What Use for Civilization and Its Discontents Today?

In Civilization and Its Discontents, Sigmund Freud introduced fundamental psychoanalytic hypotheses about the relationship between social structure and the psyche, including the psychopathology of the neuroses. Freud hypothesized that the repression of sexual and aggressive drives demanded by civilization led to the development of neurosis. While Freud’s theory of a relationship of social formations and psychic formations remains invaluable, postmodern society is different in distinctive ways from Freud’s Victorian society. Changes in social structure, particularly the dominance of the symbolic order that characterized Freud’s era, can be articulated with new psychic structures today and new forms of suffering.