by Jens Callens | Vol 24 (2) 2006
The author focuses on the meaning that the break-up of an elderly couple has for their child(ren) and refers to some principles formulated by Françoise Dolto: 1. the recognition of the child as a person that makes its own choices; 2. “to say nothing is a way of speaking”; 3. the assurance of continuity; and 4. visiting duties as opposed to visiting rights. These principles function as guidelines for work with children whose parents have separated. Using a clinical fragment, the author argues that these guidelines are not to be taken as universally applicable but rather their value lies in the possibilities they offer to the subject to express something of its particular truth.
by Jens Callens | Vol 25 (1) 2007
The author focuses on the ethical aspects of work in an institution with youngsters whose problematic behaviour deviates from societal norms. A central element in this work concerns tension in the relationship between pedagogical norms and psychoanalytical ethics. The ethics of psychoanalysis translates to: (1) the level of policy; as well as to (2) the level of the clinic around which this policy is being constructed; and last, but not least, to (3) the level of the subject who finds him or herself within the institution. Some theoretical guidelines of Lacan support this threefold translation. In this process, the concept of ‘neutrality of the analyst’ will be confronted with the norm as the incarnation of the ‘desire of the Other’. The value of this theoretically founded ethical attitude is illustrated through the clinical work with a seventeen year-old boy.