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Mahler and Kohut: Perspectives on Development, Psychopathology, and Technique represents an informative study of Mahler's and Kohut's positions that reflects the Freudian partisanship of its editors. The book is a compilation of papers that were presented at the 25th annual Margaret Mahler Symposium on Child Development, held in 1993. Its explicit aim is to compare Mahler's and Kohut's ideas about development, psychopathology, and technique. The comparison is made not only by having some presenters review Mahler's and Kohut's ideas, but also by having proponents of these respective positions—Calvin Settlage and Ernest Wolf—outline their current viewpoints.
This collection of papers does illustrate how Mahler and Kohut were “digging tunnels from different directions into the same area of the mountain” (Kohut, 1980) as they explored the origins, manifestations, and treatment of preoedipal pathology. Two commentators, Howard Levine and Thomas Wolman, present key similarities and differences between Mahler's and Kohut's positions with a fair-minded appreciation of both theorists' perspectives. Levine demonstrates Mahler's and Kohut's common emphasis on the roles of the real object and the actual object relationship in development and treatment. Wolman contrasts Mahler's view of mirroring as an aspect of the early mother-child relationship that becomes relinquished as the individual matures toward autonomy with Kohut's view of mirroring as an aspect of this early relationship that is retained and transformed in the course of development.
These even-handed papers do not succeed, however, in giving a balanced tone to the overall book. Considering the influence of Mahler and Kohut, Selma Kramer sharply criticizes the environmental emphasis in Kohut's thinking. Discussing Wolf's contribution, Salman Akhtar presents a sophisticated dismissal of self