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This book comes at a time when we are experiencing an escalation of problems caused by every manner of addiction. The author takes alcohol as his paradigm to delineate the psychodynamics of addiction using the insights of analytical psychology. It throws the spotlight on a contribution of Jung which tends to be overlooked.
The author is a Jungian analyst with many years of experience as a chemical dependency addiction counsellor in the U.S.A. His hypothesis is that only the Jungian view of the psyche can adequately explain in psychodynamic terms the complexity and the unique aspects of the addiction and recovery processes. He believes that Alcoholics Anonymous has intuitively and pragmatically discovered these dynamics, and addressed them in a practical way in the spiritual programme of the Twelve Steps, but that A.A. has not been able to translate its experience into the psychodynamic language spoken by analytical psychologists and psychoanalysts and other mental health professionals. Furthermore, he has found that in A.A. today there is little awareness of the part Jung played in its beginnings. He aims to bridge this gap.
Schoen bases his theory on the written evidence of Jung's perspective on addiction documented in the correspondence which he exchanged in January 1961 with Bill Wilson, one of the founder members of A.A. He explores the significance of the text of these letters fully and with admirable clarity. This offers the reader a starting point for grasping Jung's approach, as well as explaining Jung's indirect influence in the origins of A.A. and exploring the reasons for Jung's own reticence about his perspective. From this starting point, the book unfolds in four chapters, which deal in turn with: the development of an addiction; the essential character of addiction; the process of recovery through the Twelve Steps of A.A.; and finally, the significance of a particular aspect of the dreams of recovering alcoholics.
From Jung's statement that alcoholism is