Two Discussions of 'The Inner Experiences of the Analyst' and a Response from Theodore Jacobs

For several years now, the Congresses of the International Psychoanalytical Association have demonstrated a legitimate concern. In response to the multiplicity of theoretical systems that have arisen in the post-Freudian era, in which there co-exist ideas as diverse as those of Klein, Bion, Winnicott, Hartmann, Kohut and Lacan, to name but a few, we have attempted, beyond the issues that divide psychoanalysts, to pinpoint those on which we are united. Similarly, rather than continuing to confront each other in the sphere of intellectual speculation alone, we have endeavoured to put in perspective the different ways of understanding and experiencing the practice of the treatment. This trend is illustrated, for example, by the issue of the International Journal of Psycho-Analysis, published in 1991, devoted to 'Fifteen Clinical Accounts of Psychoanalysis' (Volume 72, Part 3). It is clear from a reading of these accounts that their fifteen respective authors are extremely diverse not only in their theoretical options, but also in the way they understand the material of a session, the choice of what is to be interpreted and the formulation of their interpretations.

Today, two years on, the contributions—of Theodore Jacobs, Madeleine Baranger and Dennis Duncan—selected for this Congress present their readers with a similar difficulty, precisely because they differ so much from each other. My reason for pointing this out at the very beginning of my discussion of Jacobs's presentation is to place my remarks in proportion, and to emphasise that my view is merely one among others and equally likely to give rise to predictable disagreements. I have never felt so strongly as after reading Jacobs's contribution that our way of thinking is determined by the place and time of our psychoanalytic training, by our allegiance to the particular environment where we practise our trade, and by our personal affinities. For example, I felt much more familiar with the approach of Bar