The Los Angeles Psychoanalytic Society and Institute, conscious of, and concerned about, a widespread sense of alienation and disaffiliation among its membership regarding the politics of the American Psychoanalytic Association, about three years ago began to consider possible reasons and remedies for this state of affairs.
The greatest resentment toward The American appeared to derive from the fact that analysts graduating from affiliated societies of The American are denied voting membership in their own national professional organization until they achieve certification by that body. LAPSI surveyed the entire membership of The American (excluding Affiliate members) to assess individual response to the question of whether full voting membership in The American should be accorded all graduates of affiliated institutes or whether voting membership should continue to be restricted to those who had been certified. Fifty per cent of those polled responded. Two-thirds of the certified members who responded were in favor of an amendment granting full voting membership rights to noncertified graduates of affiliated psychoanalytic institutes. A much higher percentage of the noncertified members, approximately 90%, were in favor of such delinking.
“The certification requirement for participation creates a kind of snobbery and a disdain toward those who have not yet been certified….”
I myself am in favor of delinking full voting membership in The American from certification by that body for several reasons. First, basic requirements for graduation from an affiliated institute are identical to those for certification by The American with the possible exception that some institutes do not require that a case be taken to termination. Therefore, there should be no disputing the graduate's eligibility on the grounds of inadequate education. Second, insofar as assessing his or her performance vis-à-vis that education, the progression committee and the supervisors of the local institute are in the best position to know the candidate's progress in courses, in supervised work, and in practice in the community. If the local institute declares a person ready to graduate, then that graduate should be deemed equipped to participate fully and completely in the affairs of The American, rather than delaying participation for anywhere from two to ten years pending more searching assessment by the national body. Such delays in participation, at least for the members of my institute, have engendered a bitterness toward The American that is not fully reversed even when certification is finally achieved and the possibility for participation can be realized.
The certification requirement for participation creates a kind of snobbery and a disdain toward those who have not yet been certified; it undermines respect for our own training procedures and for the candidates who matriculated in good faith under those same training procedures.
With the enactment of this proposal, the Board on Professional Standards is in no danger of losing its hegemony over training. At the same time, uncoupling membership from certification will produce a greater responsiveness to membership as a whole when the entire membership has voting rights.
We owe it to the young people in our organization to welcome them, not just to accept their dues but to value their judgment as well. We should not require them to pass through a difficult postgraduate examination before we consider them worthy of full membership in the community of American analysts.