental health personnel became a priority for the
Veterans Administration and the new National Institute of
Mental Health. Millions of dollars were poured into psychol-
ogy in the postwar period; these monies led to significant in-
creases in faculty as well as students. In the 25-year period
from 1945 to 1970, the APA experienced the most rapid
growth of its entire history. Membership grew over 630%,
from 4,183 to 30,839 members (Crawford, 1992). From 1970
to 2000, APA membership grew to 88,500, with another
70,500 affiliates.