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In his paper on this subject Dr. Kubie1 describes a dilemma which confronts the analyst: Either the analyst is interested in the individual and must refrain from active participation in the problems of society, or if interested in the problems of society, his ability as an analyst becomes thereby impaired. Dr. Kubie maintains that the “basic reasons for non-participation are: (1) lack of time, (2) the preservation of the analytic incognito, and (3) the ignorance which is the price paid by the analyst for his long years of highly specialized training.”
In the meeting of the New York Sub-Committee for the Study of Social Issues on January 15, 1951, the article of Dr. Kubie was discussed and the following reply was drafted by the majority:
Time can be provided for participation in social issues if there is libido. Each man has the right to divide his time in proportion to his interests.
The analytic incognito is an ideal which cannot be attained. The analyst's age, sex, race, marital status are no secrets and favor or inhibit specific transference formations decidedly. Active participation in social issues reveals only data of a superficial nature. The analyst more fully reveals himself in his teaching and writing. Committee work does not interfere with the incognito at all.
Ignorance is no virtue. As long as we do not have an obligatory study of the social sciences as a pre-condition for training in psychoanalysis, every psychoanalyst will do well to voluntarily fill the gaps in his knowledge. Awareness of the relativity of his own system of values and of the social forces represented in his patients' superegos is helpful and even necessary in the analysis of the individual.
In spite of Dr. Kubie's attempt to be fair in the characterization of the “ivory tower analyst” and the “socially aware analyst,” the latter is definitely put at a disadvantage. Apart from sacrificing a part of his income through his interest in applied psychoanalysis, this article forces him