On Denial and the Essential Nature of Defence1

The term defence shortly after its introduction by Freud became indiscriminately employed and fell into disuse. Since he revived the term defence mechanisms in 1926 to denote 'all the techniques of which the ego makes use in the conflicts which potentially lead to neurosis' (23), the same tendency towards indiscriminate usage has recurred. Thus the term defence has been applied to phenomena as widely variant as disease entities (1), (3), character (45), symptom complexes (4), (9), affects (49), physiological states (7), art forms (35) and antisocial behaviour (46).

Ambiguity stems from disagreement on the essential characteristics of the defensive process itself. Some authors restrict it to pathological processes only, whereas others include their normal analogues (27). To unconscious mechanisms of defence some add conscious mechanisms that resemble them (27). As to the basic defence mechanism, the hitherto prime position of repression has been recently questioned (30), (51). McGranahan (40) collated from the literature the following varied agents or forces which were stated to instigate repression: the censor, ego, ego-ideal, superego, the pleasure principle, fear, anxiety, guilt feelings, self-esteem, master sentiment of self-regard, and the ego, death, and sexual instincts.

Such recorded disagreements upon the characteristics of so fundamental a concept as defencc provoke criticism of psycho-analysis as lacking in conceptual clarity or scientific merit. Paradoxically, these differences in the literature often do not reflect real disagreement among the authors concerning the fundamental nature of the defence process itself. The apparent differences often stem from semantic difficulties that ensue upon implied, altered, or shifting meanings of the terms employed, deleted explanatory steps, the use of a part term to represent the whole or from the different frames of reference or emphases utilized at the moment.

In Instincts and their Vicissitudes,