The Blinding Luster of the Psychoanalytic Clinic
transl. by Ignas Gutauskas
original article here
In his foreword to the compilation “Negativity in Psychoanalysis,” Žižek expresses concern about the “philosophical colonization of psychoanalysis.” For him, it consists of merging psychoanalytic concepts with philosophical ones, for instance, substituting the philosophical negation for the death drive. This substitution supposedly allows us to limit ourselves to relying on a philosophical study of negativity, making the clinic, which should be primary, optional. Curiously, Žižek himself arouses this same worry in the prince of Lacanian psychoanalysis, Miller. The latter in his usual paternalistic manner accuses Žižek, Badiou, and other Lacanian philosophers of colonizing Lacan. This accusation gives Žižek’s warning a comic twist—it is as if a thief was outraged that someone stole the very goods he had stolen.
Žižek’s solidarity with Tupinambá in his recent endeavor, where the latter exposes the “Lacanian ideology,” further tightens the plot of the stolen goods. In Tupinambá’s exposition, Miller appears as an ideologue of the signifier, which, not without Lacan’s complacency, colonizes linguistics in particular and science in general. That is, it was Miller who became Lacan’s successor with whom Lacan’s teaching, on the one hand, appeared to be suitable for its incursion into the realm unrelated to the clinic and, on the other, froze in the forms of Miller’s organization that does not tolerate any outside interference. Lacan has been Millerized, if you will. Here, the comic acquires a new shade: two thieves meet and are outraged by stealing from each other.
All this results in the following figure:
- Žižek laments the philosophical colonization of the clinic and at the same time joins Tupinambá in accusing Miller of ideologizing Lacan.
- Miller accuses Žižek of philosophically ideologizing Lacan while simultaneously psychoanalytically colonizing areas unrelated to the clinic.
When it is finally possible to identify these mutually exclusive accusations between which one cannot choose, the observer is justified in losing interest in them, and after doing that he might discover an area previously overlooked due to the need to decide between equally valid initiatives. In his 17th seminar, Lacan speaks of the fall of knowledge to the rank of symptom: what was previously sensible to the participants of the dispute, because it allowed them to regulate enjoyment, is seen by the observer as a symptom, as a private tinkering with truth. Actually, this line of thinking is customary to Žižek: he is well-known for looking at things in the so-called parallax regime, when one shifts from observing the particular confrontation between an ideological dispute and intellectual criticism of it to viewing the instance of speech, the conditions of utterance. Now what makes it possible to parallax Žižek himself is the “other eye,” the function of the outside observer.
But how do Žižek’s or Miller’s reflections on this subject differ from those of a potential outside observer? The answer is provided by Althusser: if ideology constantly speaks about its content, then the critique of ideology refers to the problematics due to which both ideology and the critique of ideology itself operate. Ideology does not see beyond its self-awareness, it cannot think the sphere where its problems and, as a consequence, their solutions lie. The critical subject of ideology resembles an obsessional neurotic engaged in self-analysis: no matter how ingeniously he exposes himself, the result is always the same—he resists, continues to repeat one and the same figure, that is, it is this self-exposure that is his symptom. In order to escape this cycle of repetition, the injection of the signifier from the outside, the analytical incision, is necessary.
In fact, here we come close to Miller’s position. Unlike Žižek, who has never embarked on his own clinical practice, Miller is an analyst, so he is the one whose job is to perform the analytic incision. It means that Žižek’s warning about the clinic’s dismissal in favor of, for example, philosophical negativity does not apply to Miller. Except that the fact of Miller having analysands does not keep him from being drawn into ideological disputes… Psychoanalytic self-consciousness and the fight for truth do not allow Miller to spot the appearance of the symptom and, as a consequence, to identify the possibility of performing the incision. In short, Miller cannot act as the “other eye” with regard to himself in this case.
This situation is depicted by Derrida: when it comes to the resistance of psychoanalysis, the analyst is no less obsessive than the analysand. The analytic obsession, as it manifested itself, for instance, in the case of Freud, consists in the analyst’s perceived necessity to account for the workings of the unconscious or overcome resistances. The analyst also enjoys his symptom, and he differs from the analysand only in that the latter cannot see that the analyst enjoys, since the analytic setting makes the analyst’s anxiety undetectable. But things develop differently outside the clinical setting: if within its limits one is really endowed with psychoanalytic knowledge, knowledge about how the other enjoys, then outside of it, this knowledge becomes symptomatic like any other knowledge and, therefore, can be examined analytically. In fact, in his seminars, Lacan did exactly this—there, he constantly questioned the knowledge of other analysts.
But what distinguishes the analytic setting from other conditions of utterance? It is obvious that Žižek finds it difficult to answer this question. He confines himself to declaring the importance of the clinic and leaves all the rest to clinicians. As for Miller, even though he could have provided an answer, he does not tell us why the clinic is so important or how the analytic setting differs from the conditions of Žižek’s utterance. After all, in his lectures, Lacan also often referred to Hegel and was known for his attacks that were no less sharp than those of Žižek. Why then should we accept Miller’s idea that philosophy is doing something to Lacan or psychoanalysis in general? Why not take up Green’s dissatisfaction and declare that it is Lacan who is engaged in the philosophical emasculation of Freudian psychoanalysis?
Of course, Miller knows the answer to this perfectly well: the setting makes it possible not to answer the demand and thus keep the analyst’s anxiety unlocatable; Lacan is not lacanizing anyone, lacanians are simply engaged in transference onto him or, speaking in Marxist terms, they think that Lacan succeeds in formulating their class interests. Thus, Miller has no other choice than to stand up for everything marked by the signifier of Lacan’s name, the content attributed to it by the Lacanian community.
As soon as the first flock of Lacan’s followers formed, it became both the group that pushed more and more analysands into buying Lacan’s analysis and the mirror in which he saw his knowledge become truth. Lacan, to put it mildly, conducted himself strangely in the clinical setting—or, at any rate, such behavior was only attributed to him (the reality of it is unimportant, it is enough that he made such an impression on his analysands)—and when it came to his audience, he shifted as soon as it mastered the material he presented in his latest seminar. But one thing remained constant: for Lacan, there was no clinical experience of Lacanian psychoanalysis, which meant one could not refer to it when disputing with philosophers, etc. In fact, everything Lacan did was Lacanian, but only because there were people who considered themselves Lacanians, among whom, for obvious reasons, there could not be Lacan himself: there is no Other of the Other, so there could not be Lacan for Lacan. But this had a price: Lacan was a Freudian, and seen from the perspective of Freudians he, of course, had Lacanized Freud, which resulted in his expulsion from the analytic community.
Miller insists on the fact that, firstly, it was Lacan who was the exponent of the psychoanalytic knowledge, and, secondly, that this knowledge stays psychoanalytic beyond its functional connection with the setting. The first point was to guarantee Miller the psychoanalytic position owing to his monopoly of Lacan, the second—to ensure the transfer of knowledge from Lacan to all the members of the Lacanian community, Miller being the first to receive it, of course.
If Miller were to acknowledge that there is no direct link between analytic knowledge and what goes on beyond the analytic setting, he would have to stop insisting on his clinical practice and, during public discussions, would need to treat Lacan as any other author. For instance, Lacan regarded Marx’s knowledge of surplus value as no less analytic than Freud’s concepts. That is, Miller should consider Žižek’s references to Marx and Hegel no less significant than his discussions about Lacan. Also, he would need to show why his clinical experience is worthy of attention at all. If Miller were to stop insisting that that which is Lacanian is identical to that which is psychoanalytic, it would become clear that Lacan succeeded Freud not in a Millerian fashion because he would rewrite Freud at his discretion, fruitfully borrowing from his texts what he needs for his psychoanalytic aims. In this case, it is difficult to see why Lacan himself cannot be approached in this same manner by those whom Miller seeks to prohibit from doing so.
Undoubtedly, over the decades of discussions within the walls of Miller’s school many have repeatedly attempted to speak on this topic, there is no reason to call into question the diligence and training of the analysts belonging to the Freudian field. Just as Marx lamented that every young Hegelian criticized Hegel but did not take a single step away from him, so too can we see that arguably every Lacanian psychoanalyst suspects some school, the university, or even Lacan himself, yet does not make a move of his own. Back to Althusser, the reason for this should be sought not in the insufficiency of self-awareness of individual analysts, but in their lack of awareness of the problematics of ideology, in their insufficient understanding of the mechanism inside of which these questions, on the one hand, make sense and, on the other, cannot be resolved.
In the same 17th seminar, Lacan shows why these ideological disputes continue: the truth is fought for because of its relationship with the Real, which remains “neither better nor worse” as a result of this fight. The effect of truth is not on the side of the Real, it lies in the fall of knowledge.
If we recall in which register Tupinambá situates the psychoanalytic clinic, everything falls into place: the clinic is the Real of psychoanalysis, end of story. Time and again, psychoanalytic knowledge leaves the borders of the analytic setting—which, however, is not confined to the walls of the analyst’s office. Then, the knowledge about enjoyment is suddenly detected by an outside observer—but now as a symptom. What once functioned when the analyst did not display his anxiety, when the setting did not allow his anxiety to be detected, becomes knowledge as any other, knowledge embedded in the chain of S2 between the critique of capitalism and existentialism.
This, of course, does not mean that this knowledge is something bad; it is simply knowledge like any other, something that is used as a currency on the open intellectual market and, therefore, measured by the common standard of value. For such an exchange of knowledge to take place, it is enough to teach Lacan or apply psychoanalysis to solving pressing problems, that is, it suffices to answer the audience’s demand. There is nothing surprising in this because if one needs to maintain a school, secure a professorship, or at least attract analysands, someone (not necessarily you) needs to make use of knowledge in order if not to answer questions, then at least to meet certain expectations; if not to show what the use of analysis could be, then to present oneself as an analyst.
Ultimately, the symptomatic character of knowledge results in the insolubility of an array of issues, the task of them being, on the one hand, resistance, neglect of another issue, and, on the other, preparing the ground for the resumption of the production of knowledge—although using other means now. The clinic is advocated for even though, as Lacan put it, the Real is “neither better nor worse” regardless of what philosophers do with Lacan—whether they plunder him, as Miller sees it, or replace clinical material with philosophical thinking, as Žižek warns. The analyst’s anxiety would find its way even if every philosopher declared themselves a psychoanalyst or if every subject seeking to start their clinical practice were obliged to go to Paris to get permission first.
In the end, the Real manifests itself in the outages of the symbolic: the more subjects are neuroticized by Lacan’s letter, the greater the resistance on the analytic scene; the more everyone is fooled by the truth, the brighter the luster of the Real. The only trouble is, Lacan writes, that not a thing can be seen in this luster.
