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In recent years there has been a reexamination in the self psychology literature of the concept of optimal frustration. Although Kohut (1971, 1977, 1984) was insistent that optimal frustration is an essential aspect of the curative process, a number of authors (Bacal, 1985, 1988; Socarides and Stolorow, 1985; Terman, 1988; Bacal and Newman, 1990) have raised questions about its significance for cure and have recommended that the term be replaced by alternative constructs. The purpose of this chapter is to review these criticisms in light of the critical implications that such suggestions might hold for the theory and practice of self psychology.1
Though Kohut's concept of optimal frustration is well known, a brief review is necessary for the later discussion.
Although Kohut (1972) credits Bernfeld (1928) with first using the term, the idea of optimal frustration was used in classical analysis (Freud, 1946) in reference to the neutralization of drive energy and was later taken up by Kohut in reference to the internalization of selfobject functions. Through his experience-near empathic treatment stance, Kohut (1984) came to recognize that cure (i.e., “transmuting internalization”) in