title: Technique and final cause in psychoanalysis: four ways of looking at one moment.
abstract: This paper argues that if one considers just a single clinical moment there may be no principled way to choose among different approaches to psychoanalytic technique. One must in addition take into account what Aristotle called the final cause of psychoanalysis, which this paper argues is freedom. However, freedom is itself an open-ended concept with many aspects that need to be explored and developed from a psychoanalytic perspective. This paper considers one analytic moment from the perspectives of the techniques of Paul Gray, Hans Loewald, the contemporary Kleinians and Jacques Lacan. It argues that, if we are to evaluate these techniques, we must take into account the different conceptions of freedom they are trying to facilitate.
authors.affiliation: University of Chicago - Committee on Social Thought, 1130 East 59th Street, Chicago, IL 60637, USA. jlear@uchicago.edu
authors.forename: Jonathan
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Lear
mesh_terms: D003674:Defense Mechanisms; D004532:Ego; D005201:Fantasy; D006117:Grief; D006801:Humans; D010684:Philosophy; D011573:Psychoanalytic Interpretation; D011574:Psychoanalytic Theory; D011575:Psychoanalytic Therapy / Q000379:methods*; D014473:Unconscious, Psychology