First Principles

Abstract The book’s main objective is to make the case for the centrality of applied ethics to psychoanalytic practice. It focuses on the articulation of an accessible framework for developing and exercising an identifiable method—an ethical self-discipline—to support therapists’ critical reflection on their psychoanalytic work with patients and to help them to approach more systematically the resolution of ethical dilemmas. The book integrates key concepts from the field of applied ethics, and bioethics specifically, and reinterprets them for use within a psychoanalytic framework. It provides applied examples and a dedicated chapter to how to teach ethics during psychoanalytic trainings and outlines a curriculum with specified readings to assist trainers.