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I am truly honored to be here with you tonight and to remember Karen Horney. It's hard to believe that 50 years have gone by since Karen Horney founded the American Institute for Psychoanalysis and the Association for the Advancement of Psychoanalysis. Her contributions to the field of analysis and psychiatry have survived the test of time, forming a link between the old school of pure psychoanalytic thought and today's biopsychosocial approach to the treatment of psychiatric patients. Horney said, “Man turns uncontrollable or destructive only if he cannot fulfill himself.” Fifty years ago was she clairvoyant? Could she envision the horror of the Los Angeles riots, the assassination of presidents? Did she foresee private citizens packing guns as they went to work? Those who knew Horney best did not find it difficult to account for her clairvoyance and her foresight. They describe her as eager, creative, endowed with spirit and originality, self-reliant, and very strong in advancing her ideas in the face of enormous professional opposition.
Her daughter, Dr. Marianne Eckardt, stated Horney was not one to worry about whether her thoughts would be right. Rather, she permitted her thoughts to form unreined. She was always questioning and working and debating and discussing, and that inner dialogue went on throughout her life and gave her satisfaction. She was a beautiful lecturer. She always had notes, but she never read her lectures, and they always made a circle. She was at home in her creative concepts.
Today I will discuss with you “Violence: The Malignancy of Our Times! Is There Hope?” Unlike Horney, I will not be able to speak simply from notes; I do have a written paper. I hope, however, to emulate her creativity, her strength, and to stimulate controversy, thinking, debate, and discussion because, as she said, “Progress and analysis can only be made the hard way—;by including ourselves and our difficulties. If we remain static and adverse to changing our theories,