Nearly forty years ago, in December 1957, William Langer, a diplomatic historian, used the occasion of his presidential address to the American Historical Association to call on historians to familiarize themselves with depth psychology (i.e., psychoanalysis) and to integrate its findings into historical scholarship. The following year, Erik Erikson published Young Man Luther: A Study in Psychoanalysis and History. These two events mark the beginning of an interdisciplinary relationship that has been accompanied by controversy and criticism, but one that has also produced a diverse body of scholarship that has deepened our understanding of the past. It is not as surprising as it might at first appear that a diplomatic historian and a psychoanalyst noted for his work with children should have been the initiators of this collaboration. Langer, after all, was the brother of Walter Langer, a psychoanalyst trained in Vienna in the 1930s, and the coauthor, with Henry A. Murray, Ernst Kris, and Bertram D. Lewin, of a then-secret wartime report, “A Psychological Analysis of Adolf Hitler: His Life and Legend,” written for the OSS during World War II. Langer had himself been psychoanalyzed by Jenny Waelder Hall following several personal crises in 1938. Although Langer's scholarly writings adhered to the conventions of his training and field, chapter three of his The Diplomacy of Imperialism (1935) discusses with great insight the fantasies and anxieties that animated popular support for nineteenth-century British imperialistic policies.
Erik Erikson's interest in the interplay between cultural norms and values and child-rearing practices and their shaping of adult personality was first explored in his 1950 Childhood and Society. There, interspersing clinical vignettes from his own work with children, Erikson examined the experience of childhood in two American Indian tribes, as well as the legends surrounding the childhoods of Adolf Hitler and Maxim Gorky; delineated the theory of infantile sexuality; and proposed his paradigm for human development, the Eight Stages of Man, which begin with Trust versus Mistrust and conclude with Ego Integrity versus Despair. The sympathetic and humane understanding that informs the book's delineation of the relationship between historical circumstances and an individual's intimate family experience struck a deeply responsive chord among readers.
Erikson was drawn to write about Luther's young manhood because the subject afforded him an opportunity to investigate the psychodynamics of adolescence and identity formation. As Erikson wrote in his preface, Luther provided him an opportunity “to concentrate on the powers of recovery inherent in the young Ego.” Erikson organized his portrayal around the theme of Luther's creation of an identity for himself and showed that in resolving his own identity crisis he found a solution in Protestantism that had widespread appeal. Interestingly, in his presidential address Langer too singled out Luther as an individual who evoked a great popular response, by virtue of having “succeeded in expressing the underlying, unconscious sentiments of large numbers of people and in providing them with an acceptable solution to their religious problem.”
Although Erikson's work was severely criticized by some historians, it was welcomed by others, who found in his Eight Stages an accessible paradigm for applying psychoanalytic theory in their own research. An excellent example of such an approach is found in John Demos's The Little Commonwealth: Family Life in Plymouth Colony (1970). His point of departure is the atmosphere of chronic contention and enmity among the colonists, which is documented in the surviving legal records of numerous court cases. He notes that the writings of colonists on child-rearing practices reveal an implacable belief that a young child's will must be firmly controlled; expressions of anger are especially unacceptable. The period at which the child's will was broken, between the ages of one and two, is in Erikson's schema the stage at which issues of autonomy and shame emerge. If the child's moves toward autonomy are not supported, feelings of shame will dominate. Demos finds this coupling of autonomy and shame strikingly relevant to Puritan culture; numerous court cases involving suits for slander well attest the colonists' preoccupation with shame. Though it had long been assumed that the colonists were particularly concerned about issues relating to sexuality, Demos argues convincingly that “there was a different bugbear in their lives—and psyches—namely, a tight cluster of anxieties about aggression” (p. 137). He thus draws on Erikson's developmental schema to present in a new light the relationship between the colonists' attitudes toward children and their adult character and behavior.
Initially, then, ego psychology dominated the collaboration between psychoanalysis and history. Gradually, however, the role of psychoanalytic theory in historical writing has become more complex and varied. In part this reflects the fact that historians have become better versed in psychoanalytic theory; a number have even undergone formal analytic training. But it also reflects the state of contemporary psychoanalytic theory and practice, where different theoretical approaches—classical theory, object relations theory, self psychology, etc.—compete and overlap. Moreover, historians differ not only in their theoretical approaches but also in the extent to which they specify their theoretical foundations. Psychoanalytic concepts and theory openly inform the arguments and interpretations in some studies, whereas in others theory is not formally cited or is relegated to footnotes.
Among historians who take self psychology as their point of departure are Charles B. Strozier and Thomas Kohut. In The Leader: Psychohistorical Essays (1985) Strozier and his coeditor, Daniel Offer, apply the themes of self psychology to such figures as Lincoln, Gandhi, and Wilson. Kohut's Wilhelm II and the Germans: A Study in Leadership (1991) uses self psychology to great effect to elucidate the historical significance of Wilhelm II's personality, his impact on the German people, and their influence on him. Kohut argues that the needs of the Kaiser's personality corresponded to the needs of German society: “Wilhelm's restless search for admiration, his driven need to exhibit himself and his accomplishments, served to focus national attention on his person… . Wilhelm's brittle facade of personal sovereignty, his defensive need always to appear right and in control fulfilled the need of Germans to have a powerful and independent Kaiser. Wilhelm's anxious and belligerent insistence that he be listened to and
Nellie L. Thompson, an historian, is a senior candidate at the New York Psychoanalytic Institute, where she is curator of the Brill Library's Archives and Special Collections.
treated with respect expressed the widespread sense that Germany was entitled to take its rightful place as a great imperial power“ (p. 4).
Object relations theory has been used in the work of Judith M. Hughes (Emotion and High Politics: Personal Relations at the Summit in Late Nineteenth-Century Britain and Germany, 1983), John Demos (Entertaining Satan: Witchcraft and the Culture of Early New England, 1982), and Lewis Wurgaft (The Imperial Imagination: Magic and Myth in Kipling's India, 1983). The last is a particularly stimulating example of historical writing informed by object relations theory. Wurgaft finds the concept of the intrapsychic object useful because culture and society, as represented by values, ideals, and myths, embody the individual's ultimate object world. The exploration of shared myths and ideals allows the historian to uncover the psychological concerns and fantasies that unite a group across several generations. Wurgaft's particular concern is with the British who served and lived in nineteenth-century India. A close study of their writings, in particular those of Rudyard Kipling, permits Wurgaft to explore the many meanings that India held for them. He is careful to note that Kipling, his writings, and British India cannot be simply equated, but argues that Kipling's India, though the “construct” of a mythmaker for a culture under stress, is yet “a compelling reality in the history of British imperialism” (p. xx).
In general, the people of India are portrayed in British writings as mysterious, morally weak, impulsive, cruel, and sexually licentious. The psychic mechanism of projection, whereby one's own deep-seated fears and wishes are projected onto an external object, is utilized by Wurgaft to explain the intensity of the British involvement with India. In response to Indian demands for greater political recognition, the British became even more rigid and controlling, and developed an heroic mythology centered on British achievements that idealized instinctual and social control. Political and psychological rigidity reinforced each other and resulted in defeat for the British and tragedy for India.
The work of Demos, Kohut, and Wurgaft illustrates how greatly the relationship between psychoanalysis and history has changed since Langer and Erikson challenged historians to integrate psychoanalysis into their work. It is not possible here to do justice to the different methodological positions historians have adopted concerning the relationship between psychoanalysis and history. Peter Loewenberg has written extensively on this topic, and more recently Kohut has written on it from the perspective of self psychology. There is also a body of writing devoted to exploring the role of psychoanalytic theory in the study of groups. Demos has made contributions here, as have Bruce Mazlish and Saul Friedlander. The latter in particular has articulated an ambitious, sweeping view of group history and psychoanalysis. His contribution has been to conceptualize the aims of group history, define what is possible, and suggest how this may be accomplished. In History and Psychoanalysis: An Inquiry into the Possibilities and Limits of Psychohistory (1978), he writes that the primary aim of the psychohistory of collective phenomena is “the investigation … of the unconscious meaning of fundamental myths, … their hidden relationships, their manifestations on the level of ritualized behavior and everyday beliefs, and finally their place in the symbolic network which includes the culture as a whole” (p. 81).
A more recent development in the relationship between history and psychoanalysis has been the emergence of the history of psychoanalysis as an area of study by historians, among them Hannah S. Decker, Peter Gay, Nathan G. Hale, Jr., and Frank J. Sulloway. The majority of biographies of psychoanalysts and studies of psychoanalysis as a theory and movement, however, continue to be written by nonhistorians. The results are decidedly mixed. Critics of early accounts of Freud's life and work and of the history of the psychoanalytic movement were scornful of what they saw as the protective and insular nature of these accounts. But all too often the newer biographies and histories have embraced interpretations of Freud, his followers, and psychoanalysis that are no more satisfying than the ones they seek to overturn.
For example, a great deal has been written about schisms and dissent in the psychoanalytic movement. This literature is characterized by themes that are essentially dramatic. Elements of the drama include the rebellion of sons and daughters against the father, their unfair and cruel banishment as the price they must pay for their independent stand against rigidity and authoritarianism, and their ultimate vindication when the importance of their ideas is later acknowledged. But until this happens, the rebels' innovations are attributed to their unresolved conflicts or personal pathology. Although explanation by psychoanalysis is deplored by many writers, it is nonetheless employed, presumably because it seems to explain why splits keep recurring in the psychoanalytic movement. It is noteworthy that the language used in these accounts, from both sides, often includes such words and phrases as “rigid,” “cult of personality” or “cultism,” “ruling cliques,” “authoritarian,” and “orthodox.” Affectively, these words elicit images of hardness, irrationality, and dullness. They seem to be defensive, condoning righteous anger against individuals and obviating any need to take seriously the ideas identified with them.
Nathan G. Hale, Jr.'s The Rise and Crisis of Psychoanalysis in the United States (1995) emphasizes the role of generational differences between American analysts in fomenting schisms. The profound impact of emigré European psychoanalysts on the organizational and theoretical development of American psychoanalysis is cited as another factor. But emigré analysts also immeasurably enriched and strengthened psychoanalytic practice and education in the societies they joined. Their complex legacy clearly deserves much closer study than it has heretofore received.
It is often argued that Freud's intolerance of dissent is the reason that the early psychoanalytic movement was so riven by splits. By this line of reasoning, those who identified strongly with Freud and classical analysis were also intolerant and rigid. The time has come, it would seem, for the case to be made that Freud was actually rather tolerant of dissent and disagreement. Perhaps one reason this case has not been made is that attributing the problem of schisms in psychoanalysis to Freud's legacy permits the avoidance of some troubling and complex issues. These have to do with creativity and aggression, and the relation between them in psychoanalysts and psychoanalytic institutes.
Ralph R. Greenson's “The Origin and Fate of New Ideas in Psychoanalysis,” written twenty-five years ago, makes two useful points about this relation. The first is that “the distress and even the outrage which confrontation arouses are important antecedents to creativity in our psychoanalytic institutes” (p. 513). Second is that institutes themselves play an important role in nurturing creativity because “the [institute] also provides a holding, structuring function.” In other words, creativity in psychoanalysis requires boundaries as well as freedom.
The preoccupation with schisms as events that somehow define or epitomize the character of the psychoanalytic movement (and hence theory) has deflected attention from two important matters. The first is the need to investigate groups of analysts (not necessarily coextensive with societies) who have been notably creative and productive. Of particular interest are the experiences and characteristics that define the group as a group. A splendid example of this approach is found in Loewenberg's “The Creation of a Scientific Community: The Burgholzli, 1902-1914” (1995). There Loewenberg emphasizes, as ingredients that went into creating the special climate that characterized the Burgholzli in those years, the leadership of Eugen Bleuler, the organization of the Burgholzli as a psychiatric hospital and research group, the diverse nature of the staff (which included Karl Abraham, C.G. Jung, Max Eitingon, Hermann Nunberg, and Ludwig Binswanger), and the nearly complete emotional and intellectual absorption in Freud's ideas. Why these elements were so potent a mix is explained by reference to Winnicott's ideas on creative play, transitional objects, and the holding environment, and to the writings of Ludwig Fleck, an historian of science, on scientific groups. Other analytic groups that might be studied include the members of the Kinder seminar in Vienna in the late 1920s and the 1930s, and the analysts who collaborated with Melanie Klein in the late 1930s and the 1940s.
The second neglected area is the question of what happens to a society/institute after a split has occurred. If we find variations, how are these to be accounted for? In the case of the New York Psychoanalytic Society/Institute, for example, many of its members were unusually creative and productive in the years following the schisms created by Karen Horney's departure in 1941 and Sandor Rado's fractious disengagement during the years 1942–1947. The question of the relationship, if any, between these developments is certainly an important one to explore.
References are available from the author upon request.