Transcending interactional tension Commentary on steven stern's “needed relationships”

Steven Stern has proposed an integration of what Mitchell (1988) has labeled the relationalconflict perspective (Stern's Paradigm I) and the developmental-arrest perspective (Stern's Paradigm II). Although his undertaking is a laudable effort in which we share an interest (Tansey and Burke, 1989; Burke and Tansey, 1991), we find ourselves in strong disagreement with both the theoretical and technical implications underlying his argument. We focus our objections on three main points: his distinctions between “needed” versus “repeated” relational patterns; his extension of the concept of projective identification; and his conceptualization of his “true integration.”