A Critique of So-Called Standard Psychoanalytic Technique

IN A PREVIOUS PAPER (LIPTON, 1977) (AND ADDENDUM, 1979), I attempted to demonstrate that Freud did not change his technique after his analysis of the Rat Man. I learned later that Racker had come to a similar conclusion (Racker, 1968, p. 35). In attempting to make explicit what I thought was implicit in Freud's technique, I wrote that he established a personal relationship with the patient, using a phrase which Anna Freud had used, albeit with some cautionary reservations (A. Freud, 1954, p. 618). I thought that this relationship could not be prescribed or codified, but I described it as restricted (using that word) by its purpose (Lipton, 1977, p. 269) and said it could not be demarcated with precision. To claim that what I referred to is "a purely spontaneous personal relationship," or an "unrestricted personal relationship," (not only reversing my meaning, but even reversing my own word, restricted), and to claim that I said the personal and technical relationships can be completely separated, strikes me as a tendentious misunderstanding (Stone, 1981, pp. 105–106).

In that paper, I contended that after Freud's death the misconception arose that he had changed his technique and conducted analysis according to a technique which came to be known as classical, or standard. Those who adhere to this misconception contend that Freud's change can be inferred from the study of his later papers, and in using standard technique they claim they are simply following Freud. This claim has led to confusion. I may clarify my position by stating that I disagree equally with both Stone (1981) and Brenner (1979), despite what I regard as their minor differences with each other, as well as with Erle and Goldberg (1979) because they all share the view that this personal relationship can be codified. The result is that they tend to define analytic technique