Personal networks placed psychoanalysis inside the Institute of Social Research, linking it with Marxism

Evidence

The opening of the Frankfurt Institute of Psychoanalysis, with Karl Landauer and Heinrich Meng as its directors, and Frieda Fromm-Reichmann and Erich Fromm as lecturers, was the realization of a plan formed by the Heidelberg circle around Frieda Reichmann in 1926. As a result of a whole network of personal connections between Erich Fromm, Frieda Reichmann, Leo Lowenthal, Max Horkheimer and Karl Landauer, the Frankfurt Institute of Psychoanalysis (the second to be set up in Germany, following the one in Berlin) was accommodated in offices at the Institute of Social Research. This was the first, even if only indirect, connection between psychoanalysis and a university, and it was followed in 1930 by the highly controversial award of the Goethe Prize to Freud, a public recognition of the founder of psychoanalysis by the city of Frankfurt. The sharing of the same premises also led to an institutional link between psychoanalysis and historical-materialist social research. — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School, 214

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to the Frankfurt School’s later work fusing Freud and Marx (e.g. Marcuse, Fromm’s revisionism) and to the history of psychoanalysis’s institutionalization in Germany. — connects to: The Frankfurt Institute of Psychoanalysis housed itself within the Institute of Social Research. — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School: Its History,…, 214; Socialist school reform ideals shaped the Psychological Institute’s research ethos — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School: Its History,…, 675; Marxist theories of false consciousness merged with Freudian psychoanalysis in the Frankfurt School. — John T. Jost and Jim Sidanius, Political Psychology, 100 (+6 more)
• DEFINE: Dates and personnel anchor the institute’s founding against the Berlin one, useful reference detail.

Broader Connections

• Marxist theories of false consciousness merged with Freudian psychoanalysis in the Frankfurt School. #corroborates (0.85) — John T. Jost and Jim Sidanius, Political Psychology, 100
• Psychoanalysis was seen as a bridge from economic determinism to ideology formation #expands (0.80) — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School, 231
• The informal Marxist Work Week expanded into a permanent research institute #expands (0.80) — Martin Jay, The Dialectical Imagination, 95
• Networked mutual influence, not heroic individuals, explains neoliberal thought formation #corroborates (0.80) — Philip Mirowski & Dieter Plehwe (eds.), The Road from Mont Pèlerin, 13
• Tracing how Marxism got absorbed into other philosophies requires delicate analysis of hidden connections. #expands (0.75)
• Internal power politics shaped Adorno’s early relations with the Institute #corroborates (0.75) — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School, 639