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(1981). Journal of American Academy of Psychoanalysis, 9:620-621

Existential Foundations of Medicine and Psychology: Medard Boss, Jason Aronson, New York, 1979, 303 pp. Price: $20.00.

Morton L. Enelow, M.D.

The fundamental contribution of existential psychiatry and psychoanalysis as explicated by Medard Boss is its understanding of man as being. It does not deny the validity of dynamisms and the study of specific behavior patterns in their rightful places. However, it holds that drives or dynamisms, by whatever name one calls them, can be understood only in the context of the structure of the existence of the person with whom we are dealing. The distinctive character of existential analysis is that it is concerned with ontology, the science of being, and with dasein, the existence of this particular being sitting opposite the psychotherapist. Being and becoming are fundamental concepts in the existential framework of Boss. In his viewpoint, the problem is not at all that patients happened to have endured emotionally traumatic or impoverished pasts; it is rather that they cannot or do not commit themselves to the present and future. Some hope and commitment to work toward changing someth

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