The surrounding ideological climate is one of the systems for producing meaning which operate in part without our knowledge. The psychoanalytic explanation of historical events in terms of the death drive and the leader-group dynamic lacks complexity. To understand the basic dynamics of History, we must take a long-term view of it and analyse the complexity of the dialectical interaction between economic conditions, collective psychology and the surrounding ideological climate. There are links between the individual superego and the cultural superego. The latter can be localized in Winnicott’s transitional space and in Kaës’ 4^th space. Two clinical examples are used to illustrate the protective function of the surrounding ideological climate, followed by an example of its destructive function with Nazi ideology. The article ends by asking whether the characteristics of neurotic functioning associated with a healthy capacity for renunciation do not constitute the indispensable ingredients of a critical capacity without succumbing to totalitarianism.