ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the evidence on another neglected aspect of Klein's work. A usual assumption is that Klein paid little attention to the role of the parents with regard to their children's problems, perhaps tied up to the old dogma that Klein gave minimal space to the external—or privileged almost exclusively the internal world of the child. The chapter is set in the historical context of work with children in the era before the widespread development of the child guidance movement in the United Kingdom under the impact of the Second World War, and the later practice of separate psychotherapeutic/support work with parents as the norm, or at least a standard of good practice, in UK NHS child psychotherapy settings. Klein recognized that one of the key factors to keep in mind as a potential obstacle to parental co-operation with their child's analysis was the parent's unconscious.
