Abstract
The skin as the first image of ourselves, the first contact with the outside world and with our mother, is a privileged organ in relational life.
It reveals what is going on inside us, as it is a visible organ that blushes, pales, sweats, freezes, etc. It represents the organ of touch, harbinger of sensations of vital importance. The skin, mirror of our soul and our feelings, is a kind of maternal Read more
Abstract
This text is dedicated to research on the setting and therapy provided by a research team that worked on the relationship between the extended family mind and the individual, where the former becomes an ectopic storage space for the individual’s content. The team acts as a container for issues that the individuals of the family group Read more
Abstract
In conjunction with personal analysis and theory/technique seminars, clinical supervision represents one of the three pillars of psychoanalytic training. Since several years, however, ‘supervision’ is also a term which describes consulting for staff groups in health and social institutions, a practice standing at the crossroad between training and consultancy, offered to teams more and more heterogeneous and involved in an often confused network of related services. The Authors developed their hypotheses by reflecting about their work as consultants/supervisors providing staff support systems within various institutions. The first part of the paper focuses on similarities and differences between individual and institutional supervision, with particular attention to clinical supervision, experiential team building, organizational development, and the issues involved in the relationship, overlapping and conflict among training, support and administrative functions. The second part examines the notion of institutional container, word which has become a magical passepartout in healthcare organizations. The AA explore the functions implied by such notion in the light of: Winnicott’s concept of ‘holding’; Pichon-Rivière and Bleger’s concepts of ‘deposit’ and ‘context’; Bion’s theory of container/contained; Abadi’s paper on paradigmatic shift from the boundary to the network. The last part discusses how the so called ‘managed care’ has indeed created new institutional scenarios. The AA look at the analysis of Read more
Abstract
The purpose of this article is to explore the psychodynamics of regression in organizations. First, the paper presents a brief critique of the rationalist and mechanistic approaches to organizations and their selective inattention to subliminal and unconscious aspects of organizational life, particularly regressive actions. Then, the association between psychological regression and organizational identity is explored with an emphasis on group psychology. Next, the symbiotic lure is introduced as a metaphor for understanding collective regression. Members react to their anxieties about change at work by denying their individual differences and psychologically merging with each another. This common form of regressive withdrawal among organizational participants under stress, threatens participation, consensual decision making, learning and effectiveness. Using Bion’s notion of “container” and Winnicott’s concept of a “holding environment, ” the author presents a brief example and discussion that clarifies the processes of change necessary for repairing the damaged organization and renewing its potential for democratic practices and effective service delivery. Much of organizational studies has assumed that decisions and actions are guided by rational (logical and sensible) norms and intentional processes. The assumption of human nature in much of mainstream organization theory was that of a one-dimensional worker void of inner life. Consequently, many scholars persuaded their students that logic and Read more
Abstract
This paper analyzes the problematic interlacement in Psychiatric Therapeutic Communities between the process of subjectivation, which is singular, and the intersubjective dimension of psychic sufferings, which is plural. Two tools are indicated to support the clinical function of Psychiatric Communities: Psychoanalytic Read more