The Bobo dilemma. Psychotherapeutic reflections on a contemporary myth

This paper investigates the psychological consequences of a social ethos that has emerged in the 1990s; the Bourgeois Bohemian (in short, Bobo) that claims that the bourgeois striving for financial success and status can be reconciled with the Bohemian striving for creative self-expression. An extended case history shows how a man in his thirties grappled with the inherent complexity and contradictions of the Bobo ethos. The question is raised how, as psychotherapists, we can deal with the individual patient's search for a good life amidst the growing pressure of the Bobo ethos, to get the best of all possible lives, the combination of authenticity and success.