José Bleger: Jew, Marxist and psychoanalyst

Abstract

The article analyses the trajectory of Dr. José Bleger (1922-1972), an Argentine psychoanalyst who tried to articulate his triple identity as a Jew, a Marxist, and a psychoanalyst. Bleger played a central role in the constitution of the 'psy movement' and, in more general terms, in the diffusion of a 'psy culture' in Argentina, a country that today is considered as one of the 'world capitals of psychoanalysis'. However, his trajectory showed not only the limits of his projects in the increasingly politically polarized Argentina of the 1960s, as well as their internal contradictions, but also the difficulties of articulating different identities in those agitated times. Through an analysis of Bleger's trajectory this article explores larger issues of Argentine political culture and their relations with the emergence of a psychoanalytic culture.