Global graphology aims to fill in that linguistic gap, and provide serious amateurs, professionals and teachers of graphology with important learning materials, modern ideas and discoveries, and research results, which have not yet received sufficient international attention. Moreover, Global Graphology aims to constitute a modest counter-balance against much of the shallow, misleading, false and presumptuous information about handwriting analysis one may encounter when surfing the net.

Global Graphology is a result of an international, multi-cultural effort, and is planned to appear in at least four languages in parallel. In our team of graphologists who brought it about there are professionals from three continents, with seven different mother tongues, different backgrounds, general education and graphological approaches. We all share a great desire to learn from each other and combine all our traditions in one body of knowledge.

Our different schools, albeit their differences in contents and techniques, all use deductive, "top-down" approaches, looking from the whole into its parts. Their principles resemble those of graphic test evaluation in general. We strongly believe that graphology, as we practice it, can be applied to all graphic imprints, and that its universal laws can be transferred to further writing systems, beyond the Roman alphabet. Therefore Global Graphology intends to search for the global aspects of graphic imprints worldwide.

We perceive the Gestalt of handwriting samples, considering the whole as more than the sum of its parts. Interestingly, the systemic concept of "synergy" is often defined in exactly the same words: the system as a whole being more than the sum of its parts. In both cases, this more-than-ness lies in the dynamics, in relationships and interactions, that are not just another part of the system, but are the strengthening, modifying and unifying components. Consequently, when there is a "Good Gestalt" or positive synergy, there is a sense of the elements belonging together and functioning well together. Positive synergy, such as the one we have experienced on the Editorial Board of Global Graphology, in which diverse cultures and schools are represented, has opened up new perspectives for each one of us, and finally brought about the present new creation shared by all of us. We hope that the insights gained in the process of sharing our professional treasures will bring about a change and synergy will beget more synergy.

Thanks are due to Ted Barnett and the Board of the IGC for supporting our initiative and believing in our ability to produce the journal within four months for the Quebec 2004 International Congress. We would also like to thank all the authors, translators and editors for volunteering their precious time and professional knowledge, in order to make the dream come true. Special thanks go to Marie-Noëlle Gauthier, for her dedication and technical support.