Erotic drives adapt to social conditions while self-preservation drives resist them

Evidence

Because the former were capable of being displaced, sublimated, and satisfied in fantasies (for example, sadism could be gratified in a number of socially acceptable ways), while the latter could not (only bread could relieve hunger), sexuality was more adaptable to social conditions.” The task of an analytical social psychology was to understand unconsciously motivated behavior in terms of the effect of the socio-economic substructure on basic psychic drives. Childhood experiences, Fromm argued, were especially important, because the family was the agent of society. — Martin Jay, The Dialectical Imagination, 330

Categorization

• DEFINE: Clarifies Fromm’s key theoretical move, distinguishing adaptable libidinal drives from rigid self-preservation drives.
• XREF: Connects to the reader’s prior learning on the Frankfurt School’s Freud reception and the family-as-agent-of-society theme echoed in Milgram’s institution work. — connects to: Sexual attraction arises from socially conditioned images, not raw nature; Social change outpacing libidinal adjustment creates explosive political conditions — Martin Jay, The Dialectical Imagination: A History…, 331; Advanced industrial society channels erotic and aggressive instincts into socially controlled outlets. — Herbert Marcuse, One-Dimensional Man: Studies in the…, 61 (+2 more)