Cultic Studies Review, Vol. 5, No. 2, 2006, Page 100
The worst potential of narcissism, for which we reserve the term ―malignant,‖ was
fortunately not realized by Freud, whose work, in spite of his imperial tendencies and many
serious mistakes, has nevertheless been profoundly generative. But because the
psychotherapist is a potent transference figure—not quite a parent, not quite an Oracle, not
quite God Almighty, but, for many patients, something like all three—it is within our power,
if our power goes unchecked, to gain almost total control over our patients, or a group of
patients, and, in the name of psychotherapy and with the power invested in us, to abuse,
exploit, and enslave them in every conceivable way. That is precisely what happened when,
in 1957, Saul Newton and Jane Pearce began training therapists in what they called the
Sullivan Institute for Research in Psychoanalysis, later described in their book, written
primarily by Pearce, The Conditions of Human Growth (1963). Aside from a New York
magazine article (Black, 1975) and a Village Voice article (Conason &McGarrahan, 1986),
little has been written of the Sullivanians, until recently.
Amy B. Siskind, raised within the Sullivanian community and now a sociologist, has adapted
her Ph.D. dissertation into the first published book about the Sullivan Institute. Siskind does
not provide a tell-all personal account of her own experience as the child of a Sullivanian
patient, nor does she provide a psychological analysis of the dynamics of the group, its
leaders and followers. What she does present is a thorough sociological-historical account of
the group, its leaders, and its practices, as well as excerpts of accounts of the experiences
of former members. The publication of Siskind‘s book presents the psychoanalytic
community with an opportunity (although the opportunity has been there for quite some
time) to confront and try to make sense of some of the most egregious professional
violations and abuses ever to have occurred in the name of psychoanalysis. This review of
Siskind‘s book is a preliminary effort in that direction.
As Siskind tells the story, Jane Pearce, a psychiatrist who studied with Harry Stack Sullivan
in the late ‗40s, met Saul Newton in the early ‗50s at the William Alanson White Institute,
where he worked in the bursar‘s office. Newton had no degree and no formal training. He
was a charismatic confabulator, who convinced people who knew him that he had fought
with the Abraham Lincoln Brigade in the Spanish Revolution. In fact, he had not been a
soldier at all, but a payroll clerk. Newton and Pearce married, and together they sought to
extend and elaborate Sullivan‘s ideas. They were particularly disappointed that Sullivan‘s
critique of society and family norms hadn‘t gone far enough. Dissatisfied with the White
Institute and seeking full control of an institute of their own, they permanently severed their
ties to White. Like many others swept up in the counterculture revolution of the ‗60s,
Newton and Pearce sought to create a community, like a Puritan city on a hill, whose
members would disdain decadent bourgeois conformity and convention, and reach superior
psychological status (and, by implication, superior moral status) through radical processes
of regression, corrective experience, and personality restructuring. The hidden problem with
many of these kinds of personal growth and self-realization projects is that they can often
degenerate into an attempt, for leaders and followers, to gain power so as to compensate
for a sense of impotence. Things go very wrong in these groups when narcissism runs
amok, and when omnipotence, as opposed to power, becomes the unconscious goal. In
such cases, these groups develop delusions of superiority accompanied by self-righteous
justifications for scapegoating, dominating, and controlling others.
Before cataloging some of the practices of the Sullivanian community, I want to emphasize,
for those who may not know, that these things did not happen, for example, in a
fundamentalist, apocalyptic, UFO, or other cultic group in the deep south or the remote west
of the United States, far from the reach of progressive contemporary cultural and
intellectual influence, and from the culture of psychoanalysis. This story took place on the
Upper West Side of New York City, involving a population of middle class, liberal, college-
educated artists, professionals, academics, and intellectuals—many of whom were notable
The worst potential of narcissism, for which we reserve the term ―malignant,‖ was
fortunately not realized by Freud, whose work, in spite of his imperial tendencies and many
serious mistakes, has nevertheless been profoundly generative. But because the
psychotherapist is a potent transference figure—not quite a parent, not quite an Oracle, not
quite God Almighty, but, for many patients, something like all three—it is within our power,
if our power goes unchecked, to gain almost total control over our patients, or a group of
patients, and, in the name of psychotherapy and with the power invested in us, to abuse,
exploit, and enslave them in every conceivable way. That is precisely what happened when,
in 1957, Saul Newton and Jane Pearce began training therapists in what they called the
Sullivan Institute for Research in Psychoanalysis, later described in their book, written
primarily by Pearce, The Conditions of Human Growth (1963). Aside from a New York
magazine article (Black, 1975) and a Village Voice article (Conason &McGarrahan, 1986),
little has been written of the Sullivanians, until recently.
Amy B. Siskind, raised within the Sullivanian community and now a sociologist, has adapted
her Ph.D. dissertation into the first published book about the Sullivan Institute. Siskind does
not provide a tell-all personal account of her own experience as the child of a Sullivanian
patient, nor does she provide a psychological analysis of the dynamics of the group, its
leaders and followers. What she does present is a thorough sociological-historical account of
the group, its leaders, and its practices, as well as excerpts of accounts of the experiences
of former members. The publication of Siskind‘s book presents the psychoanalytic
community with an opportunity (although the opportunity has been there for quite some
time) to confront and try to make sense of some of the most egregious professional
violations and abuses ever to have occurred in the name of psychoanalysis. This review of
Siskind‘s book is a preliminary effort in that direction.
As Siskind tells the story, Jane Pearce, a psychiatrist who studied with Harry Stack Sullivan
in the late ‗40s, met Saul Newton in the early ‗50s at the William Alanson White Institute,
where he worked in the bursar‘s office. Newton had no degree and no formal training. He
was a charismatic confabulator, who convinced people who knew him that he had fought
with the Abraham Lincoln Brigade in the Spanish Revolution. In fact, he had not been a
soldier at all, but a payroll clerk. Newton and Pearce married, and together they sought to
extend and elaborate Sullivan‘s ideas. They were particularly disappointed that Sullivan‘s
critique of society and family norms hadn‘t gone far enough. Dissatisfied with the White
Institute and seeking full control of an institute of their own, they permanently severed their
ties to White. Like many others swept up in the counterculture revolution of the ‗60s,
Newton and Pearce sought to create a community, like a Puritan city on a hill, whose
members would disdain decadent bourgeois conformity and convention, and reach superior
psychological status (and, by implication, superior moral status) through radical processes
of regression, corrective experience, and personality restructuring. The hidden problem with
many of these kinds of personal growth and self-realization projects is that they can often
degenerate into an attempt, for leaders and followers, to gain power so as to compensate
for a sense of impotence. Things go very wrong in these groups when narcissism runs
amok, and when omnipotence, as opposed to power, becomes the unconscious goal. In
such cases, these groups develop delusions of superiority accompanied by self-righteous
justifications for scapegoating, dominating, and controlling others.
Before cataloging some of the practices of the Sullivanian community, I want to emphasize,
for those who may not know, that these things did not happen, for example, in a
fundamentalist, apocalyptic, UFO, or other cultic group in the deep south or the remote west
of the United States, far from the reach of progressive contemporary cultural and
intellectual influence, and from the culture of psychoanalysis. This story took place on the
Upper West Side of New York City, involving a population of middle class, liberal, college-
educated artists, professionals, academics, and intellectuals—many of whom were notable
