Paul Williams is a training and supervising analyst with The British Psychoanalytical Society and a member of the Royal Anthropological Institute. He was a consultant psychotherapist in the British National Health Service, retiring in 2010. From 2001-2007 he was Joint Editor-in-Chief, with Glen O. Gabbard, of the 'International Journal of Psychoanalysis'. He has published widely on the subject of severe disturbance. He lives and practises in Hampshire, UK.

• Series Preface -- Introduction -- Thick- and thin-skinned organisations and enactment in borderline and narcissistic disorders -- Internet discussion review* -- The central phobic position: a new formulation of the free association method 1 -- Internet discussion review* -- The unconscious and psychosis: some considerations on the psychoanalytic theory of psychosis 1 -- Internet discussion review* -- Psychopathology and primitive mental states -- Internet discussion review* -- Problems of female sexuality: the defensive function of certain phantasies about the body 1 -- Internet discussion review*