Feist−Feist: Theories of
Personality, Seventh
EditionII. Psychodynamic
Theories- Fromm: Humanistic
Psychoanalysis
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Companies, 2009W
hy war? Why can’t nations get along? Why can’t people from different coun-
tries relate to one another, if not in a respectful manner at least in an accept-
able one? How can people avoid the violence that leads to and perpetuates slaughter
on the battlefield?
As the young boy pondered these questions, a war raged throughout his home-
land. This war that he saw firsthand was World War I, the Great War, the War to End
All Wars. He saw that the people of his country—Germany—hated people of the op-
posing countries—mostly France and England, and he was sure that the people of
France and England hated the people of Germany. The war made no sense. Why
would normally friendly and rational people revert to such senseless killing?
These questions weren’t the first to have bothered the young boy. He was also
at a loss in trying to understand the suicide of a beautiful young artist who killed her-
self immediately after the death of her father—an event that left the 12-year-old boy
confused and perplexed. The young woman—a friend of the boy’s family—was both
beautiful and talented, whereas her father was old and unattractive. Yet she left a sui-
cide note stating that she wished to be buried with her father. The young boy could
make no sense of either her wish or her actions. The beautiful artist seemed to have
had much to live for, but she chose death rather than a life without her father. How
could the young woman make such a decision?
A third experience that helped shape the young man’s early life was his train-
ing by Talmudic teachers. He was especially moved by the compassionate and re-
demptive tone of the Old Testament prophets Isaiah, Hosea, and Amos. Although he
later abandoned organized religion, these early experiences with the Talmudic schol-
ars, combined with his distaste for war and his puzzlement over the suicide of the
young artist, contributed substantially to the humanistic views of Erich Fromm.
Overview of Humanistic Psychoanalysis
Erich Fromm’s basic thesis is that modern-day people have been torn away from their
prehistoric union with nature and also with one another, yet they have the power of
reasoning, foresight, and imagination. This combination of lack of animal instincts
and presence of rational thought makes humans the freaks of the universe. Self-
awareness contributes to feelings of loneliness, isolation, and homelessness. To es-
cape from these feelings, people strive to become reunited with nature and with their
fellow human beings.
Trained in Freudian psychoanalysis and influenced by Karl Marx, Karen Hor-
ney, and other socially oriented theorists, Fromm developed a theory of personality
that emphasizes the influence of sociobiological factors, history, economics, and
class structure. His humanistic psychoanalysisassumes that humanity’s separation
from the natural world has produced feelings of loneliness and isolation, a condition
called basic anxiety.
Fromm was more than a personality theorist. He was a social critic, psy-
chotherapist, philosopher, biblical scholar, cultural anthropologist, and psychobiog-
rapher. His humanistic psychoanalysis looks at people from a historical and cultural
perspective rather than a strictly psychological one. It is less concerned with the in-
dividual and more concerned with those characteristics common to a culture.
Chapter 7 Fromm: Humanistic Psychoanalysis 187