ABSTRACT

The problem of the relations between psychoanalysis and sociology, has two sides. The first is the application of psychoanalysis to sociology, the second that of sociology to psychoanalysis. This chapter attempts to make a few fundamental remarks about the principles which seem to apply to the scientific treatment of psychoanalytic-sociological problems. What psychoanalysis can bring to sociology is the knowledge—though still imperfect—of the human psychic apparatus, which is a determinant of social development alongside economic, and financial factors, and deserves no less consideration than the other factors. Psychoanalysis interprets the development of individuals precisely in terms of their relationship to their closest and most intimate surroundings. Psychoanalysis, which interprets the human being as a socialized being, and the psychic apparatus as essentially developed and determined through the relationship of the individual to society, must consider it a duty to participate in the investigation of sociological problems to the extent the human being or his/her psyche plays any part at all.