On destructive drive phenomena: a study of human aggression

Abstract

The author approaches human aggression from the viewpoint of extreme psychic trauma in which the ego is left defenceless at the mercy of crude drive phenomena. This emergency signifies the collapse of the capacity for psychic representation and for dealing with drive impulses at the metaphorical level. After this collapse, the pleasure principle will be replaced by another mode of psychic regulation to which Freud provided a theoretical description in his Beyond the pleasure principle. The present paper as a whole can be seen as a commentary on Freud's dualistic drive theory in the light of a clinical case in which destructive drive phenomena led to fatal consequences. The notion of the death drive becomes related to early psychic trauma, which tends to be repeated throughout life. The author suggests that repetition compulsion basically represents an instinctual tendency towards restitution of normal psychic functioning based on primary identification. The primary task of psychoanalytic treatment is to create the preconditions for the restitution of this early configuration, which forms a human frame of reference for the psychic integration of aggression and ambivalence rooted in the individual's vital dependence on another human being as well as on one s own bodily functions.