3. The Organizing Forces of Contemporary Psychoanalysis:
Reflections On Nonlinear Dynamic Systems Theory
Presenter: |
William J. Coburn, PhD |
Chair: |
Dorienne Sorter, PhD |
Self Psychology Page | 21th Conference
Program
Summary
The paradigm shift in psychoanalysis and related fields in the last 50 or so years has helped reorganize the notions of truth and reality. It has oriented our focus toward subjective experience, meaning, and a greater openness to more dynamic, pluralistic, perspectival thinking (Mitchell 1993). Further, these new perspectives, intersecting with the personal subjectivities of practicing contemporary psychoanalysts, have engendered a new spirit and burgeoning passion for psychoanalysis that ultimately will determine and preserve the future of our field.
This paper explores and illuminates a few of the salient forces that are currently shaping, in a nonlinear fashion, the future of contemporary psychoanalysis. It highlights three salient forces: (a) The increased realization and acceptance that the subject matter of psychoanalytic investigation is necessarily subjective, though nonetheless scientific (Mayer, 1996); much of this notion originates from developments in self psychology and quantum physics (Kohut, 1977, 1984; Sucharov, 1994); (b) the gradual transformation of the notion that learning occurs through an empirical, objectivist tradition and through filling epistemological gaps with constructions not necessarily consistent with our experience, into the alternative perspective that personal and professional development is generated from a pluralistic and hermeneutical spirit and from less "objective" epistemologies that favor subjective experience; and (c) psychoanalysis’ increased toleration for learning without always knowing and for multiple-person models in which each individual is always a participant in the therapeutic field; here, any sense of conviction about what is true and real about the patient or the analytic dyad is dynamic and evolves through continuing, collaborative inquiries.
This paper focuses on these forces from the perspectives of nonlinear dynamic systems theory--a mode of conceptualization, increasingly popular in self psychology, that informs the ways in which the organizing forces and trends in our field today configure our field's character and direction. Within these theoretical guidelines, it also explores some practical ideas about the preservation of the future of self psychology and "contemporary psychoanalysis." This includes the necessity of continuing to inspire and impassion new members of the psychoanalytic community.