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Erik Erikson has developed a theoretical system that has allowed him to speak cogently about clinical patients, groups in special situations, children, cultural interaction, and historical figures. To accomplish this he treats social situations as complex, adaptive, psychosocial events. His position is a result of the consideration of such viewpoints as the psychological, sociological, theological, political, historical, and cultural without an inherent subordination of one view to another or all to an overgeneralized simplistic position. Among his studies of historical figures his major work, Young Man Luther, stands out as an elegant integration of the various forces that made Luther the man he was. His second major study, Gandhi's Truth, is a much weaker statement. The purpose of this paper is to develop an implicit element in Erikson's own theory and to use it to reinterpret what Erikson identifies as the central psychological issues in Gandhi's life and character.
Interestingly, although Erikson makes little of it, the identity Luther attained was closely allied to a masculine identity perspective, as it is usually defined in present-day Western civilization. My reading of Gandhi's Truth leads me to conclude that the identity Gandhi attained was closely allied to a feminine identity perspective.
Erikson calls his theory a developmental psychosocial theory. It is commonly classed within the general category of ego development. He defines his central concept, ego identity, as follows: