ABSTRACT
For a long time, research on trauma was more or less a blank page in the theoretical and clinical psychoanalytical discourse. Given the multiple catastrophes and extreme experiences that people were exposed to and suffered from during the twentieth century, trauma ultimately became the signature mark of the entire century. In Beyond the Pleasure Principle, Freud developed a model of trauma from a psycho-economic point of view. In the moment of traumatization, the excessive quantum of excitation cannot be psychically bound and overwhelms the ego, breaking through the protective shield. In Inhibitions, Symptoms and Anxiet, Freud connected the psycho-economic view of trauma with his theory of anxiety. He draws on the concept of automatic anxiety that he developed for the actual neuroses. The object-relations theory approach to trauma theory was further developed by research into the severe traumatization that was suffered during the Holocaust. A key psychic consequence of such experiences is the breakdown of the empathic process.
