Idealization and its Discontents: A Reconsideration of the Functions and Limits of a Psychic Phenomenon

The notion of “idealization” has been an essential component of psychoanalytic theory and clinical practice for nearly 80 years. Although no consensus regarding its psychological meanings has been reached (Spruiell, 1979), the literature on idealization appears to rest on one or another of two developmental assumptions. Freud (1914) maintains that the idealization experience is an outgrowth of efforts to regain the lost equilibrium of a passively blissful merger state. This viewpoint has been reaffirmed by a number of classical theorists, and Kohut (1971) made it a central assumption of his own arguments regarding the origins of idealization as a psychological phenomenon. On the other hand, Melanie Klein's (1934, 1940) view of the development of idealization as a defense against primary aggressive and destructive impulses rests on assumptions of an active and anxiety-provoking fantasy life early in infancy. Apart from whether these assumptions are compatible with one another, both have now been called into serious question by the observations of analysts working with children and adults, as well as by recent research on infant development.

Winnicott, for example, presents an account of the subjective experience of early infant development, which differs significantly from the sense of self-perfection presumed to exist in a blissful state of drive-gratifying merger. For him (1945), the early infant's