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with the younger sibling, she would be displaying partial neutralization of the aggression with no displacement and little drive fusion. Hartmann and his collaborators especially theorized about the use of neutralized aggression in building up structures within the ego and its use for other purposes as well. They argued that neutralized aggressive drive energy is used in the setting up of self/other boundaries, as well as boundaries within the mind such as the repression barrier. In regressive states, such as incipient psychosis, borderline regressions, and trauma, where there is a partial breakdown in self/other boundaries and of repressions, there is also a regressive freeing up of large quantities of raw aggression, which Hartmann (1953) points to as one piece of evidence that the building up of these boundaries, both with others and within the mind, uses partially neutralized aggressive drive energy. The differentiation of the roles of libido and aggression was used by ego psychologists in fine-grained conceptualizations of various processes. Kris (1956a, 1956b) tried to demonstrate using detailed clinical material that in repression partially neutralized aggressive drive energy provides the counterforce or ‘countercathexis’, while partially neutralized libido is used to invest in screen memories, fantasies and myths that direct attention away from, and hide, the thing repressed. Hartmann (1948, 1950) stated that there were different degrees of neutralization, and that it was not the case that more neutralization was always better. For assertiveness one would need a somewhat lower degree of neutralization than when using aggressive energy to think through a problem. Hartmann and Lowenstein (1962) noted these differences as well with the various functions of the superego: the punishing function, even in a less harsh superego, needs to operate with somewhat less neutralized aggression, as compared to the guiding function. And the ego ideal is usually invested with partially neutralized libido, which was formerly used in narcissistic investment of the self. As a final example of the use of drive conceptualizations by the classical ego psychologists, one could mention Ernst Kris’s well-known concept of regression in the service of the ego. While this is often viewed as a strong ego-controlled regression for its own needs, Kris (1950, 1952) asserted that this process involved the cooperation of ego control with the capacity to neutralize drives and also to de- neutralize them, allowing a deep intermingling of drives and ego. Kris described how highly creative individuals are capable of performing these changes, from the depths of the id to the heights of the ego, from raw drives to much more neutralized versions, very quickly back and forth, thus allowing access to the depths of the id, and at almost the same time achieving the highest levels of symbolization of these depths. Among others who made important contributions during this era to further developments in the area of drives were David Rapaport (1951a, b), who explored complex relationships between affects and drives towards a psychoanalytic theory of affects; René Spitz (1946, 1965), who studied anaclitic depression and anxiety during the first year of life, Max Schur (1962,1966), who explored developmental transformation of drives, and Robert Waelder (1936, 1962), who updated Freud’s ‘complemental series’ and principle of overdetermination, and postulated the principle of multiple function where drives, together with ego and environmental factors, are implicated in the etiology of infantile neurosis, and various adaptive and maladaptive outcomes throughout life.
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