The Ad Hoc Committee on Los Angeles, chaired by Dr. Joan Fleming, presented its report to the open meeting of the Board on Professional Standards on May 5th in Baltimore. This committee visited Los Angeles from February 26th to 29th, 1976, with the understanding that it was “not a site visit committee, not an investigative committee, not a subcommittee of any of the committees of the Board, but a new exploratory, consultative committee with the aim of assessing the present turmoil and the status and viability of psychoanalytic education in the Los Angeles Society and Institute.” The Committee undertook its task “with an open mind and a sincere wish to help our colleagues in Los Angeles to solve their problems.”
The report briefly reviewed the history of the Los Angeles Society and Institute, noting that in 1967 the Institute made a major reorganization in response to chronic factional disputes and to the frustrations of many younger members in the face of tightly controlling authoritarian attitudes in the Education Committee. The changes, aimed at openness and democracy, led to the appointment of many new training analysts under new loose guidelines, and insured rapid changeovers in leadership. In 1973, the periodic site visit by a subcommittee of the Committee on Institutes observed that the level of analytic training had deteriorated, and that there was a failure to determine who was qualified to do training analyses. It was also felt that there was insufficient appreciation by analytic educators in Los Angeles of the confusions engendered in candidates who were taught various theoretical orientations in a manner that hampered, rather than enriched, their understanding of classical theory and practice.
Following the 1973 Site Visit Report, there was increasing evidence that the Los Angeles Institute was lacking the appropriate educational and personal atmosphere for analytic training, and that measures taken locally were not providing a progressive resolution of the difficulties. Appeals from candidates' groups confirmed the necessity of attempting to assess, and, if possible, to help beleaguered colleagues. On February 18th, 1976, shortly before the announced visit of Dr. Fleming's committee, a Unification Committee in Los Angeles was formed to “open immediately communication with persons from each factional position as well as the American Psychoanalytic Association.” Dr. Fleming notes that “the (Unification) Committee saw itself as representing various factions … being made up of members who have remained relatively noncontroversial.”
The Ad Hoc Committee came into contact with about 95 members of the Los Angeles group in its February visit, and members felt they had begun to gain significant understanding of its problems. They saw improvements in the teaching, but thought there was a lack of orientation toward educational goals, and serious difficulties in formulating criteria for evaluation of training analysts and supervisors. The Committee has steadily maintained that the Freud-Klein controversies need to be confronted in a scientific-educational context, rather than in the highly politicized manner that has been the custom over many years.
At the March 13th, 1976, meeting of the Coordinating Committee in New York, it was agreed that an on-going consultative relationship should be maintained for a limited time between the Ad Hoc Committee and representatives of various groups from Los Angeles, including students. A meeting took place in Denver, April 2nd to 4th. The methods, observations and follow-up of this unique experience in consultation, mutual observation, and education of educators deserve to be written in detail for future study. The Ad Hoc Committee was impressed with the potential of the students, and carefully noted that “fighting has been part of the Los Angeles ego ideal and tradition” which has tended to pass down through the generations by processes of identification.
Following the Denver meetings, there was communication from Los Angeles. Some disaffected members stated that “intervention from the American” and a change in atmosphere brought about by the Unification Committee had rekindled wishes to return to active personal involvement in teaching and proposed study groups. Several candidates also gave evidence of encouragement and help they received at Denver. At a faculty meeting in Los Angeles on April 26th, a self-confronting report containing proposals for beginning to solve problems was offered by the Unification Committee. It was received without the traditional attack and opposition that had usually ended in acrimony even though it contained evaluations similar in many ways to those of the Ad Hoc Committee.
The recommendations of Dr. Fleming's report to the Board were:
(1) A definitive decision regarding the status of the Los Angeles Society and Institute should be deferred until the Meeting of the Board on Professional Standards in December 1976. (2) During this period no splits should take place. (3) There should be clear communication with the students by the Institute concerning the benefits to them of any proposed changes involving any aspects of the tripartite educational program. (4) A moratorium should be initiated for admission and graduation until the educational process is on a sounder basis. (5) A commitment should be maintained to a sequential educational process that avoids premature inclusion of alternative conceptual viewpoints in the curriculum. (6) The Institute should continue a close consultative relationship with the American and with the Ad Hoc Committee.
Dr. Fleming's Committee had three recommendations for action by the Board on Professional Standards:
The intervening period should be utilized by the Board to study how to implement the consultative relationship with an Institute where provisional status is envisioned, including the specific nature of its relationship and the method of communication with the involved candidates.
As part of the implementation of a consultative relationship between the Board and the Los Angeles Institute, the Ad Hoc Committee should be authorized to distribute their report to the appropriate participants.
The Board should evolve ways of clarifying the Freud-Klein controversy and related issues. It was further suggested that, if these recommendations failed to result in a demonstrable improvement in the psychoanalytic educational atmosphere in Los Angeles by the time of the December 1976 meeting of the Board, the Los Angeles Institute be offered the opportunity to request provisional status; failing this, it would be recommended that formal disaccreditation proceedings be instituted.
The Board voted, without dissent, to accept the recommendations of the Ad Hoc Committee. Dr. Fleming's committee will continue to work with the Los Angeles Institute and Society and will report to the Board in December.
The members of the Committee are, in addition to Dr. Fleming, Drs. Maurice R. Friend, Frances H. Gitelson, James T. McLaughlin, Nathan P. Segel and Stanley S. Weiss.