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Violence in Children: Understanding and Helping Those Who Harm

Editor : Rosemary Campher

Reviews and Endorsements

'This is a rare book. Although much has been written from a psychoanalytic point of view about aggression, very little has been written about violence, and even less about violent children. This book goes some way to redressing that imbalance. Every chapter in Rosemary Campher's book ... is written by a psychoanalyst or child psychotherapist who has worked therapeutically with children. Violent children hunger for a real response to their aggression that recognizes them as distinct and separate. They are yearning for a reaction that takes them into account without negating them or retaliating, but one that is reparative in the way that understanding can be. The therapist's real but non-retaliatory reaction to being hurt is the beginning of a new experience for children who often experience others as reacting intrusively or by withdrawing. Rosemary Campher's book invites the reader into the physicality and reflectiveness of the therapeutic relationship to learn about what makes these children violent and how to help them.'
- Donald Campbell, from the Foreword

'"Violence in Children" consists of a wide-ranging series of contributions from eminent workers in the theory, practice and research into violent behaviour. It traces the many roots of violence to sources in childhood and it seeks to throw light on the complex problems that arise when extreme violence manifests itself in society. However,the authors do not attempt to offer direct and simplistic solutions to these problems. What they do provide is a series of illuminating questions and, above all, a framework for creative thinking from which helpful solutions might be arrived at and applied.'
- Dr Bernard Barnett, Training and Supervising Analyst at the British Psychoanalytical Society; Director, The Squiggle Foundation, author of "You Ought To!"[Karnac Books]

'Both the glamorization and the demonization of violence helps us avoid having to understand the violent mind. We should enter the violent person's subjective world, not just in order to be able to offer treatment, but also to better anticipate the nature of the risks they embody both to themselves and to society. The attempt at explanation does not amount to an exculpation; rather, understanding is the first step in the prevention of violence. The answer to the riddle of how an individual can lose restraint over his or her propensity to injure others must lie in what is ordinary rather than extraordinary: normal human development.'
- Peter Fonagy, Freud Memorial Professor of Psychoanalysis, Director, Sub-Department of Clinical Health Psychology, University College, London; Chief Executive, Anna Freud Centre, London