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CONTROL OR LOVE? AN INQUIRY INTO THE STAKE IN KNOWLEDGE IN PSYCHOLOGICAL THERAPIES

by | Vol 42 (3) 2024

Summary: This article argues that knowing the ‘know-how’ as ‘knowing-how-to- control’, how to direct the treatment, extends beyond the ‘how-to’, the purely clinical dimension, mastering one’s subtlety of skills, and chattering about its supposed ethical groundings in the name of the nature of mental illness. It most importantly lies in the ethical implications of knowing the stake in knowledge – its own particular nature – as the constant of an impasse. The contemporary emphasis on the necessity of ‘control’, as evidenced in the ongoing debates on ‘regulation’ and ‘supervision’, and of ‘love’, in the research literature on ‘transference-love’ and ‘therapeutic relationship’, appears to designate ‘cure’ as a product of a harmonious relationship between the two. The article, by showcasing how Lacan’s work goes beyond Freud, capturing logic, attempts to the present inquiry into the stake in knowledge in ‘psy’ therapies is essentially an inquiry into its impasse insofar as ‘control’ and ‘love’, as knowledge effects, are complementary delusions rendering talking therapy pragmatically possible.

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