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In Freud, Women and Morality, Eli Sagan presents an insightful analysis of the emergence of a sense of morality, which he calls “consciousness,” based on a critique of Freud's model of superego formation. It is a creative attempt to apply a Freudian framework to the understanding of Freud's own work. Thus, he argues that Freud's theoretical model reflects historical factors (the Victorian era) as well as Freud's anxiety regarding women. Such anxiety stems from a deep, unconscious fear regarding men's ties to the preoedipal mother. Mechanisms of defense are used to cope with the anxiety. At the individual level, defenses take the form of denial, splitting, denigration, and sadism toward women. At the societal level, defenses take the form of attitudes, value systems, and institutional arrangements that keep women subordinate to men. Freud's own defenses took the form of chauvinistic views of women and his inability to understand and incorporate in his theoretical model the role of the preoedipal mother. Consequently, Sagan argues, Freud provides us with a theory of morality that is fundamentally flawed. His structural model, by focusing on the superego and oedipal strivings, provides a protection against his own unconscious fears. “Conscience” has been repressed in Freudian theory and in society. Sagan sees it as his task to bring it back into our consciousness and to make it an instrument for discriminating between good and evil.
The book is organized into five parts: In Part I, “Conscience and the Superego,” Sagan provides a summary and a critique of Freud's theory of the role of the superego in the emergence of morality. For Freud, as for many of his disciples, the superego is the heir of the Oedipus complex, born