Decline and Fall of the Freudian Empire (1985; second edition 2004) is a book by the psychologist Hans Eysenck, in which the author criticizes Sigmund Freud, the founder of psychoanalysis.

Eysenck accepts Elizabeth Thornton's argument, made in Freud and Cocaine (1983), also published as The Freudian Fallacy, that Breuer's patient Anna O. suffered from tuberculous meningitis.

[8][9] The book was also reviewed by the psychiatrist Anthony Clare in Nature,[10] the psychologist Stuart Sutherland in the Times Higher Education Supplement,[11] Chris Brand in Behaviour Research and Therapy,[12] and Michael H. Stone in the American Journal of Psychiatry.

[9] The psychologist Stephen Frosh described Decline and Fall of the Freudian Empire as one of a number of books in which Eysenck acted as a "propagandist" for the view that psychoanalysis is unscientific.

He observed that these authors provide conflicting accounts of what malady Anna O. suffered from, and argued that establishing any retrospective diagnosis with certainty is difficult.

[2] Sybil Eysenck wrote that the "real strength" of Decline and Fall of the Freudian Empire was that it "not only cast doubt on traditional psychotherapy and psychoanalysis" but suggested behavior therapy as an alternative to them, a position in her view justified by subsequent research.