Psychanalyse et transversalité essais d'analyse institutionnelle

by Félix Guattari, Gilles Deleuze

Dans ce livre, initialement publié en 1974, Félix Guattari présentait le fruit de quinze années de réflexion sur les incidences de la psychanalyse, aussi bien dans le champ psychiatrique que dans le champ politique. Dans ce livre, initialement publié en 1974, Félix Guattari présentait le fruit de quinze années de réflexion sur les incidences de la psychanalyse, aussi bien dans le champ psychiatrique que dans le champ politique. Un thème central traverse ces textes : la promotion d'une méthode d'analyse institutionnelle, qui devra dépasser chacune des strates séparées constituant les sciences sociales et les sciences humaines. Pour Guattari, la problématique de la révolution est nécessairement liée à celle d'un remaniement radical des conceptions et des méthodes qui ont cours dans le champ de l'analyse. C'est donc un principe de transversalité qui doit rapprocher et unifier la fonction de l'analyste et celle du militant.

Genres: Philosophy, Psychoanalysis, Theory, Nonfiction, France, Psychology

292 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1972

About the author

Pierre-Félix Guattari was a French militant, an institutional psychotherapist, philosopher, and semiotician; he founded both schizoanalysis and ecosophy. Guattari is best known for his intellectual collaborations with Gilles Deleuze, most notably Anti-Oedipus (1972) and A Thousand Plateaus (1980), the two volumes of Capitalism and Schizophrenia.

Reviews

[Heronimo Gieronymus · Rating 4 out of 5]

It really would not be overstating that matter to say that Félix Guattari's collaborations w/ Gilles Deleuze (especially the two Capitalism and Schizophrenia books) are the primary foundational books of my life. Or were. The encounters I had with those books in my late teens and early twenties set a great deal in motion. I have read the bulk of Deluze's work. Deleuze means more to me than any other twentieth century thinker. By a good measure. Guattari's work has remained an avenue less explored for me. There is much less of it, is has traditionally been less readily available, and it has been significantly less lauded. This collection of essays (and two interviews) is a fine corrective. It illuminates in a couple ways. Primarily it looks at group psychology, institutionailty, and revolutionary praxis. Over more than a decade of reflection. It is common to look at Guattari in terms of "antipsychiatry." This is tremendously misleading. Of course, before Anti-Oedipus was published (and infuriated him) Lacan genuinely saw Guattari as a potential successor. Guattari was always genuinely invested in institutional psychiatry. And there is A LOT of fidelity to Lacan in Psychoanalysis and Transversality. Lacan is even significantly more fundamental than Marx to all revolutionary or radical discourse on display here. Guattari's break w/ Marxist-Leninist discourse here (critical and decisive), dwarfs any deviation he might demonstrate from Freud and Lacan. What really excites Guattari, of course, is desire, and its necessary role in any recommendable radical politics. The role desire plays in the formation of group subjectively (mediated unconsciously / within the imaginary) is the real core of his project. Why be interested in class struggle (no longer at all cleanly dialectical) without desire, madmen, and adventure?

[Jennifer Doyle · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is fantastic. Really great way to dive into his thinking/practice.

[Fabiana · Rating 4 out of 5]

“Society as a whole must be held responsible for what emerges from those places which offer a privileged chance to study moral and human values: prisons, concentration camps, barracks, psychiatric hospitals, etc. True anthropological research should propose the recovery of these regions, which are more or less “scotomized” from the social domain from a normative point of view, in order to reevaluate the meaning of society as creator of these “symptoms,” with the aim of reaching concepts and practices that can modify the existing situation.” (Pg 87)

"The production of signifiers in the universities is becoming more and more detached from society; this is particularly noticeable in literature and art. The products of genuine research are not very saleable, because they question the social order. The essence of mass consumption is to turn away from the truth, to avoid actually having to face an active agent, or desire, or eccentricity. In the end, students and academics reach the same position in relation to signifying production as mental patients. Neurosis and madness, as a basis of truth, are subject to permanent suppression." (Pg 313)

Against all principles, I am nothing but fervent to look for a cause. Desire? Labor? Language? What is the thing that alienates us from all other spheres? The Marxist conception of labor alienation permeates through all the other layers, of course, (from self/work/product/other etc.) but there is something more to it here.

The fear has always been in the unknown. It is why there is such a comfort in murder (symbolically and physically. Once the thing is dead, it can be dissected, figured out. This is all science sets out to do.) The beauty of the mind is that it cannot be devoured in the way the body can. It can be labeled, prescribed, subjected, etc. but only known so as far as it speaks or is seen. (The real danger in language+speech I mention above).

And so what does this do? Now there is a production of the unconscious, ascribing qualities to it (ie Libidinal/"Political"/Production of neuroses) and an exploitation of it. So much so it exits the realm of psychoanalysis and is e c o n o m i c a l. In the conventional sense where there is desire, there is some degree of economy (gain/expenditure, Thinking of Bataille). Its the most crucial point of the integration of leftist/May 68 thought here. The "social neurosis" that is a result of systematic oppression. The repeated failures of these movements (which I personally think is fucking hilarious if that is your justification against "revolution". The firm success of socialist/communist/whateverthefuck movements depends ON THE NEIGHBORING STATES WHICH ARE CAPITALIST. demanding autonomy from your funding, just aint gonna work unless everyone is on board. Nevertheless I am compelled to wish for the collapsing of all government, but thats a separate issue.)

Is eviscerating desire supposed to make us understand it? Beyond this, I just firmly believe that if it can be spoken about, it can be exploited. Once something is a historical problem (written/spoken about), it becomes a political problem, and thus economical. Switch the order of this equation and nothing changes. The true essence of transversality. History is war waged by other means.

The intersection of all the lines of flight is such a fucking dangerous and precarious point. The tenth circle of hell (and I am down there putting on a show).

[vr reads · Rating 4 out of 5]

do you like getting in fights with movement leftists? if so, this book is for you.

[Regn · Rating 5 out of 5]

I really love this book. It’s probably Guattari’s least dense book and a fantastic introduction to his theory (and shows off Guattari the polemicist!). However, one thing to note about it is that it is his early work, so it professes some ideas that he would come to completely oppose, most notably the idea that the group and unconscious is “structured like a language”. All in all though, I definitely recommend this book for anyone who wants to understand Guattari a little bit better.

[Omar Abu Samra · Rating 5 out of 5]

A month of reading, worth every second

[Roberto Yoed · Rating 1 out of 5]

The politizacion of psychoanalysis should be politicizing psychoanalytic practiques, not shcizoanalysis.