Balint suggests that a basic fault can be caused by some failure or inadequacy in the patients’ upbringing process, and this can result in serious psychopathology. Here is what he states.
He [the child] feels there is a fault within him, a fault that must be put right. And it is felt to be a fault, not a complex, not a conflict, not a situation. Second, there is a feeling that the cause of this fault is that someone has either failed the patient or defaulted on him, and third, a great anxiety invariarbly surrounds this area, usually expressed as a desperate demand that this time the analyst should not – in fact must not fail him. (Basic Fault ,P21.)
These statements might not be sufficient for us to grasp what he exactly means by the notion of the basic fault. Here is one of his comments using a geological metaphor that might help us understand its nuancel;
Thus, for instance, in geology and in crystallography the word fault is used to describe a sudden irregularity in the overall structure, an irregularity which in normal circumstances might lie hidden but, if strains and stresses occur, may lead to a break, profoundly disrupting the overall structure. (ibid,p.21)
It is worth noting that in his work, Balint once restats basic fault as trauma.
From that point on his further development has been fundamentally influenced by the method he developed a the time for coping with the effects of that particular trauma-his basic fault (p82, stress added) .
With this notion of basic fault, Balint means some kind of traumatic interaction between a mother and her child which is subtle and covert but nonetheless very traumatic. He does not describe it as some kind of abuse inflicted by the parent(s). Similar to a subtle failure in crystal formation, this can be due to either the child’s innate problem or mother’s failed interaction with him, or probably the both.
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