ABSTRACT
In considering the total doctor-patient or therapist-client relationship, we feel it is helpful to distinguish three elements. These are the therapeutic or working alliance, transference, and countertransference. The therapeutic or working alliance refers to the ordinarily good relationship that any two people need to have in cooperating over some joint task. In medicine it has often been known as establishing a good rapport with a patient. It is an everyday affair, fostered by friendliness, courtesy, and reliability, as any good tradesman or professional person unselfconsciously demonstrates. Greenson (1967: 46) has defined it as ‘the relatively non-neurotic, rational relationship between the patient and the analyst which makes it possible for the patient to work purposefully in the analytic situation’.
