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In this book, the authors attempt to understand the roots of violence and hatred by looking at development and aggression through the prism of psychoanalytic concepts and theories. The first chapter by Selma Kramer discusses the Oedipus complex and all its vicissitudes, especially during adolescence. In my view, too big a leap is taken from individual development to conflicts between nations. For example, wars are seen as unresolved conflicts of the super ego, unresolved Oedipal clashes between father and son, issues around constancy and the internalization of love.
To bolster her point, Kramer quotes from a paper by which seems a bit exaggerated to me: “Just as revolution must be viewed as an expression of parricide, one final manifestation of parental filicidal aggression comes with the advent of our periodic wars between nations. The opportunity for massacre of the young assumes here its ultimate and most devastating form, and the blind kings of every household have their chance to act out and at the same time deny their own felicidal aggression.” Some might say religious, economic, and political rivalries also have some bearing on what causes war.
One of the best chapters, by Harold Blum, is entitled “Sanctified Aggression, Hate, and the Alteration of Standards and Values.” In this chapter's discussion of group process and social and cultural values, Blum explores regulation, counter-aggression, self-defense, and developmental considerations. He directly links severe multiple trauma in childhood to later acts of violence in adulthood. For example, adult rapists were often sexually abused as children. Terrorists were often survivors of severe childhood illness, with experiences of protracted pain, restricted mobility, and solitary confinement. Such people, according to Blum, are not only more likely to entertain violent fantasies, but also to exhibit violent behavior. Blum points out that superego development is impacted by a child's fantasies about the illness as