Back to Table of Contents
The succeeding formulations of Freud’s dualistic drive theory reflected evolving classification of opposing drives. They included: 1. Self-preservative drives versus sexual drives (1905-1914), 2. Ego drives versus sexual drives (1914-1920), based on elaboration of Ego-Libido versus Object Libido 3. Life drives or Eros (including the self-preservative drives and the sexual drives) versus death drive or Thanatos (from 1920-1939). In the first two phases, the opposition was between a drive to preserve the individual ego (through regulation of basic needs, e.g., nutrition) and the drive for sexual pleasure (in the service of preserving the species even at the expense of putting the individual at risk). In the earlier phase (1), self and ego were often used interchangeably, in opposition to the expanded view of sexual drive, developed within the concept of infantile sexuality; in the later phase (2), the opposition was defined by narcissistic libidinal investment in Ego or anaclitic investment in the objects. In the final phase (3) the opposition was seen between the attempt of Eros to keep up and extend life, and the death drive which was thought to creates pressure to terminate it. Eros brought entities together and raised the total level of psychic energy, while the death drive broke up connections and created pressure to return to an inorganic state. The above dualistic formulations can also be viewed as a series of expansions and conceptual elaborations of the drive domain (Skelton 2006, Mijolla 2003/05, Akhtar 2009, Auchincloss and Samberg 2012). In this context there are three successive ‘‘steps’’ in Freud’s theory of the drives: an ‘‘extension of the concept of sexuality,’’ ‘‘the hypothesis of narcissism,’’ and the ‘‘assertion of the regressive character [of drives]’’ (Freud 1920, p. 59). These steps can be traced to Freud’s major works: first, “Three Essays on the Theory of Sexuality” (1905d); next, ‘‘On Narcissism: An Introduction’’ (1914c) and the metapsychological papers of 1915, “Instincts and their Vicissitudes”, “Repression” and “The Unconscious”; and finally, “Beyond the Pleasure Principle” (1920). The first step dissected the sexual drive into component partial drives and emphasized the importance of infantile sexuality. The second step explored new psychic formations of larger dimensions, such as the ego and narcissism. At this stage, the drive, its pressure, and its psychical representatives were clearly defined. The third step established the life-drive and the death-drive, a dualism of vast proportions under which all of mental life and all matter was now subsumed. At each step, Freud expanded the drive’s domain without abandoning previous knowledge or more limited perspectives. Although there is no explicit entry of ‘drive’ in the contemporary secondary literature of Latin America (Borensztejn 2014), contemporary Latin American authors proceed according to similar progression of three ‘periods’. With respect to the dualism of the relative influences of sexual drives versus (routine or traumatic) experiences in life, Freud applies the principle of Complemental series , which states that “The diminishing intensity of one factor is balanced by the increasing intensity of the other…There is, however, no reason to deny the existence of extreme cases at the two ends of the series,…” (Freud 1905, p. 240). Complemental series , called at first etiological series (Freud
124
Made with FlippingBook - professional solution for displaying marketing and sales documents online