Table Of Content“Books and essays on psychoanalysis seem to alternate between those that
focus on its future and those that focus on its decline and marginalization.
Is our current state of pluralism a sign of health and vitality or of decay and
fragmentation? Progress in Psychoanalysis: Envisioning the Future of the
Profession is a serious and rigorous effort to grapple with the tensions of
the future of psychoanalysis under pressure to meet our health care sys-
tem’s demands for access, cost containment, research evidence, and public
accountability. This book is essential reading for anyone interested in the
future of psychoanalysis and psychoanalytic education.”
– Lewis Aron, Ph.D., Director, New York University
Postdoctoral Program in Psychotherapy and Psychoanalysis
“This book, with broad reach, addresses a pervasive problem of closed-
mindedness within the culture and among the ‘citizens’ of the psycho-
analytic community. That closed-mindedness has been shaken in recent
decades, but still includes much excessive either/or thinking about theory,
technique, training, research, and what psychoanalysts can do. And the
book addresses this head-on in its theoretical sections, and by concrete
illustration in its sections on training, research, and work beyond the one-
to-one in-the-office. It is very much a worthwhile read for the already
open-minded and a necessary read for all the others. Having discovered in
my own clinical/research/teaching life the value of such open-mindedness,
I found it fascinating again and again as I read through it and recommend
it highly.”
– Fred Pine, Ph.D., Professor Emeritus, Department of Psychiatry,
Albert Einstein College of Medicine, New York City
“This book is a breath of fresh air. Perhaps a life-saving one. What unites
its chapters is a recognition of two closely related facts: (1) that psychoa-
nalysis is not important – it is about something important – and (2) that
psychoanalysis is not about itself – it is about the human mind, an object
of study that we share with other disciplines.”
– Mark Solms, Chair of Neuropsychology, University of Cape Town
and Research Chair, International Psychoanalytical Association
“The profession of psychoanalysis faces immense challenges to its viabil-
ity. This stunning text captures both the internal and external challenges
and it offers solutions. In three sections, ‘Perspectives’, ‘Research and
training’, and ‘Beyond the consulting room’, the book addresses the need
to integrate disparate theoretical perspectives while maintaining clarity
about core principles, to realize the relevance of psychoanalytic psycho-
therapy research, to develop meaningful collaborations with allied disci-
plines and to get smart about how the profession engages with health care
reform. This book offers a path to a fundamental re-orientation of the pro-
fession and how it can thrive.”
– Harriet L. Wolfe, M.D., President, American Psychoanalytic
Association; Clinical Professor of Psychiatry, UCSF
Progress in Psychoanalysis
Is psychoanalysis in decline? Has its understanding of the human condition
been marginalized? Have its clinical methods been eclipsed by more short-
term, problem-oriented approaches? Is psychoanalysis unable (or unwill-
ing) to address key contemporary issues and concerns?
With contributors internationally recognized for their scholarship,
Progress in Psychoanalysis: Envisioning the Future of the Profession
offers both an analysis of how the culture of psychoanalysis has contrib-
uted to the profession’s current dilemmas and a description of the progres-
sive trends taking form within the contemporary scene. Through a broad
and rigorous examination of the psychoanalytic landscape, this book high-
lights the profession’s very real progress and describes a vision for its
increased relevance. It shows how psychoanalysis can offer unparalleled
value to the public.
Economic, political, and cultural factors have contributed to the mar-
ginalization of psychoanalysis over the past 30 years. But the profession’s
internal rigidity, divisiveness, and strong adherence to tradition have left
it unable to adapt to change and to innovate in the ways needed to remain
relevant. The contributors to this book are prominent practitioners, theo-
reticians, researchers, and educators who offer cogent analyses of the cul-
ture of psychoanalysis and show how the profession’s foundation can be
strengthened by building on the three pillars of openness, integration, and
accountability.
This book is designed to help readers develop a clearer vision of a
vital, engaged, contemporary psychoanalysis. The varied contributions
to Progress in Psychoanalysis exemplify how the profession can change
to better promote and build on the very real progress that is occurring
in theory, research, training, and the many applications of psychoanaly-
sis. They offer a roadmap for how the profession can begin to reclaim its
leadership in wide-ranging efforts to explore the dynamics of mental life.
Readers will come away with more confidence in psychoanalysis as an
innovative enterprise and more excitement about how they can contribute
to its growth.
Steven D. Axelrod, Ph.D., is an Adjunct Assistant Professor at the NYU
Postdoctoral Program in Psychoanalysis and Psychotherapy and a Senior
Editor of Division/Review, a quarterly published by the APA’s Division
of Psychoanalysis (Division 39). He is also a Principal of the Boswell
Group, a psychodynamic management consulting group, and he maintains
practices in psychoanalysis, psychotherapy, and organizational consulting
in New York City.
Ronald C. Naso, Ph.D., ABPP., is a Board-Certified Psychoanalyst and
Clinical Psychologist in independent practice in Stamford, CT. He is cur-
rently President of the American Board and Academy of Psychoanalysis.
His book Hypocrisy Unmasked was published in 2010. In 2016, two addi-
tional books, Humanizing Evil and Ethics of Evil, co-edited with Jon Mills,
were also published.
Larry M. Rosenberg, Ph.D., is the President of the Child and Adolescent
Section of Division 39 of the APA and is a member of the board of the
Section for Applied Clinical Psychoanalysis of the Division. He is a
Co-Editor of the Child Section of the Psychodynamic Diagnostic Manual-2
and currently practices in Stamford, CT.
Philosophy & Psychoanalysis book series
JON MILLS
Series Editor
Philosophy & Psychoanalysis is dedicated to current developments and cutting
edge research in the philosophical sciences, phenomenology, hermeneutics, exis-
tentialism, logic, semiotics, cultural studies, social criticism, and the humanities
that engage and enrich psychoanalytic thought through philosophical rigor. With
the philosophical turn in psychoanalysis comes a new era of theoretical research
that revisits past paradigms while invigorating new approaches to theoretical,
historical, contemporary, and applied psychoanalysis. No subject or discipline is
immune from psychoanalytic reflection within a philosophical context including
psychology, sociology, anthropology, politics, the arts, religion, science, culture,
physics, and the nature of morality. Philosophical approaches to psychoanalysis
may stimulate new areas of knowledge that have conceptual and applied value
beyond the consulting room reflective of greater society at large. In the spirit of
pluralism, Philosophy & Psychoanalysis is open to any theoretical school in phi-
losophy and psychoanalysis that offers novel, scholarly, and important insights in
the way we come to understand our world.
Titles in this series:
Inventing God: Psychology of Belief and the Rise of Secular Spirituality
Jon Mills
Jung’s Ethics: Moral Psychology and his Cure of Souls
Dan Merkur, edited by Jon Mills
Temporality and Shame: Perspectives from Psychoanalysis and
Philosophy
Edited by Ladson Hinton and Hessel Willemsen
Progress in Psychoanalysis: Envisioning the Future of the Profession
Edited by Steven D. Axelrod, Ronald C. Naso & Larry M. Rosenberg
Progress in Psychoanalysis
Envisioning the Future of the Profession
Edited by Steven D. Axelrod, Ronald
C. Naso & Larry M. Rosenberg
First published 2018
by Routledge
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN
and by Routledge
711 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business
© 2018 selection and editorial matter, Steven D. Axelrod, Ronald C. Naso &
Larry M. Rosenberg; individual chapters, the contributors
The right of the editors to be identified as the authors of the editorial
material, and of the authors for their individual chapters, has been asserted
in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents
Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or
utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now
known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in
any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing
from the publishers.
Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or
registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation
without intent to infringe.
British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Axelrod, Steven D., 1951- editor. | Naso, Ronald C., 1954- editor. |
Rosenberg, Larry M. (Psychologist), editor.
Title: Progress in psychoanalysis: envisioning the future of the profession /
edited by Steven D. Axelrod, Ronald C. Naso & Larry M. Rosenberg.
Description: Abingdon, Oxon; New York, NY: Routledge, 2018. |
Series: Philosophy & psychoanalysis | Includes bibliographical references
and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2017060533 (print) | LCCN 2018002761 (ebook) |
ISBN 9781351103992 (Master) | ISBN 9781351103985 (Web PDF) |
ISBN 9781351103978 (ePub) | ISBN 9781351103961 (Mobipocket/Kindle) |
ISBN 9781138477872 (hardback: alk. paper) | ISBN 9781138477889
(pbk.: alk. paper)
Subjects: LCSH: Psychoanalysi–Practice. | Psychotherapy. | Psychiatry. |
Psychoanalysts.
Classification: LCC RC504 (ebook) | LCC RC504 .P68 2018 (print) |
DDC 616.89/17–dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017060533
ISBN: 978-1-138-47787-2 (hbk)
ISBN: 978-1-138-47788-9 (pbk)
ISBN: 978-1-351-10399-2 (ebk)
Typeset in Times New Roman
by Deanta Global Publishing Services, Chennai, India
To the memory of Martin S. Bergmann –
Who modeled a psychoanalysis of depth, range, and vitality that
helped inspire this book.
SDA
For Lina and Zac
My heart and my soul
LMR
