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In the last few decades, the application of psychoanalysis to children has been considerably extended in several directions. Psychoanalytical treatment of children has increased in accordance with the theoretical and technical options of the various schools of thought, while the psychoanalytical comprehension of mental functioning has added a new meaning to child psychiatry as well as to pedagogy. If nowadays no one doubts the importance of the contribution of the psychoanalysis of children to the elaboration of psychoanalytical theory—the vehemence of discussion on this subject is testimony enough—the modes of application of psychoanalysis to children have at times evoked a certain suspicion among analysts who, for various reasons, wondered if one could legitimately retain the term 'psychoanalysis' for techniques that did not seem to follow the adult psychoanalytical cure on certain decisive points.
The difficulties brought out by the application of psychoanalysis to other disciplines concerning the child reinforced this doubt. The limit was no longer clear between the technical variations indispensable in the application of psychoanalysis to children and the psychotherapeutic or educational uses entrusted to specialists of various formations who utilize psychoanalytical concepts but risk introducing important distortions if they do not practise psychoanalysis. This risk has not gone unnoticed by any of the schools of child psychoanalysis and has resulted in a deepening of the theory, as well as a growing concern for the proper formation of child analysts. In the long run these difficulties have been a factor of progress, and we meet together today to evaluate this progress and the prospects deriving from it.
Let us not forget, however, that the problems which we shall debate have practically all been brought up since the publication in 1909 of the Little Hans case history. His father's very special attitude and interventions aroused a mobilization of forces wh