The objective of this article is to examine the multiple meanings attributed to the notion of analytical neutrality. Such a word was used for the first time by Strachey in the English translation of the text “Observations on Transference-Love” and emerged in post-Freudians and Ego psychologists’ clinical discussions about abstinence and countertransference. A subsequent investigation into the history of Brazilian’s psychoanalytical movement demonstrates, through news items and published reports of the Amílcar Lobo Case, analyst candidate involved with political torture, that the notion of neutrality was employed to conceal the omission of national and international institutions towards State violence during the military dictatorship. We defend the importance of interlacing both theoretical and sociopolitical perspectives to consider the issue of neutrality with appropriate complexity.
Keywords
Analytical neutrality; countertransference; analytical abstinence; history of psychoanalysis; political neutrality