You do not currently have permission to view the full text for this document. Please sign in to an account with an active subscription or contact support.
Until 1920, Freud argued that psychic life was governed by sexuality or libido, and when he encountered war neurosis did he begin to formulate the death drive based on the forms of destructiveness manifested by compulsive repetition. In Freud's theory that he defined the life and death instincts, also called Eros and Thanatos, it was assumed that the forces and mechanisms operating in the individual were generally valid for the community as well. While Eros tries to unite or synthesize separate units in society by bringing individuals together in groups, Thanatos distances the same units from each other. Therefore, within the action that tries to establish and build a social bond, there is a counter-tendency that tries to break it easily. Although Freud's theory helps to explain destructive human activities such as war, it is far from establishing a clear psychological link between human aggressive drives and the social institution of war. Man consciously or unconsciously enters into a psychological relationship with the institution of war with which he cooperates, conforms, resists, ignores, remains silent, or glorifies. It is precisely at this point that psychoanalytic theory has the power to have a say on this relationship, that is, the individual's predisposition to war, or specifically psychological involvement in the institution of war.