In this paper, the author explains the characteristics of the French Model, one of the training models accepted by the International Psychoanalytical Association. After presenting a history of the development of the model, he specifies the slight differences between the ways in which French Psychoanalytic Association, the Fourth Group and in particular Paris Psychoanalytical Society apply the model. Then he conveys a strikingly different and not completely clear model that Jacques Lacan proposes called the “pass” (passe).

According to Penot, the most important feature of the French model is the high value it sets on supervision. In this model supervision should be understood as a mutual analytic work between supervisor and supervisee.