Civilization and Its Discontents

Civilization and Its Discontents

By: Sigmund Freud  

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Average Customer Rating: 4.0 out of 5

Civilization and Its Discontents may be Sigmund Freud's best-known work. Originally published in 1930, it seeks to answer ultimate questions: What influences led to the creation of civilization? How did it come to be? What determines its course? In this seminal volume of twentieth-century thought, Freud elucidates the contest between aggression, indeed the death drive, and its adversary eros. He speaks to issues of human creativity and fulfillment, the place of beauty in culture, and the effects of repression.

Louis Menand, author of the Pulitzer Prize-winning The Metaphysical Club, contributor to The New Yorker, and professor of English at Harvard University, reflects on the importance of this work in intellectual thought and why it has become such a landmark book for the history of ideas.

Not available in hardcover for decades, this beautifully rendered anniversary edition will be a welcome addition to readers' shelves.

Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company

Customer Review: 5 out of 5
Western civilization is part of our unconscious mental history as well - This was required reading for a graduate course in the Humanities.
Sigmund Freud's "Civilization and Its Discontents," written in 1930, was his attempt at using his theories of psychoanalysis to observe and critique the psychological affect Western civilization had on the human subject. In his book, Freud sets the stage for his analysis by comparing the development of Western civilization with the development of the individual. In a sense, Freud is using Darwin's evolutionary theory to link social constructs and psychic constructs (Freud 3-9).

In essence, Freud postulated that the history of Western civilization is part of our unconscious mental history as well. Since Freud had an extensive classical education, it is no wonder that his works were replete with classical analogies. In this book, Freud relied on the city of Rome to represent the historical birthplace of society, and to explain the ill effects civilization had on the human psyche. Rome has been destroyed and rebuilt, in situ, numerous times since its founding. Rome contains ruins from all its previous eras, which allows one to observe every stage of its developmental history and character. Thus, Freud uses Rome as a metaphor for the observation of the developmental process in the human psyche. Similar to Rome, our unconscious psyche possesses ruins and traces of the past, which make up the structure of the mind as well. The mind is the repository for all of its earlier stages of development and it allows them to coexist with the latest stages of development. By using Rome as his metaphor for psychic development in both the subject and humankind, Freud is answering the criticism that was often leveled against psychoanalysis. Freud's psychoanalytical theories often came under criticism for depending too heavily on the psychological traits of the individual without taking into account the interaction of individuals within society.

Freud believed that the individual would always find it hard to feel content with life in civilization, because unbeknownst to the individual, the individual was under tremendous pressure from their unconscious guilt. Thus, civilization acted as a kind of superego; its conscience, repressing the individual's unconscious desires manifested by their id (Freud 86). What Freud theorized, was that in a sense, civilization, had a life of its own and that it had to control and punish the individual's two great primal instincts in order for civilization to survive and flourish (Freud 69). The two primal instincts are: 1) the death instinct, which in Greek is Thanatos, where one's aggressive impulses reside; and 2) Eros, which is his name for the life instinct or sex drive, also known as the libido. Both Thanatos and Eros reside within an individual's unconscious id and are in a constant state of struggle with each other. In fact, Freud believed that the history of civilization was a struggle between Thanatos and Eros (Freud 80-82). Thus, civilization acting as a superego and protecting itself from destruction, represses humankind's death instinct towards each other through the implementation of authoritative agencies, religion, and by enacting laws (Freud 36, 69, 73-74). Thus, aggression is turned inward towards the individual's ego and forms a person's "conscience," giving the individual their sense of guilt and frustration with life in civilized society (Freud 82-84). Therefore, civilization, acting as the superego, subdues the individuals death instinct; "...setting up an agency within him to watch over it, like a garrison in a conquered city" (Freud 84).

Recommended reading for anyone interested in psychology, philosophy, and history.

Customer Review: 5 out of 5
So Much to Think About - Not a thick book, but one that took me a month to read through and understand and I feel I'm the better for it. I'd heard so much about Sigmund Freud, but I'd never actually read him before. No matter what you may think about him, the man was brilliant and his work will stimulate your grey cells. So much to think about in such a small volume.

Customer Review: 4 out of 5
To Synthesize Duality - A good book though a little wordy at times. Follows a train of thought from time to time just to illustrate that it's a dead end. Does it a lot to be honest.
The struggle to transform the inner primate into the higher being and all the twists and turns that lead men astray. To supress, to deny, to self-loathe, the fear of acceptance. "Civilization and Its Discontents" discusses the very dilemna of humanity's persistent emptiness and seemingly futile attempts to become an "enlightened" race and proposes the idea that the answer may very well lie in a simplistic new perception of where we come from and where we are going.
A satisfying read that I would recommend to anyone intrusted in the study of psychology/sociology and the dynamic evolution of consciousness.

Customer Review: 5 out of 5
This book changed my life - I read this book at age 18 after getting interested in psychiatry by an author named Karl Menninger. Freud's essay, Civilization and Its Discontents, has had the greatest impact on my life out of any book or experience. Within this short book he had taken my whole view of the world, turned it upside-down, and added an exclamation point. To understand this book doesn't require great intellectual power but rather mental capacity. I would add almost as a warning that Freud's implied philosophy is almost conducive to depression in a maladjusted mind. If you want hope or faith, this is not for you. Regardless, everybody should read this book.

Customer Review: 4 out of 5
prophetic - Whether you agree with Freud's psychoanalytical theories or not, there is no dispute over his intelligence, insight, and his eloquence. In this short book, he explains the conflicts civilization process created in individual psyche. Basically, he argues that the civilization's aim in uniting community in order to avoid sources of suffering imposes restrictions on individual liberty (of origin is libido--pleasure principle) which becomes the main source of discontents. He also warns about the danger of a powerful group with control over the force of nature which can potentially eliminate some human beings, which is rather prophetic considering the Nazi's presenct in Europe shortly after publication of this book. His logic is very tight according his main theories (structural theory, mainly), and writing is precise and eloquent. Just Brilliant.

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