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British mental health workers are watching with concern the declining status of psychoanalysis. Psychoanalytic knowledge is increasingly considered irrelevant within the British National Health System. This book is a response to this concern. In 12 chapters, written mostly by mental health professionals affiliated with the Tavistock Mental Health Center, the book points to the relevance of psychoanalytic knowledge, with all its variations, to many psychotherapeutic activities, projects, and many contemporary forms of psychotherapy. The emphasis is on bringing a psychoanalytic mindset to therapeutic activity, not a defense of psychoanalytic techniques. The most interesting papers focus on this issue by describing very specific projects or services, such as suicide prevention, working with parents of children under five, dealing with traumatized adolescents, working with imprisoned mothers who had babies, approaches to panic disorders, and cognitive behavior therapy.
The focus on a psychoanalytic mindset is best illustrated in the highly interesting first chapter: “Off the Couch and Around the Conference Table.” John Lord Alberdice, a psychiatrist and psychoanalyst as well as a professor in Belfast, involved himself in Irish politics and became a key negotiator of the 1998 Good Friday agreement, bringing the North and South together in a peace settlement. The paper describes the value of his psychoanalytic outlook for his ability to assess the motives of his opponents and to his skill in mediation. He was able to shift the focus of the discussion from the divisive issues of a settlement to attending