Factions are Back

When I was in analytic training at NYU Postdoc in the 1980s, there were two dominant tracks (the relational track didn't come into being until after I had graduated, and the independent track was pretty quiet during those years). The two active orientations, Freudian and interpersonal, were at war—well, at cold war.

The caricatures were consistent—and consistently unfriendly: Freudians were rigid and unempathic; interpersonalists made superficial and/or undisciplined use of their countertransference while ignoring the patient's underlying dynamic issues. When they were even included in the conversation, self psychologists were described as avoidant of conflict and inauthentically empathic. The notion that each had a contribution to make and that something good might accrue from cross-theoretical exchange was quite remote. Suspicious, both of alternative perspectives and of the analysts who identify with them, our theory—whatever its particulars—became part of our character armor (Reich 1975).

It could have been worse. Like other training programs teaching multiple orientations, NYU Postdoc encouraged (and encourages) candidates to take courses and get supervision in every track. Nevertheless, felt pressure to align with one track was palpable and subtly affected many of us, albeit in variegated ways.

Intertrack conflicts at NYU Postdoc intensified further when a relational track was proposed in the late ’80s. Some interpersonalists felt that the relational movement was ignoring the significant overlaps between it and interpersonal theory (I think we were); others joined the relational track. Those splits carried profound emotional meaning and took a personal