The National Membership Committee on Psychoanalysis in Clinical Social Work (NMCOP) was founded in 1980 by Crayton Rowe, a clinical social worker who had received his psychoanalytic training from the New York Freudian Society. It was formed originally as a membership committee within the Clinical Social Work Federation but has since become an independent organization with its own incorporation and board of directors. The two organizations maintain a close affiliation, and all individuals who are members of the NMCOP are required also to be members of a state society for clinical social work, part of the Federation.
The NMCOP is currently a national membership group of approximately 500 clinical social workers who practice psychoanalysis and/or psychoanalytic psychotherapy. Its core goals are
To provide an organizational base for clinical social workers engaged in psychoanalytically informed practice.
To add a social work perspective to psychoanalytic thinking.
To promote the understanding and use of psychoanalytic concepts within the social work profession.
The NMCOP's educational goals are partly carried out through a regular program of national conferences. Our seventh conference, “Inclusions and Innovations: Visions for Psychoanalysis in the New Millenium,” was held in New York City in January 2000. We have sponsored the publication of two books, designed to be used as texts in schools of social work and psychoanalytic psychotherapy programs. Both discuss the usefulness of psychoanalytic concepts in work with the types of patients often seen by social work practitioners. The first of these, Fostering Healing and Growth: A Psychoanalytic Social Work Approach, was edited by Joyce Edward and Jean Sanville and published in 1996. The second volume in this series, The Social Work Psychoanalyst's Casebook, edited by Joyce Edward and Elaine Rose, was published in 1999 by Analytic Press and is a festschrift honoring Jean Sanville.
One of the main goals of the NMCOP has been to protect the right to practice of clinical social work psychoanalysts and to insure parity for them in training programs. The catalyst for Rowe's founding the committee was his study revealing that clinical social workers made up an increasingly larger segment of the student body in psychoanalytic training programs but were vastly under-represented in the ranks of supervisors, faculty members, and training analysts. A number of psychoanalytic training programs did not (and a few still don't) accept clinical social workers for training on an equal basis with those from other professions.
These programs may, for example, require that clinical social workers have doctoral degrees to be eligible for application in spite of the facts that (1) the master's degree is considered the terminal degree in the field; (2) social workers with master's degrees often have significantly more clinical experience than graduates of doctoral programs in other professions; (3) social workers with masters degrees are eligible for licensing or state certification in every state; and (4) most doctoral programs in social work emphasize research or administration and have little to do with preparation for clinical training or practice.
The NMCOP is also greatly concerned with potential legal challenges to the right of trained clinical social workers to practice psychoanalysis. Around the time the committee was founded, for example, the psychology licensing board in New Jersey was attempting to have “psychoanalysis” designated as a subspecialty of psychology. This would have disqualified members of other professions from practicing psychoanalysis in that state. In the context of such issues, the NMCOP considers its participation in the Psychoanalytic Consortium one of its most important activities. Through the Consortium we have the opportunity to protect the future of psychoanalytic training and practice with colleagues from psychiatry and psychology.
The relationship between the NMCOP and the American actually precedes the founding of the Psychoanalytic Consortium, beginning around 1991 when George Allison was president of the American. The NMCOP initiated negotiations in the hopes that the American would revise the “waiver” requirement that forced experienced clinical social workers with master's degrees to undergo an extensive and distasteful procedure in applying to those institutes that would consider them. Our position was, and is, that clinical social workers with substantive post-master's experience (many of whom are diplomates of the American Board of Examiners in Clinical Social Work) are qualified to apply for training in all institutes on an equal basis with psychiatrists and psychologists.
We have found it gratifying that many of the institutes of the American are not only becoming more flexible in considering applicants from clinical social work, but are also actively encouraging clinical social workers to apply. Many clinical social workers enjoy membership in both the NMCOP and the American. Recently, the American passed a by-law amendment that removed the waiver requirement for clinical social workers wanting psychoanalytic training.
In our many years of organizational involvement with the American, both within the Psychoanalytic Consortium and outside it, we have consistently found the APsaA leaders to be flexible, thoughtful, and seriously dedicated to the future of psychoanalytic training and practice in this country. A number of our members have been invited to join various committees of the American, and we hope that this organizational cross-fertilization will develop even further in the future.
It is clear that there will be a steady increase in the number of psychoanalytic candidates and practitioners with a background in clinical social work. The NMCOP is the only organization that represents their interests, and our leadership is committed to advocacy on their behalf. One of our key goals will always be equal opportunity for clinical social workers at every level of psychoanalysis and within every psychoanalytic organization. We have no doubt that the field of psychoanalysis will continue to be enriched by the contributions of clinical social work and by the scholarship, talents, dedication, and creativity of the members of our profession.
David Phillips, D.S.W., B.C.D., immediate past president of NMCOP, serves on the faculties of the Postgraduate Center for Mental Health and the Institute for Psychoanalysis and Psychotherapy of New Jersey. He is also an adjunct associate professor at the Wurzweiler School of Social Work, Yeshiva University.
William S. Meyer, M.S.W., B.C.D., president of NMCOP, is the director of training for the Department of Social Work at the Duke University Medical Center, where he is an assistant clinical professor in the Departments of Psychiatry and Obstetrics/Gynecology. He is also on the faculty of the Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy Study Center of North Carolina.