ABSTRACT
Projective identification, a Kleinian concept par excellence, can assume several meanings, depending on the authors, and is linked to three fields: the psychic development of the child, the understanding of psychotic and delusional processes, and finally child psychoanalysis. Briefly stated, the subject lends to others elements of his own ego with which he cannot coexist. The mechanism of projection involves projecting outside what the subject refuses in himself, namely, the aggressive and negative aspects. Initially, the child keeps in his own psyche what is good and projects into the maternal imago what is bad. Subsequently, he identifies with this projection. Thus, the aim of the process of projective identification in normal development is to reappropriate what initially was most reviled. Theorisations in psychoanalysis of the child look at the vicissitudes of the child's psychic development in the light of the processes of projective identification.
