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The author seeks to bring about a major reorientation of clinical and theoretical thinking, particularly in regard to depressive illnesses. However, he extends his comments to the whole range of phenomena which classical analysis has related to the Oedipus complex. He draws heavily on the writings of Klein and Fairbairn to develop the thesis that classical depression is the result of an unsuccessful attempt to defend oneself against a schizoid withdrawal by clinging to ambivalently valued objects (essentially bad objects). Similarly Guntrip sees mania as a defense against regressive tendencies, i.e., against devitalization and passivity. To illustrate his thesis, he cites clinical material from the case of one manic-depressive patient.
Indeed, Guntrip regards the basic conflict in all emotional illness to be either the expression of or the struggle against regression, i.e., withdrawal to a womblike state or flight from life. Like Fairbairn, he regards the Oedipus complex as 'an end product of infantile insecurity and not as the cause of psychoneurosis per se'. He consequently believes that the Oedipal material must be analyzed in treatment not as the ultimate cause of neurosis but rather, to be seen as a defense against the deeper schizoid tendency.