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One of the most controversial members of the Vienna Psychoanalytic Society and Freud’s intimate for many years, Reich is known not only for his seminal contributions to therapeutic and social psychoanalysis in his 1933 classic Character analysis, but also for his notoriety as a discoverer of an energy he named orgone. This paper is devoted to Reich the psychoanalytic sociologist and reformer, with special prominence given to his other, now somewhat forgotten, 1933 book >The mass psychology of Fascism<.
The world is regularly confronted by occurrences of mass violence wherein specific groups of a population are brutally killed, raped, and tortured by another group that considers its own behavior morally justifiable. There are social, economic, and political crises that lead to the scapegoating of one group designated as the enemy. It represents a mental instrument that validates dehumanizing the chosen enemy and gives >meaning< to the extermination of dangerous >elements< as part of a battle between good and evil. In the case of suicide bombers and terrorists, sacrifice and devotion to the ideology that promises martyrdom and support for sacred ideals are requirements. Some researchers talk about the personality of the torturer, particularly about how some childrearing practices annihilate children’s sense of self by teaching them to be obedient to authority. Others talk about the role of moral disengagement and the role of specialized military training. Psychoanalytic thinkers emphasize that the key mechanisms at work in these atrocities are splitting, paranoid projections, projective identification, sadomasochistic forces, strong mechanisms of negation and dissociation, and an extremely weak social identity. Those who commit evil acts seldom perceive their actions as evil. This paper focuses on the social influences that lead to dehumanizing and blaming the >other,< and childrearing practices that influence the creation of the genocidal mentality.
This article intends to propose a basis for a reflection on how separation mechanisms, both intrapsychic and social, may, by a normal identification process, be comparable in traumatic situations to true forms of violence. According to the theories of Benedetti and Peciccia (1996), a symbiotic Self and a separate Self are continuously present, integrated development lines of the Self, even though they are never fully conscious. Conversely, in the structure of the psychotic Self, a deintegration is inferred between the symbiotic and the separate states of the Self, of which the patient is painstakingly conscious. In light of significant psychoanalytic theories relating to the anxiety of separation, we aim to interpret this symbiosis and separation through the history of Michele, a psychotic young man from a Camorrist family, who was currently hospitalized in a psychiatric facility. The article intends to investigate the separation imposed by the clan, and the even deeper one, inferred from the significant separations experienced within the family circle. Furthermore, we will also outline our therapeutic method and the use of progressive mirror drawing, a psychotherapeutic technique which can be used with patients suffering from different pathologies that compromise verbalization, such as psychosis.
Triangularity in separation
(2019)
Traditional psychoanalytic literature tends to present issues of separation as a two-person dilemma. Current understanding, however, seems to challenge that view. The recent realization that there is no such thing as a baby, but only a mother-and-baby unit, has opened the way to the further understanding that there is no such thing as a mother-and-baby unit >extra-context<. In other words, there is always a father in the background – be he real or phantasized. Separation, therefore, cannot but be conceptualized as involving a triangle. It should never be forgotten that Oedipus’s own life history starts with a separation initiated by a father and acquiesced with by a mother. The aim of this paper is to present some thoughts on the Oedipal (i.e., triangular) dimension of separation.
This paper presents a case of >trauma by omission< as a product of the attachment process. The absence of intimate and specific recognition and response by the caretaker of a child can create, by their omission, a >freeze< version of the fight/flight/freeze trauma response. The frozen moments, then dissociated, can become confusion and paralysis at the cusp of adulthood. This state is illustrated in the case below of a 23-year-old Chinese woman being treated by a 29-year-old Chinese male psychoanalytic fellow. The role of cultural context in >omission< is highlighted regarding development and treatment, which is taking place in a Communist society with a recent violent history of extinguishing individuality, modifying how attachment and individuation are expressed. A relational/interpersonal treatment orientation is applied and advocated at this intersection of individual and social realities. This paper contributes to attachment theory by raising awareness of how its many forms and outcomes may or may not be deemed healthy and functional.
Concepts from Self-Determination theory are related to Fromm’s conceptualizations of existential human needs and human strengths. Empirical findings seem to support Fromm (1955a) in stating that socio-economic environments which embody particular values will influence psychological well-being, health and social relations of consumers. Further, empirical studies on effects of working in democratic enterprises and experiencing a sociomoral work climate upon employees’ attitudes and behaviors will be presented. All in all, the findings support Fromm’s vision of a humanization and democratization of work.
Fromm was one of the first psychoanalysts to deal with the crisis of civilization. His ideas about human nature, the social character and the social unconscious, the pathology of normalcy and the ideal of productivity are important. Fromm criticizes industrialism for its unrealizable promises of freedom and happiness, which correspond to an ideology of growth and progress. The satisfaction of >false< needs and desires does not lead to human well-being.
The vacuum of kidnapping
(2019)
All forms of kidnapping are presented in this paper, as is their psychodynamic underpinning affecting human behavior: abduction with or without ransom, political kidnapping, kidnapping by well-organized criminal groups, human trafficking and governmental kidnapping, which all highlight the important crises in the major decline in ethics and values. Apathy, fear, and insecurity lead to an increase in dependencies on substances, psychosomatic problems, and depression, which result from the suffering of this >vacuum of kidnapping.< The author wonders, >Has right to live in peace been kidnapped?<
Nowadays, violence appears in various forms in Brazil. From an agricultural country, Brazil became rapidly industrialized, which resulted in large rural exodus and explosion of population density in major cities. Brazil faces today a great social and economic disparity, added to endemic corruption of government, nepotism and lack of social planning. The roots of such violence can be found in our archaic heritage that has been forming Brazilian identity since its early days. The interest of former colonizers was to extract wealth, without regarding the establishment of a nation. This exploitation has been always done by force and violence, with the slave labor of native Indians and imported black people. As a state Brazil was exposed to the primal father’s law, and to the absence of a symbolic father, who could have provided his people with a more stable identity, only given by the paternal law. Is it possible to reframe archaic heritage, rebuilding the missing father image without resorting to a false savior of the fatherland? Is it possible to construct a more equitable society that could propitiate true conditions of citizenship in order to make every citizen, to the extent possible, the protagonist of his own history?