Programme of the Congress: Editorial Comment

By and large, the London Congress was considered to be a great success. The 1600 participants were easily accommodated in the Great Room of the Grosvenor House Hotel, and in the halls and numerous conference rooms, without ever feeling trapped in a crowd.

Once the traditional addresses of welcome were over, Monday morning's Plenary Session was devoted to the central theme: CHANGES IN PSYCHOANALYTIC PRACTICE AND EXPERIENCE. After Prof. Serge Lebovici had opened the debate, we were able to listen to a very lively dialogue between Dr Rangell and Dr Green, during which they were able to pursue and develop certain aspects of their prepublished papers. The afternoon discussion, introduced by a very lively paper by Miss Anna Freud, was very animated. Many of the ideas put forward that day seemed to come up again during the rest of the Congress, so it certainly seemed to have had the desired impact to set the tone for the Congress.

The second day's three simultaneous Panels were also very successful. For the first time it was possible to have simultaneous translation for all the Panels and this gave much more flavour of an international meeting. The Dialogue meetings on the Thursday were even more popular and successful (1. FREUD AND FEMALE SEXUALITY; 2. THE ROLE OF FAMILY LIFE IN CHILD DEVELOPMENT; 3. THE CHANGING USE OF DREAMS IN PSYCHOANALYTIC PRACTICE), and all three meetings were talked about and discussed very much by the participants afterwards. This did not prevent the individual papers from being followed attentively. The Friday morning Forum on THE ROLE OF THE PSYCHOANALYST IN A CHANGING SOCIETY gave way to a very lively debate. A great number of statements showed all the hope and difficulties encountered by the practise of psychoanalysis in a changing society. A very moving statement showed how disgraceful a misunderstanding between psychiatric therapy and political repression can be. Another part of the debate dealt with the changes that philosophic