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The rationale for introducing a new theoretical concept should be that the new term allow for greater clinical understanding of observable data or for more meaningful integration into current theory. Dr. Balint's most recent work deals with a group of severely ill patients—borderline or even schizophrenic—similar to those
described so well by Greenacre. For these patients classical psychoanalytic technique must be modified to deal with the regressive states which emerge during treatment.
To describe the severe early pathology, Dr. Balint feels it is helpful to introduce his concept of the 'basic fault'. He states: 'The level is described as a fault, not a situation, position, conflict, or complex. In this level, (a) all events belong to a two-person relationship which is quite different from later levels; (b) the nature of forces is not that of conflict; (c) adult language is often misleading in describing events at this level because words do not have an agreed conventional meaning.' Unfortunately there is scant clinical material alluded to in this highly technical work to illustrate convincingly either the clinical usefulness or the technical advantage of the concept of the 'basic fault'.
Dr. Balint, a disciple of the school of Ferenczi, argues for the introduction of greater activity on the part of the analyst as the best way to deal with certain early traumata. He describes the treatment of a patient with a crippling fear of uncertainty whenever faced with decision making. After about two years of work, the patient was given a crucial interpretation: that apparently the most important thing for her was to keep her head safely up with both feet firmly planted on the ground. In response, the patient alluded to a long-standing fear of doing somersaults; to the analyst's query, 'What about now?', the patient got up from the couch and to her great amazement did a perfect somersault without any difficulty. This incident proved to be a real break-through.
Dr.