Discomfort in the community. The place of psyche: Between zōē and bios

Abstract

In this paper, the author considers the treatment of people diagnosed with a psychosis or borderline personality disorder in therapeutic communities from a psychoanalytic perspective, with a particular focus on the work of Jacques Lacan and of André Green. He discusses two key questions. First, how are these patients to recover life? – not just in the biological sense but in terms of subjectivity. Secondly, is it ever really possible to build relationships with them? In relation to this second question, the author emphasizes the importance of the training and supervision of practitioners, as well as their own analysis. Therapeutic communities, above all, he argues, can provide structure and security in a society which is increasingly fragmented and unstable.

Keywords:

• therapeutic community
• psychoanalysis
• Oedipus
• lack
• psychotic discourse
• death

Notes

1. These remarks originally appeared in Aulagnier (1964). Remarques sur la structure psychotique Un interprète en quête de sens. Paris: Ramsay.