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Morris Eagle has written a foundational text laying out the basis of a modern ego psychology for an integrated general psychoanalytic psychology of the mind. It is a big book: big in ideas, big in scope, big in scholarship, big in accomplishment. Eagle is a thought leader among thought leaders. His seminal book brings us an academic-psychological, scientifically objective approach to psychoanalytic clinical variables of mental function. Further, Eagle explains how this approach can provide a firm foundation for psychoanalytic theory.
Modern ego psychology is a growing interest area for a group of psychoanalysts (Marcus 1999, in press). We are devoted to the task of developing a badly needed, unifying theory. This requires a general psychology encompassing all aspects of mind: the biological, the developmental, the interpersonal and relational, the structural, and the subjective. Freud started his work with this general psychology project in mind. Eagle, a leader in this area for decades, now explores and summarizes the current status of ego psychological theory, claiming its place as the foundation of a modern, psychoanalytic general psychology.
Eagle contends that ego psychology, broadly described, provides the basis for a general psychology, along with certain amendments and expansions. Many of these are already accepted in psychoanalytic theory broadly, but are in need of clarification and specification. Eagle selects central topics. He reviews studies from academic psychology that bear on the topics he discusses and that ground his theory.
Anyone who wishes to expand theory must deal with barriers to growth within the theory itself. Eagle sees this as a process of necessary corrections and revisions. He takes on the big issues that ego psychology faces if it is to become a modern theory of the mind. He thus prepares the way for ego psychology to usefully integrate all theories. He does so in a brilliant and scholarly way. What are some of those big issues and what