Editorial

This editorial is written at a time unlike any other, towards the end of the first wave of the Covid-19 global pandemic, and in the middle of a worldwide response to structural racism sparked by the death of George Floyd in the United States. There is no doubt that over the next months and years, we will see our literature expand in relation to what these events mean, and what their implications might be for psychoanalytic clinical theory and practice with children and young people, parents and families.

Apart from the research digest that helpfully draws together abstracts relating to telephone and video therapy, the papers and articles in this journal emerged from a time before the current struggles and preoccupations. In their breadth and range of interest, however, they highlight how our community of practice has been able to respond with flexibility and interest to the challenges of what we are all facing globally as human beings and as psychoanalytic practitioners. What comes across from the work in this edition is the curiosity, readiness to explore, and depth of engagement that are alive in the minds of those who work psychoanalytically with children; these papers illustrate some of the different places towards which that instinct to understand more has been directed.

The first group of articles in the journal are full-length papers with a particular area of interest under examination. A foundation of our psychoanalytic work is our own experience of being a patient; the first paper by Coralie Lasvergnas-Garcia has this experience as a focus, asking important questions and exploring themes that may encourage further debate and discussion regarding analytic treatment during training.

Next, Deborah Marks looks at the centrality of work with parents as another foundation in the frame, allowing and supporting the work undertaken with children. Crasnow et al. provide an account from the practitioners’ perspectives of work with parents in a homeless hostel, part of a