German Academy for Psychoanalysis

The Deutsche Akademie für Psychoanalyse (DAP) e. V. — also known as the Berlin School of Dynamic Psychiatry — is a German psychoanalytic training, research and therapy organization founded in Berlin on 14 December 1969. It is dedicated to the dynamic psychiatry and human-structural psychoanalysis developed by its founder, the psychiatrist and psychoanalyst Günter Ammon (1918–1995). The academy is a registered voluntary association (eingetragener Verein) and operates through teaching and research institutes (Lehr- und Forschungsinstitute, LFI), the two current ones being in Berlin and Munich. The DAP grew out of Ammon's earlier institutional work. In 1968 he founded the Lehr- und Forschungsinstitut für Dynamische Psychiatrie und Gruppendynamik in Berlin, and in May 1969 the Deutsche Gruppenpsychotherapeutische Gesellschaft (DGG). The DAP itself was founded in December 1969 as a deliberate alternative to existing psychoanalytic bodies such as the DPV, with the stated aim of organizing psychoanalytic work in associations capable of self-analysis and of establishing a psychoanalytic approach to treating severely disturbed patients. The Berlin teaching and research institute describes five decades of teaching, research and therapy. It offers state-recognized training in depth-psychologically founded and analytic psychotherapy, as well as continuing education for physicians and psychological psychotherapists, including group psychotherapy and analytic group dynamics. Its programme includes training and further education in depth-psychologically founded psychotherapy, analytic psychotherapy, group psychotherapy and group dynamics, psychotherapeutic counselling, and a broad psychotherapeutic service for adults in individual and group settings, alongside self-experience opportunities and cooperation with international professional societies, clinics, institutes and practices. Training under the Psychotherapeutengesetz (Psychotherapy Act) qualifies candidates to apply for licensure as psychological psychotherapists. The DAP reached its greatest institutional expansion in the early 1980s. Its history, up to the recognition of its teaching institutes as state training institutions under the Psychotherapy Act of 16 June 1998, was marked by internal and external conflicts; from the late 1970s into the 1990s, disputes involving Ammon and the DAP played out in the media and in courts. Günter Ammon shaped the DAP professionally and organizationally until his death in 1995. As of 2020, Maria Ammon was chair of the DAP.

The Deutsche Akademie für Psychoanalyse (DAP) was founded in Berlin on 14 December 1969, emerging from the institutional and theoretical work of the psychiatrist and psychoanalyst Günter Ammon (1918–1995). Its prehistory lies in the postwar German psychoanalytic landscape. In 1945 the Deutsche Psychoanalytische Gesellschaft (DPG) was re-founded, with Carl Müller-Braunschweig as its first chair. Differences between Müller-Braunschweig, representing Freudian psychoanalysis, and Harald Schultz-Hencke, representing neopsychoanalysis, led to a split; in 1950 Müller-Braunschweig and five like-minded colleagues founded the Deutsche Psychoanalytische Vereinigung (DPV). Günter Ammon began his psychoanalytic training with the DPV in 1952 and underwent a Freudian teaching analysis with Müller-Braunschweig. After completing it, he went to the United States in 1956 and worked at the Menninger Foundation in Topeka, where his teachers included Karl Menninger and Ishak Ramzy, with whom he undertook a second, ego-psychologically oriented teaching analysis. Ammon later referred above all to this American training. He returned to Germany in 1965, worked at the psychotherapeutic counselling centre for students at the Freie Universität Berlin, ran a private practice for psychoanalysis and psychotherapy, and was a teaching analyst of the DPV. In 1968 Ammon founded the Lehr- und Forschungsinstitut für Dynamische Psychiatrie und Gruppendynamik in Berlin, and in May 1969 the Deutsche Gruppenpsychotherapeutische Gesellschaft (DGG), which presented itself in July 1969 in the Audimax of the Freie Universität Berlin with lectures by Ammon and by Martin Grotjahn, who had emigrated to the United States in 1936. The DAP was then founded on 14 December 1969, justified by scientific, therapeutic and training-related demarcation and redefinition of existing psychoanalytic institutions. The founding appeal stated the goal of organizing psychoanalytic work in associations capable of self-analysis and not, like the DPV, perpetuating the Victorian origins of psychoanalysis in the guise of associational bureaucracy and thereby hindering the further development of the science. A key founding impulse was to establish a psychoanalytic approach to treating severely disturbed patients. Institutional conflicts followed. The DPV suspected that the founding of a group-psychotherapy society by one of its members was a fundamental violation of its purposes and interests and demanded a review in an oral hearing; this did not take place because Ammon left the DPV. The German psychologist and psychoanalyst Wolfgang Schmidbauer interpreted the break through the correspondence between Ammon and Helmut Thomä, then chair of the DPV, concluding that Ammon's sensitivity to criticism made it easy for his opponents in the DPV to get rid of him. Schmidbauer suggested that this development was possible only in Germany, noting that Ammon initially had strong support among a group of emigrated analysts who, like him, had found a new home in the USA and were critical of their old homeland, while the DPV, still unsure of its standing in the International Association, had to avoid any appearance of laxity. The journal Psyche, close to the DPV, informed the DGG in writing that it no longer wished orders for advertising or insert advertising; the weekly newspaper Die Zeit reported on this some months later. The era of Günter Ammon lasted until his death in 1995. The DAP reached its greatest institutional expansion in the early 1980s. Its history, up to the turn of the millennium and the recognition of its teaching institutes as state training institutions under the Psychotherapy Act of 16 June 1998, was accompanied by internal and external conflicts. From the late 1970s into the 1990s, disputes with Ammon and the DAP took place in the media and in courts. The Berlin teaching and research institute (LFI) of the DAP, based in Berlin Charlottenburg, describes five decades of teaching, research and therapy, and the DAP's two current teaching and research institutes are in Berlin and Munich. As of 2020, Maria Ammon was chair of the DAP.

• 2020

  Maria Ammon is chair of the DAP.

• 1998

  The Psychotherapy Act of 16 June 1998 recognizes the DAP's teaching institutes as state training institutions.

• 1995

  Founder Günter Ammon dies; he had shaped the DAP professionally and organizationally.

• 1980

  The DAP reaches its greatest institutional expansion in the early 1980s.

• 1969

  In May, the Deutsche Gruppenpsychotherapeutische Gesellschaft (DGG) is founded; in July it presents itself at the Freie Universität Berlin. On 14 December, the Deutsche Akademie für Psychoanalyse (DAP) is founded in Berlin.

• 1968

  Günter Ammon founds the Lehr- und Forschungsinstitut für Dynamische Psychiatrie und Gruppendynamik in Berlin.

A psychoanalytic training, research and therapy academy rooted in Günter Ammon's dynamic psychiatry and human-structural psychoanalysis, offering state-recognized psychotherapy training and continuing education in Berlin and Munich.

• Training in depth-psychologically founded psychotherapy

  State-recognized training qualifying candidates to apply for licensure as psychological psychotherapists under the Psychotherapy Act.

• Training in analytic psychotherapy

  Training in analytic psychotherapy offered by the Berlin teaching and research institute.

• Group psychotherapy and group dynamics

  Continuing education in group psychotherapy and analytic group dynamics.

• Psychotherapeutic counselling and treatment

  Psychotherapeutic counselling and a broad psychotherapeutic service for adults, in individual and group settings.

• Self-experience groups

  Opportunities for self-experience, including a new self-experience group starting in July 2026.

1. 1Deutsche Akademie für Psychoanalyse – official websitedap-psychoanalyse.de
2. 2Berliner Lehr- und Forschungsinstitut – homepagedapberlin.de
3. 3Geschichte des Berliner Lehr- und Forschungsinstitutesdapberlin.de
4. 4Deutsche Akademie für Psychoanalyse – Wikidatawikidata.org
5. 5Deutsche Akademie für Psychoanalyse – Wikipedia (German)de.wikipedia.org