ABSTRACT
Source: Richards, B (ed.). Crises of the Self. Further essays on psychoanalysis and politics. London: Free Association Books Ltd, 1989. Reproduced by permission.
The psychoanalytic concept of projective identification is a mechanism of intrapsychic defence (Klein, 1946). It is also an element in interpersonal relatedness (Ashbach and Sharmer, 1987). It is therefore one of the bridging concepts that we have between the intrapsychic and the social. There are other bridging concepts between the individual and the social, ones which come from the social sciences; in particular I will deal with ‘role’ (Miller and Rice, 1967; Agazarian and Peters, 1981) and ‘alienation’ (Geyer and Schweitzer, 1981; Meszaros, 1970).
