PSYCHOANALYSIS AND WAR: HISTORIES OF THEORIZING, RESISTANCE AND SUPPORT FOR WAR VIOLENCE

Abstract

Psychoanalysis worldwide was formed by wars and responses to them. Wars were also personal to psychoanalysts: Freud’s sons fought in First World War, and Bion’s theories were influenced by his work with a dying soldier. Psychoanalysis, starting with Freud, was engaged with not only theorizing about wars but addressing its horrific impacts on human beings. Freud’s essays discuss not only his understanding of psychic and social origins of such aggression but his work was directly engaged with understanding and supporting victims of war violence, especially among the military. Early psychoanalytic congresses were dedicated to promoting psychoanalysis in support of the military and veterans. Psychoanalysts under conditions of wars (i.e., both World War I and II) engaged in adaptations of psychoanalytic theories of trauma, psychoanalytic practices (i.e., psychoanalytic frame) to meet the needs of those who were directly affected by wars. Moreover, wars, such as the World War II, were marked by some psychoanalysts’ turn toward totalitarianism or by their silent complicit participation in maintaining violent regimes. In addition, in times of wars and political conflicts psychoanalysis contended with its own turn toward or away from violent ideologies, such as in relation to Hitler and German National Socialism. Histories of so-called isolation and neutrality, especially in the USA during the World War II, reveal not only ideological rhetoric that served to prop the aggressor (i.e., Nazi Germany) but also paint those who resisted genocides as “imperialists.” Russian psychoanalysts’ response to their nation’s atrocities toward Ukraine is similarly examined. These psychoanalytic histories are applied to understanding Russian war aggression against Ukraine, as well as to supporting Ukrainian psychoanalytic community in its work under conditions of this war.