Primitive object relations and mechanisms.

In the first part of this paper I have concentrated on Melanie Klein's description of early infantile positive and negative object relations, which, in her view, start from birth onwards. I have also described the defences which arise in early infancy, which Melanie Klein stressed particularly in her papers in 1935 and 1946. I have discussed in greater detail those processes which Melanie Klein and others, including myself, have described under the term projective identification.