Letter to the Editors from Dr Nina Vasilyeva, St Petersburg

At the beginning of the century there were strong psychoanalytic traditions in Russian psychiatry. However, from the middle of the 1930s, psychoanalysis was buried in oblivion for many years in Russia. Pavlov's theory was the dominant theory of psychiatry and psychotherapy. On the psychotherapy stage there remained hypnotic suggestion, rational and explanatory therapies.

Psychology assumed the form of an academic science. For many decades Russian psychology existed within its own empire. Only rarely was there any real exchange of information with the West. Language and scientific-cultural barriers made it difficult for Eastern Europeans to access Western texts or to publish in the West. So, important figures in Russian psychology, such as Teplov, Lomov, Leontiev, Rubinshtein, Nebilytsin, Ananyev, Bernshtein, remained virtually unknown abroad (Foreman, 1997).

After the period of ‘perestroika’ in the 1980s the situation began to change rapidly. There arose a new openness to foreign contacts and information. It is difficult to count how many foreign psychotherapists and psychoanalysts have visited Russia over the past fifteen years. They have presented to Russian psychologists and psychiatrists almost all of the world's existing psychotherapy schools and stimulated the development of these in Russia. The independent education system, which began with workshops and seminars, gradually took the form of independent schools which are also psychotherapy centres.

Since the summer of 1996, the situation in psychoanalysis has begun to change. The President's Decree proclaimed the necessity to revive psychoanalysis in Russia. A committee was organized in Moscow. Active preparatory work started. Over time it became clear that new psychoanalytic developments in Russia were taking two differing paths. One was the state level, where committees are introducing their own requirements for the new profession. It is the way of large institutions and sta