Potential communications: rethinking projective identification

The article focuses on the communicative aspect of projective identification. By distinguishing between "communicative potential" and "communicative intention" and applying this distinction to the theory of projective identification, the article argues that the communicative aspect of the latter can be interpreted in two different ways. As will be shown, the different interpretations suggest a remarkably different metapsychological picture of what is happening between the analyst and the patient. Given that the distinction between communicative potential and communicative intention has not been established in the available literature, the ongoing debate is thus haunted by a fundamental ambiguity, that has both theoretical and clinical consequences.