Editor's Introduction

This issue of Psychoanalysis and Psychotherapy in China begins with contributions from the March 2020 China online conference on family and couple psychoanalysis, and themes sounded in this convocation echo throughout the whole issue.

The cover art, by analytic psychotherapist and artist Richard Wu, introduces the theme of the modern Chinese family and the tensions within the family and between families and the wider culture. These themes, studied in several dimensions, are of paramount concern in modern China.

Section one begins with a case study and discussion by two Shanghai psychiatrist-analytic psychotherapists, Song Rui and Fang Fang, both of whom have trained in psychoanalytic couple and family therapy. Timothy Keogh, a psychoanalyst who serves on the committee establishing an IPA fourth region for Asia and Australia/New Zealand, and who also serves on the IPA's committee on couple and family psychoanalysis, contributes the presentation he gave at the conference, “Working with primitive mental states in couples”, a subject that has not frequently been addressed and that takes up issues frequently present in couple therapies. Wu Hao, another Chinese analytic therapist, presents her work, along with her colleagues, on understanding couples with embedded and destructive rejecting objects. Then Hou Puqing and Zhang Tianbu look at the cultural components in play in a closely studied case of a woman with oedipal difficulties.

In section two, we gather three contributions along similar themes. Zheng Yu also studies vicissitudes of the Oedipus complex, looking closely at questions of its relevance and particular appearance in Chinese culture. Wei Zhang studies a related topic, calling it “The intersubjective tug of war in parent-child relationships”. This examination of tension between a child's autonomy and parental behaviour, and especially this dimension within China, offers a much needed clinical perspective. Huan Wang continues this theme by examining the tension b