Philip Bromberg and the Revolution about Dissociated Self-States

Abstract In this article, I outline three primary ways in which Philip Bromberg’s work has reshaped the terrain of much of current psychoanalysis: (1) movement of the emphasis in psychoanalytic thinking from repression to dissociation; (2) premising personality disorders on dissociation; and (3) a redefinition of the unconscious. I also describe some of my work that expands on or is related to these. The latter involves a significant extrapolation of Bromberg’s understanding of personality disorders as dissociation-based, highlighting the differing dissociative structures of borderline personality disorder, “masochism,” and malignant narcissism, or psychopathy. In addition to describing how the intrapersonal dynamics involving a dissociated, punishing self-state (similar to an abusive alter) resemble the psychodynamics of archaic, or harsh superego, I enter a plea for the recognition, following some of Bromberg’s concepts, of the importance of the dissociative unconscious.