Donald L. Rosenblitt has been chair of the Board of Professional Standards, and Robert Cummings has been BOPS secretary, since May 1997. This past summer, Cummings interviewed Rosenblitt about BOPS's past and future role within The American.
RC: You have been chair of BOPS for a bit over a year now. How have you envisioned your role?
DLR: My first goal has been to focus upon the Board's internal workings, especially to support the work of the committee chairs. After all, the core of the Board's work occurs in its committees. My second goal has been to stay in good communication with BOPS Fellows and Education Committee chairs. The challenge is to avoid being pulled away from these tasks. There is also so much responsibility to the organization as a whole.
RC: How has it gone so far?
DLR: There is more to do than time to do it. Fortunately, I have had good working relationships with our past president, Marvin Margolis, and our current president, Bob Pyles, which has freed time that might otherwise be wasted. Both have understood the complexities of the Board, Marv having been a BOPS chair and Bob having been a Fellow and member of Board committees for many years.
RC: The way you and Bob are currently working together around the threats of litigation from Division 39 is an illustration of such effective coordination, is it not?
DLR: Yes. Here is a most serious, sensitive, and volatile situation. Bob and I have worked together closely and collaboratively. Fortunately, we have a strong relationship to call upon, and we don't pull many punches with each other. That will go a long way, because there are tensions in the relationship between Board chair and president.
RC: Inevitably?
DLR: I believe so. Of course it does not come up around every issue, and it is by no means always a problem; it is actually often an opportunity. But it needs to be understood as a reality that results from our organizational structure.
RC: Can you explain it more?
DLR: Well, naturally both the chair and the president have the basic responsibility to serve the interests of the entire organization and profession. The president, however, pays particular attention to so-called membership issues, which include increasing our membership, strengthening the financial stability of the organization, building alliances with other psychoanalytic groups, and pursuing political and public relations agendas. The Board chair has the responsibility to serve our entire membership by supporting, on a national level, the development and functioning of our educational programs.
It is sometimes possible and sometimes not possible to coordinate membership and educational aims. We may minimize this incompatibility because it is quite difficult to acknowledge, even inwardly, that we are advocating a course that jeopardizes educational standards for the sake of other legitimate considerations. Of course, it is also possible to pursue educational aims single-mindedly and be overly neglectful of other professional needs. Membership pressures on BOPS also come from within BOPS's own constituency. Our institutes need to survive in order to solve the problems of candidate recruitment and training analyst development. One raison d'etre for BOPS is that it provides a forum for educators to recast local considerations in a more distanced, dispassionate, and collaborative view.
The main thing is to preserve the long-term interests of our Association without losing sight of the need to accommodate to current realities. When short- and long-term goals, membership needs, and educational principles are frankly incompatible, there may not be agreement about the proper course within BOPS — or, more commonly, between Board and Council. Therein lies both our Association's greatest strength and it greatest weakness. This tension results sometimes in creativity, sometimes in paralysis, and always in contention.
RC: Can you give an example of when such an incompatibility has occurred?
DLR: Here's a common one. Our budgets for all organizational activities come out of the same pot; thus, educational priorities have to be weighed against the membership priorities of the organization. How could it be otherwise in our current structure? This would not be an issue if we thought about ourselves as a membership organization that has some educational functions. Then educational interests would simply be one of several important interests competing for available funds. But our organization is a membership organization that has within it an educational board that certifies and accredits. Seen from this perspective, a board's capacity to function according to the reasonable conditions that it deems necessary somehow needs to be protected in order for that board to have integrity and legitimacy. I suppose that this is ultimately a governance issue, and it deserves some careful thought.
RC: Let's go back to the Division 39 situation. Can you review the situation? Where do you think we should go from here?
DLR: For a number of months, we have been under a threat of suit from Division 39 of the American Psychological Association. More precisely, Division 39 has referred the matter for a decision and potential action to an associated organization, the Group for the Advancement of Psychotherapy and Psychoanalysis in Psychology. GAPPP was involved in the suit against our Association in the 1980s. The Division 39 leaders believe that our Association restrains free trade. They allege that this restraint of trade arises from our interference with independent institutes and from the structure of our national organization because we combine membership, accreditation, and certification functions. The basis of their reasoning is not clear to me.
This eruption is shocking to us and apparently to our other Consortium colleagues. In my judgment, tensions have emerged with Division 39 as we have progressed beyond rhetoric and the Division confronts the questions of whether its membership could support any frequency parameters for analysis or a training analyst system based on selection. But the current problems have many other sources, some having to do with the history between our organizations, some with Division 39's perceptions of activities in our new training facilities, and some apparently having to do with the Division's internal issues.
Up to this point, I have advocated making every effort to collaborate with the other Consortium organizations, despite the difficulties that have been there throughout. For the first time, I have serious reservations about maintaining a working relationship with Division 39. While they may not have intended us to feel this way, and may not understand how we experience the Division 39 leaders' actions and statements, we feel as if they have dealt with us with hostility and, at times, even in bad faith. Even if, as we hope, the Division does not proceed with litigation or other disruptive action, we will be challenged to develop a way to move forward constructively.
In my view, if we are not faced with litigation or some other unacceptable action from Division 39, we should continue to persevere and meet with the Division and other groups within the Psychoanalytic Consortium. However, the delicate and complicated negotiations concerning an external credentialing body are another matter. Is it possible to achieve the open and trusting dialogue and mutual commitments that are necessary to develop an external credentialing alliance in such a tenuous climate? I feel strongly that we must find a way to discuss and resolve some of the background issues directly in order to decrease the risk that continued participation in such negotiations might jeopardize, rather than advance, the interests of psychoanalysis. At least that's how I feel now. I know there will be other perspectives, and I will be interested in hearing them.
RC: There is beginning to be some talk about the possibility of established independent institutes outside The American affiliating with BOPS and the Association. How would BOPS approach such affiliation?
DLR: Our Association and the IPS are beginning to work together around some joint membership concerns. As Marvin Margolis is fond of saying, a little baby step. Any serious exploration of mutual affiliation would occur many years in the future, if at all. I hope we get there, because there are some fine training programs in the IPS and elsewhere. It would be fun to see what happened if we took a look at each other.
However, the exploratory process with any independent institute would be quite complicated. It is likely that the membership issues would be less problematic, because it would be exciting to increase our scientific, financial, and human resources. However, the educational issues involve some challenging questions. Would an independent institute have an educational philosophy compatible with the range of philosophies and standards within our institutes? More fundamentally, would the analysts in such an institute conceptualize the clinical enterprise in ways compatible with what we teach in our institutes? If not, what would be required to achieve sufficient compatibility?
This matter of compatibility of clinical perspective raises the unresolved issue of pluralism. But our pluralism does have boundaries, and we would have to determine whether an independent institute's approaches to psychoanalysis fell within our boundaries. If, in our judgment, its approaches were outside our usual boundaries, we would have to ask the educational question of whether we were comfortable with accrediting an institute with such an orientation. We have to remember that this is quite a different matter than endorsing, respecting, and exploring different approaches at the level of scientific discourse and clinical exchange.
RC: Is this another situation in which there could be a clash of membership and educational aims?
DLR: Absolutely. We would have to work very hard to benefit from the tension and to avoid getting immersed in rhetoric and disparagement. We would need to help BOPS and Council truly hear the information and perspectives from the other body. Permeability and communication are the key concepts here.
We would also need to help BOPS and Council understand and esteem the distinct responsibilities and orientations of Board and Council. Insulation and separateness are the key concepts here. There is a dialectic between permeability and insulation that has always characterized our organization. The leaders would have to help our two bodies live productively within this tension. This is not easy, and it is one reason why things do not always go well. The process to accommodate the mutual assessment by our Association and the independent institute would need to be honest, open, and open-ended — and without politicization, which in our organization often manifests as the subtle subversion of one or both bodies' capacity to truly carry out their functions. The process would also need to be transparent to the independent institute, with frankness about the prospects and difficulties. If we conducted our relations with any independent institute without covert or overt promises or seductions, we would have the greatest likelihood of continued collegial relationships were the affiliation not to work out.
RC: Some have advocated separating BOPS from the rest of the organization as a way of solving the hinds of internal conflicts you are describing. Do you think this would be a good way to go?
DLR: At points I have leaned that way because of the kind of problems we have been discussing, but I am not sure that it is the best way to go. Because of our interrelationship, we cannot ever lose sight of our educational needs; the organization stays anchored in what it believes, as transmitted by what it teaches. Goodness knows there are all sorts of pressures out there to compromise the integrity of our educational processes. We sometimes resent the Board for standing for these principles, but most of us would be deeply disappointed if the Board were not there to absorb our frustrations and to remain intelligently and flexibly true to what we all believe in. BOPS offers some protection against tendencies to be seduced into responding precipitously or shortsightedly. Also, having an integrated organization is valuable for BOPS. BOPS's evolution into a responsive and flexible body with more questions than answers has been profoundly influenced by the Association's membership dimension.
RC: You have established a new commission called Project 2000 [see page 12], which is identifying and studying some of those key questions in psychoanalytic education. How is that coming along?
DLR: Quite well. As you know, Project 2000 is a commission of senior psychoanalytic educators who are working with candidates, institute faculties, graduate analysts, and BOPS committees to take a fresh and hopefully radical look at psychoanalytic education. I am particularly pleased that Project 2000 is becoming a major vehicle to involve candidates in BOPS. Candidates were the Board's neglected constituency, prior to Larry Chalfin's term. We should now move to an even higher level of candidate participation.
One of Project 2000's important tasks is to explore how our educational programs can best prepare candidates for their careers. As an example, perhaps we will need to think of our institutes as educational programs that prepare our candidates to practice psychoanalytic psychotherapy as well as psychoanalysis. Perhaps the integrated study of these two modalities will
support the achievement of competency in both. But here I am getting ahead of things. I am looking forward to the Project, under Larry Chalfin's chairmanship, making a major contribution to the way that we think about educating our future analysts.
RC: In addition to Project 2000, are there other accomplishments in your first year that you are especially pleased about?
DLR: I immediately think of the changes in the Committee on New Training Facilities (CNTF), under Ellen Rowntree's superb leadership. We have launched a new model for supporting institute development, adding an option to the traditional model. The traditional model has relied upon an established institute to sponsor the new training facility. All administrative and teaching activities initially took place at the sponsoring institute and were gradually shifted over to the new training facility. During the tenure of the previous chair, David Carlson, we began to experiment with having the new training facilities assume responsibilities earlier. On the basis of the success of this groundbreaking effort, Ellen has developed a new model in which a sponsoring team from BOPS will replace the sponsoring institute. We have also benefited from IPA experience with a version of a sponsoring team approach. All administrative and teaching activities will begin at the new training facility under the sponsoring team's guidance. We hope that the sponsoring team model will enable appropriately selected institutes to develop more quickly and successfully. The new training facility will benefit from the stimulation of a sponsoring team of three senior educators from three different Institutes. In both the traditional model and the new model, the CNTF will continue its traditional roles of advising, monitoring, and ultimately recommending accreditation.
RC: I know that you have also been pleased with the development of CORST, the Committee on Research and Special Training.
DLR: Delighted! As with Ellen, things usually work best when you choose a talented and dedicated chair with whom you share a common vision and then stay out of their way. Peter Loewenberg is guiding CORST in exciting directions, reshaping and expanding the mission to support psychoanalysis within the academy.
RC: You have mentioned chairs and committee members. Have you had any guiding orientation about appointments?
DLR: Naturally, qualifications above all. But I have also striven for geographical balance, particularly to attain representation from institutes that have been relatively uninvolved in Board committee work. I have also tried to increase the representation of women and non-M.D.s. Each group now represents around 30 percent of the total composition of BOPS committees. There is now more representation for these groups on Board committees than in our membership rolls! We have also significantly increased the candidate representation on Board committees. Given the slow rate of turnover on Board committees, with most members serving six years, I am pleased about having attained these levels with your able help, Bob. And we all owe a great debt of gratitude to past officers, particularly Marvin Margolis and Judy Schachter, and to Ralph Roughton, for courageously bringing to our attention issues about diversity, inclusion, and respect for differences.
RC: But it all hasn't been a bed of roses. COPAP [the Committee on Preparedness and Progress] has been a difficult and contentious issue throughout the past year.
DLR: I'll say. But, as things have settled down — and I am getting some more perspective myself — we have been through a necessary process, maybe even including the stumbling and bumbling in which I played my part.
In May of 1997, BOPS accepted the COPAP report, which had been long discussed within BOPS and the institutes. This report modified Board standards for eligibility and suitability. We expanded the class of degrees that conferred eligibility for psychoanalytic training to include all doctoral-level clinical mental health degrees. In addition, eligibility was extended to include individuals with clinical masters-level degrees in mental health disciplines in which the master's is generally the highest clinical degree — if this degree was supplemented with at least two years of post-master's didactic and clinical training. For the first time, the Board has developed a careful delineation of expected prerequisite clinical training and didactic education, regardless of specific qualifying degree.
RC: The fact that new standards for eligibility and suitability address more than issues of eligible degrees is part of why there have been so many difficulties this year.
DLR: There is one other relevant background issue. When BOPS accepted the COPAP report, Larry Chalfin, the Board chair, followed our parliamentarian's ruling that our institutes should now locally administer the eligibility and suitability guidelines and standards. National waivers remained necessary only for those occasional candidates who did not meet these new eligibility standards. It was understood that the Executive Council would decide the appropriate point for our certified membership to vote about whether eligibility for this new class should become codified in the by-laws.
Problems emerged for the same reasons that we have struggled with this issue for decades: We have disagreements among ourselves about eligibility for psychoanalytic training, and many of us are simply ambivalent about it. So, some felt that BOPS had exceeded its authority in permitting institutes to administer the new standards locally before a by-law change. Our attorney has reviewed the matter and advised us that BOPS acted in an appropriate manner. Others objected that the COPAP changes did not go far enough to expand eligibility because they believed that the prerequisite criteria were excessive. So you see, in one guise or another, familiar lines were drawn: too far, too fast, vs. not far enough, quickly enough.
The problems within BOPS have been only half of the story. The Executive Committee, after sending out a mail ballot to the Executive Councilors for approval of the next step of sending the by-law to the certified membership, subsequently asked the Council to rescind its positive vote, which it did. The Executive. Committee was responding to the objections from many Councilors that Council had not adequately discussed how the new eligibility standards and procedures would change the make-up of the membership. Another problem was that only a minority of Councilors participated in the mail ballot. Yet another issue was that the Executive Committee decided that the by-law was not the best one that could be written.
RC: I know that you have been putting much thought and energy into the certification process. Can you share some of your thinking?
DLR: I know certification from many directions. I've been an applicant in adult and then in child analysis, a participant observer and then a member of the Certification Committee for five years, and for the last four years a Board leader. It is, in my view, our most complex organizational function, bar none. It is also a fulcrum for many of the organizational and professional tensions and pressures that we have been discussing.
For example, if we consider certification solely from a membership perspective, it is problematic for some. We all know of members who are less inclined to participate in the organization because of their perspectives or experiences with certification. Only certified members of our organization can be Executive Councilors, or officers, not to mention training analysts or Fellows. Some might feel, from an egalitarian membership perspective, that this is undesirable.
I understand the merit of this viewpoint. In fact, years ago I voted against the de-linkage compromise because I felt we were replacing one two-tiered structure with another two-tiered structure and we were missing a historical opportunity to achieve a truly egalitarian organization. I have come to feel that the situation is more complicated. Since our organization as a whole is entrusted with developing the principles and standards for our educational programs, doesn't it seem necessary that those who make educational decisions have experience as psychoanalytic educators? The requirement of prior certification for officers, Executive Councilors, and those who have voting privileges for by-laws makes sense, to the extent that most certified members will have teaching or administrative experience in institutes. The certification requirement is therefore, in my judgment, an inexact solution to the problem of specifying appropriate qualifications for making major educational decisions. I believe we could derive a more creative system that would better accommodate membership and educational missions, if we put our mind to it.
But there will remain, inevitably and relentlessly, membership-based pressures on the certification process. In my view, BOPS has the absolute obligation to be attentive to these issues. However, BOPS must be careful that its responsiveness does not undermine its responsibility to maintain the fundamental integrity of the certification process, which is a conferring of recognition from a national group of distinguished peers that a psychoanalyst has been able to demonstrate clinical competency at a post-graduate level. This level of post-graduate clinical competency is quite different from a graduation standard, which is a more complex and individualized determination that often involves a projection of a trajectory. The level of post-graduate clinical competency and consolidated psychoanalytic identity that is sought in certification may be achieved by some at graduation, but it may be more frequently attained in the post-graduation development. In the ideal situation, certification both recognizes and contributes to this post-graduate development and consolidation.
One further issue. The Board has evolved into a body whose main function is to facilitate and educate. BOPS is merely ourselves, in a new configuration, guiding and advising ourselves. However, we shouldn't be disingenuous about the fact that the Board also has a basis as a standard-setting body with accreditation and certification functions. Therefore, it would be important to be comfortable with the reality that exploring an affiliation between our Association and an independent institute would involve mutual assessment.
RC: You emphasize “comfortable” — why is that?
DLR: We analysts have a great deal of difficulty differentiating our roles as analysts, educators, and administrators. I think many of us are quite uncomfortable as administrators. For one thing, administration is based in procedures, not in empathy, which is what our character, training, and professional lives are organized around. We worry about hurting other groups, as we should, but we shouldn't let such concerns influence administrative process. Maybe this has something to do with why our organizational processes get so convoluted.
Fortunately, because of the maturity of our Committee on Institutes, we are in a very strong position to work with independent institutes and to offer constructive ideas for solving problems. Under a string of exceptionally creative leaders, beginning with Jerry Jacobson, continuing with Larry Chalfin, and now with Ron Benson, our COI has become a model of how to conduct an evaluative process within a matrix of peer consultation, collaboration, education, and facilitation. The COI could be enormously enriched by opportunities to learn about educational approaches and innovations different from our own. Such opportunities would nicely support the COI's focus on bringing grassroots innovation to national attention, often leading to a new national consensus.
I have one other thought about appointments. This might sound a bit corny, but it is the ethical dedication of those who have served as Board officers, committee chairs, and committee members that successfully protects and sustains BOPS from the pressures we were discussing earlier. We really do have a remarkable group of individuals leading and serving on our committees.
RC: So where are we now?
DLR: Somehow in a relatively good place, which, given the circumstances, is not so bad for a year's time. Through all the hubbub, we have clarified institutes' current role and responsibilities. BOPS has re-affirmed the COPAP report. Phyllis Tyson, the architect of the COPAP revisions, has graciously agreed to serve yet one more year of an unprecedented third term. Phyllis' wise and seasoned presence adds critical stability during this time of flux. Calvern Narcisi is co-chair of COPAP and will succeed Phyllis. In December, the Executive Council, with advisory input from BOPS, will consider an improved by-law amendment, which we expect will be sent for a vote to the certified membership in early 1999.
RC: And when it does, how are you going to vote?
DLR: I will vote for it, with ambivalence.
RC: What are you ambivalent about?
DLR: I am not ambivalent about the new Board eligibility standards themselves; I deeply believe that the capacity to achieve excellence as a psychoanalyst is linked to personal qualities and a mastery of prerequisite experiences of appropriate quality and depth, rather than to specific degree preparation. These new standards of BOPS address these issues in a sophisticated way, although we will continue to learn and modify details. However, I am worried because the new prerequisite guidelines will make it more difficult for some Ph.D.s and
M.D.s to achieve eligibility, given the limited preparation that some will have received, and will also require significant post-degree experience for individuals with masters. Will some of our institutes capitulate to the pressure to obtain candidates and not adhere to the guidelines? This would be the worst of all worlds. So my vote for the change will be because it is right, it is just, and it is rational. My vote will also demonstrate, for me, a triumph of hope and faith in my fellow psychoanalytic educators over some experiences.
RC: In some Psychoanalytic Consortium discussions and (in some measure) in the considerations of the various versions of the COPAP innovations, there has been renewed discussion of the status of psychoanalysis as an independent discipline. What are your thoughts about this issue?
DLR: Psychoanalysis is not a branch of medicine, a subset of psychology, or a sub-specialization of social work. Of course, competence in psychoanalysis requires a deep and substantial mental health background. That is what BOPS's new eligibility standards are all about. CORST provides the oversight that guarantees that those psychoanalysts who do not come to analysis from a traditional mental health background have the appropriate prerequisite experiences that allow them to conduct analysis in a fully competent and responsible way. As essential as the mental health background is, in my view psychoanalysis is a fully independent discipline with its own unique integration and orientation that is grounded in and intersects with a variety of other intellectual traditions and knowledge bases. For American psychoanalysis to endure and strengthen itself, and to be authentic to how we have traditionally understood psychoanalytic identity, we need members of our Association to identify themselves internally and publicly as professionals who are psychoanalysts, not as some other professionals who may from time to time employ psychoanalytic ideas or therapeutic techniques.
RC: Are there modifications that you would like to see in Certification?
DLR: There certainly are. Under the leadership of Art Rosenbaum, a remarkable chairman and educator, certification became fairer, more understandable, and more accessible. Mo Hurwitz, who succeeded Art Rosenbaum, and now Mike Singer have also been extremely thoughtful and wise leaders of the Certification Committee. In my view — and I know that Mike fully concurs — a range of modifications can be made to the certification process as we continue to strive for the highest level of fairness and decency we can achieve. If we were having this talk in two months, I could speak with you about some details. I would love to do so. But currently Mike, his committee, and you and I are busy clarifying the proposals that we will be discussing with BOPS in December. I fully expect that certification will continue to evolve in exciting and innovative directions.
RC: The task of the chair of BOPS takes an enormous amount of time, and inevitably draws a lot of heat. Is being chair something that you have long wanted to do?
DLR: Not really. I come from an institute [UNC-Duke] that has a laissez-faire tradition. We had respect for BOPS, but we also sometimes saw it as an interference. I continue to feel that both attitudes are well deserved, although I think that with each year BOPS becomes more facilitative and less interfering. I was completely surprised when Larry Chalfin approached me about being secretary of BOPS; the thought had never crossed my mind. I did expect that I might be asked to run for chair. I had thought it through in advance, and I declined the offer when it came.
The main reason was that I was very involved locally. I direct the Lucy Daniels Center for Early Childhood. I started this project almost ten years ago, and it is now a thriving psychoanalytic center with many activities including therapeutic nurseries and normal nurseries with more than seventy children. There is so much to be done there, and I love the work. I did not see how I could do justice to the Lucy Daniels Center, my psychoanalytic practice, and my institute commitments and also take on the chairmanship. What happened is that I told a few friends that I had declined. They urged me to reconsider, and my family was supportive of my decision either way. I wound up changing my mind, and as it turned out there was still an opportunity to run.
RC: So now that you are in office, are you enjoying it?
DLR: No. But I hadn't really expected that I would. I did know what I was in for, being the current secretary of BOPS. One had better know what one is getting into, by the way; the decisions come at you fast and furiously, they often involve very complex issues, and they require from the start a broad philosophical and practical understanding of the Board. Fortunately, I had a lengthy mentorship under someone who had such a sophisticated understanding of BOPS. Without that preparation, I would have been lost in this job. Larry is a dear friend and an ideal of a psychoanalytic educator.
RC: What are some of the difficult parts of the office for you?
DLR: I don't enjoy the politics, especially when one has to be tactical. I have, however, developed some skills in that arena. Another matter is that it is difficult for me to disappoint people, but I am getting a bit better at it, especially because this office affords me more than ample opportunities to disappoint.
I have made some real friends that I treasure, such as yourself. The central office is wonderful, and we have a gem in Ellen Fertig, our administrative director. But the real satisfaction is that I am having the opportunity to guide BOPS in its effort to contribute to psychoanalytic education, which humbles me and of which I am grateful and proud. Is it not possible to enjoy something in the abstract but in few of the details? For me, that describes it.
RC: What lies ahead for BOPS?
DLR: I think that BOPS will continue to become more intelligent, more facilitative of our institutes' missions, and more sophisticated in applying standards to individual situations. We need it within our organization too much to externalize it. We recognize, however ambivalently and reluctantly, that it plays an indispensable role in the maintenance and evolution of optimal educational practices and standards. We will continue to be very ambivalent about its yoke, magnify its flaws, and pay lip service to its value. BOPS will keep and maintain our core understandings of what is good and important in psychoanalytic education, because we need it to do that for us and for the psychoanalysts of the future.