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We developed the ideas for this special issue of the journal during the last congress of the International Psychoanalytical Association in New Orleans. In retrospect, this is not surprising, as the themes selected by the program committee of the congress revolved around the frontiers of contemporary psychoanalysis. We had presented a panel at the congress on the planning of a large research project involving psychoanalysis—a research project that is truly on the frontiers of psychoanalysis as we know them today.
At the panel we described the project: a comparative, randomized controlled trial of three active treatments—psychoanalysis, psychodynamic psychotherapy, and cognitive-behaviour therapy—with supportive clinical management as the control. We also presented a paper in which we discussed the effect of this experience on the psychoanalytic work of the analysts involved in the planning of the project. There was lively discussion following our panel and at the final plenary of the congress: some of the sharpest words were reserved for the need to establish a research enterprise within psychoanalysis, and more specifically within psychoanalytic institutes, to involve research as a fundamental element in the education of candidates.
Our experiences at the congress, both as presenters and as participants in these discussions, inspired us to approach the editor with the idea of a special issue of the journal devoted to psychoanalytic and psychoanalytically informed research papers. Don Carveth was enthusiastic about the idea, and he has given us his full cooperation. The endeavour has come to an exciting fulfilment with the appearance of this special issue. We will now discuss briefly some of the issues involved in systematic