Discussion Memorandum by James Strachey: Member of the Training Committee – February 24th, 1943

The Training Committee have been instructed by the Society to consider the ways in which current theoretical controversies affect matters of training. I want to begin by pointing out that this problem which has been confided to us is ultimately a political and administrative problem and not a scientific one. A student of psychology, having arrived at what seemed to him the truth about certain phenomena, might quite well, like Henry Cavendish in the field of physics, be satisfied with leaving things at that – and decide to keep his conclusions to himself. The Members of the Psycho-Analytical Society, for various reasons, have decided on the contrary that they wish to disseminate their conclusions as widely as possible, and the business of this Committee is to consider how best to carry that decision into effect. We are thus concerned with problems not of theory but of practical expediency.

This does not in the least imply that our problems are unimportant. On the contrary, it is quite likely that upon our decision the whole future of psychoanalysis in this country will depend. For, if we decide unwisely, one of two equally bad consequences may in the extreme case follow. On the one hand, the dissemination of psychoanalysis may become so extremely restricted that something like a Henry Cavendish position may actually be brought about. Or, on the other hand, we may effect a very wide dissemination of views, and yet, if those views bear only a faint resemblance to those of psychoanalysis or are actually opposed to them, our policy will have been no less of a failure. Between these two equally undesirable extremes it is our business to find an optimum mean. But you will already see from this that though a political problem is not