Dear Robert,
     If I have understood you correctly, your message suggests that we share
some common concerns.  I have been studying your book "Mental Space" and
considered commenting on it.  But I post so many messages that it will be some
time before I can do this.  It seems to me that a major task for psychoanalysis
is to construct a "scientific conscience," a project which should capture your
interest. I read your paper'The Psychodynamics of Psychoanalytic
Organizations,'and sent you some comments.  Since you didn't answer, perhaps you
never received them.  From my perspective, your picture of psychoanalytic
organizations supports my thesis on "the fear of retaliation" as a factor in the
inhibition of free speech in psychoanalysis.  From a casual glance at available
e-mail discussion forums,it must be obvious to you that relatively few analysts
are willing to engage in open debate, perhaps because there is nobody
immediately available to tell them what it is safe to say.  I don't criticize
those "lurkers" who don't contribute because they believe they have nothing to
say.  For many years I never tried to publish anything because I was convinced I
had nothing to say.  Perhaps my "message" is worthless and I should return to my
former silence, but I need the help of listmembers (publicly or privately) to
point out my errors. Even then I may fail to see them, but I promise to try.
Cordially,  Eric   [log in to unmask]
 
Robert Young wrote:
"I was amused to see Chris Mawson's informative posting about the British
Confederation of Psychotherapists...Beneath this apparently benign posting of
information about web sites is a long and complex and much-controverted story,
one which I have tried to tell in a paper on 'The Psychodynamics of
Psychoanalytic
Organizations' which I gave at the annual conference of the International
Society for the Psychoanalytic Study of Organizations in New York last
June. I believe it is a story about elitism, anti-democratic attitudes and
behaviour and doing things by stealth.
        I am sure that my account is not accepted by the main movers of the
BCP. I and others have sought to get them to produce a reply, to take part
in public and even private debates, to allow psychotherapeutic, analytic
and psychoanalytic organizations to belong to both umbrella bodies - all to
no avail. My conclusion is that they insist on having power over the
organizations which ae allowed to be in the BCP and are determined to
maintain a caste system in the psychoanalytic community, broadly conceived.
I would love to be proved wrong, but they will not engage publicly, whle
they move and shake and wear people down privately.
        See for yourselves. Have a look at my account and the other essays
related to this issue which I have put together into a short book at my web
site: _The Culture of British Psychoanalysis and Relared Essays_ (1996).
http://www.shef.ac.uk/uni/academic/N-Q/psysc/staff/rmyoung/papers/index.html
I have also created a web site for comments and debate, especuially since
it is of the nature of such events that one can, however hard one tries,
get things wrong, and I would be glad to make any corrections that were
relevant.
        In my opinion, people who are unwilling to have their behaviour
critically evaluated and are unwilling to take part in public discussion
often have something to hide. It is certainly my experience that one of the
two main movers of the BCP has gone to great lengths to keep his
fundamental role obscure.
        I suppose that I should add that my motive for writing about these
things was the way people in my own training organization were being
treated by the founders of the BCP. For example, we were removed from the
UKCP without consulting the members. We voted three times to re-join, but
the Professional Committee of the organization refused to re-join or to
allow the mattter to be discussed at the annual general meeting when they
refused to accede to the third vote. Some time later there was a fourth
vote, and teaching officers (who decide who will qualify) rang up the
students about it before the relevant meeting. The majority was reversed.
        This is one of many features of this story which are worrying if
we mean that our work should serve human freedom and creativity and that
our professional relatinships should maintain the highest standards of
integrity and enablement."