Quand l'éthologie revisite la psychanalyse La question de l'attachement entre Grande-Bretagne et France

In 1972, the French psychologist René Zazzodeclared that a "new fact" similar to the darwinian "scientific revolution" had just been discovered in the field of psychology. HereferredtotheattachmenttheoryorrathertothediscoveryofthistheorybyJohnBowlby (1907-1990), who had found out, reading ethologist studies, that attachment was not the result of learning but rather caused bya"primal need".Using theseanimal findings to comprehend human behaviours, Bowlby estimated that this indeed shattered the utter existenceof psychoanalysis: For if attachmentwas primal, then it could not result fromthe satisfaction of hunger as psychoanalysts had previously believedwith the notion of libido. This article thus has two methodological goals. First, it aims to propose a new way of writing transnational history. I deliberately proceed in a regressive way, starting from an analysis of Zazzo's operation of importation before going back to the context of departure. Secundly, it aims to contribute to a reflexion on the relationships between the history of science and what I call "indigenous history". Starting from the historical discourse of the actors (here: Zazzo and Bowlby), I want to think about the statut of the one proposed by the historian of science.