ABSTRACT
Most dictionaries define conscience as an inner faculty or voice that distinguishes right from wrong and generates guilt when people choose the latter. Prior to widespread secularization in the West, conscience was considered a manifestation of the divine, the Vox Dei, in an otherwise “fallen” human nature. With the Enlightenment and the rise of secular social science, conscience came to be seen as a social product, a manifestation in the individual psyche of social norms internalized in socialization. In identifying conscience with the superego, Freud made it a social product, an embodiment of the normative, rather than a moral force capable of conflicting with and morally challenging the social norms. Freud’s collapsing of the distinction between superego and conscience made it difficult for people to conceive of, let alone study, conflicts between them.
