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Psychoanalytic education today is all too often conducted in an atmosphere of indoctrination rather than of open scientific exploration. Candidates as well as graduates and even faculty are prone to study and quote their teachers, often ignoring alternative psychoanalytic approaches. The disproportionate amount of time and energy given to Freud, in contrast to the brief and superficial review of other theorists, including contemporary psychoanalytic contributions (other than those of dominant local authorities), and the rigid presentation and uncritical discussion of Freud’s work and theories in the light of contemporary knowledge give the educational process a sense of flatness.
Candidates are systematically prevented from knowing the details of their faculty’s analytic work. They are usually even sheltered from sharp disagreements within their own institute, so that, at best, they may learn about these at society meetings rather than within their formal educational program. In the case of seminars and personal supervision, candidates learn only about cases treated by themselves and other candidates, presumably treated with less than an optimal psychoanalytic technique. The more senior the analyst, the less he shares his analytic experience with students. To illustrate the teaching of technique with selected vignettes is very different from presenting ongoing clinical material fully to students. The only experience candidates have regarding how psychoanalysis is optimally carried out derives from their own psychoanalysis and from their readings. If it is true that their own analyses are highly contaminated by their
transferences, and that the literature case material is highly distorted by a variety of factors and thus of questionable value as a model of psychoanalytic technique, this failure to provide experience with optimal technique is a most astonishing and rarely discussed aspect of psychoanalytic education.
A candidate authentically dependent on