Ethics and Analysis: Philosophical Perspectives and Their Application in Therapy (Volume 13)

Carolyn and Ernest Fay Series in Analytical Psychology

by Luigi Zoja

Also available in an open-access, full-text edition at http://repositories.tamu.edu/bitstrea...
 Most books on psychoanalytical ethics focus on rules, but author Luigi Zoja argues that ethics is really concerned with personal decisions—as is analysis itself. Rules are defined by others and center on punishment, but the purpose of analysis is to free the individual to make choices from his or her own “best” psychological and emotional center while still respecting society. Rules establish black and white; real ethics and psychological understanding both operate in the gray zone. Rules emerge from Enlightenment rationality; true ethics proceeds from choices and thus cannot be given in advance or be satisfied by respecting the rational part of the psyche only.

After considering the nature of ethics, Zoja turns to Immanuel Kant and Max Weber for a practical consideration of therapeutic relationships. He applies his ethical principles to the first psychoanalytical cases (Anna O. and Sabine Spielrein) described by Freud and Jung. In his thorough examination of these original examples, Zoja balances the traditional ethic of rules and law with the “new ethic” proposed by Erich Neumann. The result is an appreciation of the complex—at times even contradictory—yet healing nature of analysis.

Genres: Philosophy

152 pages, Hardcover

First published March 23, 2007

About the author

Luigi Zoja Luigi Zoja Ph.D. (1943) is an Italian psychoanalyst and writer. He took a degree in economics and did research in sociology during the late 1960s. Soon thereafter he studied at the C. G. Jung Institute in Zurich. After taking his diploma, Zoja returned to Zurich to work at a clinic for several years. He maintains a private practice in Milan. He also practiced for two years in New York City, during a period that bracketed the terrorist attacks on New York and Washington, D. C. He has taught regularly at the Zurich Jung Institute, and also on occasion at the Universities of Palermo and Insubria. From 1984 to 1993, Zoja was president of CIPA (Centro Italiano di Psicologia Analitica), and from 1998 to 2001 was president of the IAAP (International Association of Analytical Psychology). Later he chaired the IAAP's International Ethics Committee. His essays and books have appeared in 14 languages.

Most of his essays interpret present-day predicaments (addiction, limitless consumption, the absence of the father, hatred and paranoid projections in politics, etc.) by placing them in the light of persistent ancient patterns, as expressed in myth and classical literature. Archetypal psychologist James Hillman has called Zoja an "anthropological psychologist" as one way of indicating the range and depth of his thinking.