The author systematically discusses the question frequently put to him by psychoanalyst colleagues during his stay in the Federal Republic of Germany as an Alexander von Humboldt Foundation scholar: How is it possible to work as a psychoanalyst in a society governed by a right-wing dictatorship? To answer this question, he frames it in somewhat different terms: How does the patient-analyst dyad react in a society such as that of Chile today? He subsequently defines so-called 'social reality' as a judgment on the external reality consciously or unconsciously 'shared' by analyst and patient. The author attempts to describe the reaction of the dyad on the basis of clinical vignettes which illustrate typical situations.