Published: October 2026

Keywords:
Vassilis Charalambopoulos, Systemic psychotherapy; community values; social transformation; group processes; personal and collective change; social responsibility; social, political and ecological crisis.

Vassilis Charalambopoulos

Vassilis is a systemic psychotherapist, trainer and supervisor. He has 30 years of experience in addiction counselling and in individual, group and family therapy. He studied counselling, psychotherapy and the management of health organisations, and completed a master’s degree in Counselling Psychology in England.

In 2000, together with three former colleagues, he founded the Centre for Research of Human Behaviour, the first private-sector non-governmental organisation in Greece working in the prevention and treatment of addictions. For many years, Vassilis has been actively involved in developing and running programmes of community action, prevention, therapy and training for healthcare professionals in Greece, Cyprus and the United Kingdom. This journey has also included many years of presenting at Greek and international conferences, alongside his travels to different European countries as a trainer.

In 2008, he received an award from the Minister of Health of Cyprus for his outstanding contribution to mental health. In 2015, the Centre for Research was recognised as one of the 15 most influential organisations in Greece in terms of its social impact (Social Impact Awards).

In 2002, he joined a ten-year intensive experiential training programme at the Athenian Institute of Anthropos (AIA), specialising in family therapy, group therapy and systemic community interventions. For the past three years, he has been a member of AIA’s Coordinating Scientific Team and remains actively involved in therapy, supervision and training.

Over the past decade or so, he has also focused on approaches to systemic leadership through his training in Theory U and Social Presencing Theater (SPT). These approaches place particular emphasis on the information that emerges through bodily experience, using it as a tool for change in people and the systems they participate in and influence.

Vassilis has been an elected member of the Board of the European Family Therapy Association (EFTA) since 2023. He is also a certified clinical member of the American Group Psychotherapy Association (AGPA-CGP) and a member of several professional organisations in the field of addictions. Vassilis has a deep and personal relationship with music. Since the age of eight, he has studied, composed and played classical and electric guitar in a wide range of settings. Musicality has always been an integral part of who he is, permeating every aspect of his professional work.

Abstract

These pages began as diary entries in Anafi. They bring together a personal and emotionally charged concern about the direction contemporary psychotherapy is taking at a time of social, political and ecological crisis. Drawing on more than thirty years in addiction counselling, group and family therapy, teaching and work in larger systems, I ask what we help people to adapt to - and what we enable to remain unchanged. I consider two possible responses: for our professional bodies to take clearer public positions, and for systemic practice to move more directly into the social field. The group and the community are approached as intermediate living systems through which personal change can be carried into collective life.