Fromm’s early social psychology critiqued Freud’s purely libidinal account of authority

Evidence

In the mid-thirties, as explained in Chapter 3, Fromm’s attitude towards orthodox psychoanalysis was very much in flux. As a consequence, his essay expressed a certain ambivalence towards Freud. It began with the acknowledgment that Freud’s theory of mass psychology and the superego was the best starting point for a general psychological analysis of authority. Having said this, however, Fromm quickly pointed to the shortcomings he saw in psychoanalytic theory. Freud, he argued, sometimes assigned the reality principle to the rational ego, sometimes to the superego, whereas in a healthy society it ought to belong only to the former. Freud was also too simplistic in his notion of identification as the primary source of the superego, although identification was a useful analytical tool. He was especially wrong, Fromm continued, in basing the child’s identification with his father solely on the Oedipus complex and fear of castration. There were other specifically socio-economic factors, he argued, which also affected the authority relationship. — Martin Jay, The Dialectical Imagination, 417

Categorization

• XREF: Documents Fromm’s mid-1930s break from orthodox Freudianism, connecting to his later split from the Institute and to revisionist psychoanalysis generally. — connects to: Fromm argued destructiveness varies across social groups, contradicting Freud — Martin Jay, The Dialectical Imagination: A History…, 346; Fromm argued unrestricted sexual gratification would actually ease manipulation rather than liberate — Martin Jay, The Dialectical Imagination: A History…, 377; Fromm’s preferred therapy rejected Freud’s authority and adjustment-oriented goals — Martin Jay, The Dialectical Imagination: A History…, 344 (+9 more)

Broader Connections

• Marcuse defended the libidinal reading of the Oedipus complex against Fromm’s interpersonal reinterpretation #responds-to (0.95) — Martin Jay, The Dialectical Imagination, 372
• Fromm saw love as maternal in origin and independent of sexuality #expands (0.90) — Martin Jay, The Dialectical Imagination, 336
• Horkheimer defended Freud against Fromm’s critique of bourgeois elements in his thinking #responds-to (0.85) — Martin Jay, The Dialectical Imagination, 356
• Freud’s evolutions all subordinate the aleatory event to the causal principle of sexuality #corroborates (0.80) — Catherine Malabou, The New Wounded, 1762
• Freud grounded racial paranoia in displaced homosexual desire for the father #exemplifies (0.75) — David Theo Goldberg, John Solomos, A Companion to Racial and Ethnic Studies, 1279
• Psychoanalysis reduces the social to the psychological by axiom #corroborates (0.75)