The latest recommendations from the HAS[1] come as no surprise; and should they ultimately be confirmed, they herald the emergence of a psychopathology pertaining to the states.

 Not a surprise because for decades psychoanalysis has been compelled to submit to obtuse and authoritarian evaluation criteria—criteria that deliberately disregard the conditions of speech and language.

These criteria obey several distinct logics that converge toward a single outcome: the full-scale strategy of conquering the academic sphere by cognitive-behavioralism; a politico-administrative logic prioritizing evaluation and short-term profitability; and the dominant ideology of a biologizing scientism.

 In this context, it is worth recalling that psychoanalysis is not merely another academic or administrative category—one among many—within the taxonomy of “psy” methods. It is a civilizational phenomenon, on par with writing or algebra.

Am I exaggerating? But how, then, is one to characterize an invention that—through the unconscious—situates the subject’s responsibility, and the irreducibility of the object to any form of mastery? And this—let us note—not as a matter of ideological choice, but solely by virtue of the implementation of the function of the act of speech and language. Because psychoanalysis is not but that, and that only.

 It is only from this vantage point that Freud could undertake the challenge—to this day unsurpassed—of his Discontent. And it is from this same vantage point that Lacan advances—bearing a lantern similarly  unsurpassed—of his Ethics of Psychoanalysis, wherein he delineates the Sadean coordinates of contemporary jouissance.

 And this is, in short, what we are nowadays reminded with that axe over the $[2]. 

We can read the excellent answer to this situation and it’s supporting documents given by our colleagues of the EPEP[3], while awaiting other actions to consider. 

Stéphane Thibierge

Translated by Lorena Strunk 

[1] TN: Acronym for Haute Autorité de Santé: Supreme Health Authority

[2] TN: in French the acronym HAS can be read “hache à $”.

[3] TN: Acronym for École de Psychanalyse de l’Enfant de Paris: School of Child Psychoanalysis in Paris.