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This book is one of a series being published by the Analytic Press to try to promote serious consideration of the ideas of relational psychoanalysis which have been developing in recent years, particularly in New York. Lewis Aron is part of a group of analysts involved with the New York City Post-Doctoral Program in Psychotherapy and Psychoanalysis: some of the better known thinkers around this grouping would include Jessica Benjamin, Michael Eigen and Stephen Mitchell. Aron is one of several linked to this group who have been trying to develop a theoretical underpinning for what he describes as a radical ‘relational’ psychoanalysis; and this book is really an attempt to give the reader a clear view of exactly what is unique about this perspective and, in the process, to think about how these ideas relate to and differ from more mainstream psychoanalytic views.
The first part of the book tells a story, an historical one, of the development of a way of thinking that has grown out of dissatisfaction with traditional ego-psychological theories and which attempts the challenge of integrating aspects of theories, as diverse as Kohut, British post-Kleinian and object relation perspectives, as well as the interpersonal tradition of Harry Stack Sullivan and the ‘intersubjective’ approach of Stolorow and his colleagues. He tries to link all this with ‘post-modern’ ideas in general, adding a dash of other luminaries such as Harold Searles and Schafer to create a heady brew indeed. Although at times bordering on the esoteric as he attempts to explore fine differentiations between theories which are little debated here, he does manage to guide the reader through the theoretical maze and lead us to the exposition of his particular position.
Some of the debate will not seem new to British readers, maybe in particular the need to embrace a two-person psychology. However he does argue firmly against what he sees as the positivist residues in psychoanalytic theory, in particular, the