by Emi Komatsu
It does not seem intuitive for love and work, as we understand them, to be at all related to each other—even less so as embodiments of the same concept. Likewise, Freud and Marx seem opposed to each other when it comes to their respective outlooks on society; Freud’s criticism of communism sheds much light on his radically different perspective in comparison to Marx and Engels. Despite this, their views on the relationship between the individual and society overlap much more than is apparent. Freud’s understanding of how the most primitive forms of love and pleasure are transformed by civilization accords with Marxist theories of alienated labour in such a way that we can see love as a form of such labour. He identifies the restriction and sublimation of one’s primary libidinal instinct as a significant source of the pervasive discontent seen throughout society, while Marx and Engels establish theories of the estrangement of labour and abstraction of material relationships to make a case for the struggles of the working class. Thus, the similarities between the Freudian system and Marxist theories may illuminate the prevailing factors that these seemingly opposing views name as the sources of our discontent with society. At the same time, analyzing and recontextualizing the key differences in their viewpoints can illuminate new possibilities for overcoming the factors that lead to our dissatisfaction.
The framework for love that Freud employs can be understood through the Marxist conception of human production and labour. In the beginning, Freud identifies love as one of the two main foundations of human communal life, with the compulsion to work as the other. This love is a primal sexual love, spawned from an instinctual need for genital satisfaction that Freud conjectures to be “the prototype of all happiness” and that which provides the “strongest experiences of satisfaction.”[1] Hence, the primary goal of this sexual instinct is to seek out pleasure. Likewise, the primary function of production and labour for Marx and Engels is to be a source of enjoyment—when labour is alienated, the worker “does not affirm himself . . . [and] does not feel content but unhappy.”[2] While Freud makes it seem that these foundations of work and love are two different concepts that stem from different sources, the attributes that he denotes for each apply to the other as well. On one hand, the compulsion to work does not always come from some external necessity, an example of which is our enjoyment of beauty. Freud observes “people directing their care too to what has no practical value whatsoever,” pointing towards the planting of flowers in green spaces and in homes.[3] Evidently, there is more to work than just practicality, and even Freud cannot ascertain the origin of beauty other than its “derivation from the field of sexual feeling.”[4] If this is the case, the pleasure that is sought by the sexual feeling must be found in this sort of work. Indeed, Freud comments on the “possibility [work] offers of displacing a large amount of libidinal components” and that “[p]rofessional activity is a source of special satisfaction if . . . freely chosen,” drawing another clear link between work and pleasure.[5]
On the other hand, the second foundation of communal life, love, does not come solely from the internal pleasure needs of the primitive man and woman. Sexual activity is a requirement for reproduction and the continuation of the species; Freud even remarks that civilization only tolerates it “because there is so far no substitute for it as a means of propagating the human race.”[6] Similarly, Marx and Engels also acknowledge the inherent necessities that drive labour, as production “appears [first] to man merely as a means of satisfying a need . . . to maintain the physical existence.”[7] However, they also emphasize the importance of production serving a double purpose in being the “[c]onscious life-activity” that characterizes man as a being for whom life itself is an object of the free production which affirms one’s existence as “life-engendering life.”[8] Moreover, just as pleasure and necessity exist at the same time in the act of labour, they are also present in Freud’s understanding of love in the formation of the primitive family. The woman stays with the man not only because she is “obliged, in [the] interests [of her children and herself], to remain with the stronger male,” but also “unwilling to be deprived of the part of herself which had been separated off from her [i.e., the child].”[9] This relationship of a mother to her child is very similar to that of a worker and their product, as “[t]he worker puts his life into the object [of his labour]” and can see himself in that object.[10] As such, the child can be seen as the object produced by the mother’s labour, in the form of love. But when love is alienated from this base feeling, dissatisfaction and frustration begin to brew in society.
Freud observes a “strange attitude of hostility to civilization” among those living in modern society and discovers its cause to be a restriction and alienation of the libidinal instinct that reigns over sexual feeling.[11] His account of the shaping of this instinct into other diminished forms of love by civilization corresponds with the division and estrangement of labour that intensifies and perpetuates the struggles of the proletariat. In restricting sexuality to a heteronormative and monogamous standard, society “disregards the dissimilarities . . . in the sexual constitution of human beings,” disallowing many from finding true sexual pleasure.[12] If love is a form of labour, this restriction may be seen as a division of labour in which “each man has a particular, exclusive sphere of activity, which is forced upon him and from which he cannot escape.”[13] Yet, in order for civilization to function, Freud insists there must be some form of sexual restriction so that part of the libido may be used to “strengthen the communal bond [between people] by relations of friendship.”[14] This echoes the necessity of bourgeois rule and innovation to create the conditions to “[turn t]he weapons with which the bourgeoisie felled feudalism . . . against the bourgeoisie itself” that Marx and Engels assert, despite their decrial of the lifeless and exploitative labour resulting from such circumstances.[15]
Since the ties of common work and interests are not enough for people to remain together, this libidinal instinct must be sublimated into a lesser form of love, an “‘aim-inhibited love’ or ‘affection’” that extends to those beyond one’s primary object of sexual love.[16] The sublimation of instinct is a way in which we may satiate our primal desires while still conforming to societal restrictions, but the lack of complete satisfaction implies that this aim- inhibited love must be less pleasurable than sexual love. Likewise, when labour is limited and alienated from oneself, the life-activity of the worker “appears only as a means to life” rather than life itself, and the worker “no longer feels himself to be freely active in any but his animal functions” due to the limitations placed on his production.[17] The most notable effect of this when it comes to love is the division between sexual life and cultural obligations. Freud claims this division is caused by a man’s distribution of libido, where he must “withdraw from women and sexual life” the energy that he “employs for cultural aims.”[18] As a result, one is estranged from their family much in the same way that “all family ties among the proletarians are torn asunder” by the exploitative nature of modern industry.[19]
Furthermore, even Freud’s understanding of the cultural perpetuation of this tame libidinal love accords with the abstraction of material relationships that Marx and Engels observe. Through institutions like religion, cultural priority is shifted towards the sublimated feeling by preaching universal ideals such as the Christian commandment Freud focuses on—to “love thy neighbour as thyself.”[20] While he admits there are those who can find happiness in “directing their love, not to single objects but to all men alike,” those people are a small minority; Freud sees “love thy neighbour” as something that is impossible for most people and used only as a external force to maintain society’s necessary libidinal restrictions.[21] Marx and Engels observe this as an abstraction of social relations, as the idea of a practical common interest is abstracted into an “illusory ‘general’ interest,” which is then also understood as an external entity that exercises power over the working class.[22] Indeed, they acknowledge the dual nature of alienation, where it is not only one’s labour that is separated from oneself through capitalism, but also “the spontaneous activity of the human imagination, of the human brain and … heart” which is made objective through religion.[23] Thus, these abstractions create dissonance between the vague, overarching values of society and one’s individual capabilities and material circumstances.
However, a major difference between these two systems of understanding is how the boundary between the self and the external world is formed. Marx and Engels establish that when one’s labour is least alienated from oneself, an individual will take to seeing their natural environment as a part of themself and their body in that “nature is (1) [their] direct means of life, and (2) the material, the object, and the instrument of [their] life-activity [i.e., production].”[24] In Freudian terms, the bounds of this individual’s ego have a much wider scope beyond their immediate sensuous body. While Freud acknowledges the existence of such an “all-embracing” ego-feeling in the early stages of infancy, he proposes the establishment of a tighter boundary which soon overtakes the initial ego as one discovers an inequality in the actions that can be taken to influence themself compared to those which influence the external world. An example that clearly illustrates this principle is the baby learning that the “sources of excitation …[which] can provide him with sensations at any moment” are his own body, while the “other sources [which] evade him from time to time . . . and only reappear as a result of his screaming for help” are those of the outside.[25] The other, arguably greater incentive to contract the ego from its initial state is the avoidance of “frequent, manifold and unavoidable sensations of pain and unpleasure” from a world the ego does not want to associate with.[26] This is the establishment of the reality principle, which makes “man [think] himself happy merely to have escaped unhappiness or to have survived his suffering,” as opposed to the active pleasure-seeking of the pleasure principle that it overtakes.[27] Freud treats this transformation of the ego as something absolute and rejects the Marxian idea of man as “a universal . . . being” when completely free as a part of nature, since this view fundamentally clashes with his understanding.[28]
As such, Freud criticizes communism for being unrealistic—while he agrees that “a real change in the relations of human beings to possessions” would be more beneficial than pure ethics and theory for alleviating the dissatisfaction found in civilization, Freud dismisses communism as an ideology with “a fresh idealistic misconception of human nature.”[29] He criticizes the belief that “man is wholly good and well-disposed to his neighbour,” which is somewhat of a confusing take considering there is no explicit mention of such a sentiment in the works of Marx and Engels.[30] However, it seems Freud extrapolates this principle from the assumption that a society without private property would “deprive the human love of aggression of one of its instruments,” revealing the other key idea which puts Freud in opposition to communism: the antagonistic nature of the love instinct.[31] Human communal life exists to satisfy Ananke, necessity, against the will of the libidinal instinct, which seeks only pleasure— fulfillment of the former becomes easier when individuals come together to ensure their survival as a group, but such gathering requires a suppression of the libido. Hence, Freud adopts the view which Curt Tausky defines in “Work is Desirable/Loathsome” as the pessimistic perspective of work. As an individual’s libidinal instinct must be suppressed in order for them to work to achieve the common goals of society, Freud opposes the idea that people may be naturally inclined to find pleasure in labour. He finds that the ideal he presents of finding satisfaction in one’s work is nothing but that: an ideal. Instead, he observes that “[w]ork is . . . avoided unless external prodding is present,” in such forms as necessity or “[e]conomic and/or social demands.” [32] Therefore, Freud believes that the libido is inherently asocial and will regress to a more primal and aggressive state if left unchecked.
Yet Herbert Marcuse takes this transformative analysis of the Freudian system a step further in his book Eros and Civilization, considering the development of Freud’s framework itself through a Marxian historical lens. Using Freud’s understanding of the cultural alienation of the instincts, Marcuse challenges the universality of the reality principle, the theory of the instincts, and of alienation itself to look at the plight of civilization from a different angle. Subsequently, he uses the ideas of Marx and Engels to propose a way in which the love instinct may be returned from its alienated state with little negative consequence to the overall functioning of society.
Marcuse argues the historical character of Freud’s reality principle, bringing it down from a universal principle to something subjective that reflects the society it spawns from, and can be subsequently affected by changes to that society. Reframing the reality principle in this way is crucial to truly understanding the relationship we have with the libidinal instinct, since that principle is what initially transforms it into the inhibited forms Freud observes presently.
Marcuse identifies the primary foundation of the reality principle to be “the fundamental fact of Ananke or scarcity (Lebensnot)” that presupposes a world which lacks the resources to fully satisfy human needs without necessitating work and “constant restraint, renunciation, delay” in order to continue the struggle for existence.[33] Yet, he exposes the fallacy of this simple assumption: in any sufficiently organized society, Freud’s so-called “brute fact of scarcity” is in fact a consequence of the unequal distribution of scarcity imposed upon individuals in the interest of societal domination.[34] By artificially preserving this scarcity, the dominating party (or in other words the bourgeois) forces the individual to work for it in order to satisfy their needs, thus maintaining its power. Marcuse then argues that “[t]he various modes of domination . . . may result in various historical forms . . . [which] affect the very content of the reality principle” based on the systems that may be in place to exert that domination.[35] In fact, Marcuse identifies Freud’s very way of understanding reality as another dimension in which societal domination is imposed. For instance, he asserts that “[t]he relegation of real possibilities [of libidinal disalienation]” to nothing more than an idealistic utopia “is itself an essential element” of the rationality of domination, for as soon as the subjugated masses seriously consider domination to be unnecessary, the power of the ruling class will be made irrelevant.[36] In this way, the cultural superego asserts its dominance over thought as well as action, and not only in the form of guilt— this is analogous to Marx and Engels’ viewpoint that “[t]he ideas of the ruling class are in every epoch the ruling ideas.”[37] If the conception of an antagonistic love instinct is also another artifact from this reigning ideology, then the supposed asocial nature of the love instinct as well as its regressive tendencies may be more accurately seen as an “insist[ence] on return from alienation” and rejection of domination.[38]
While the mechanism of this domination works to artificially conserve past states of scarcity and the real struggle for existence, the development of civilization under it also hints at the possibility of disalienation. Both the Marxian and Freudian systems presuppose that an individual in society is, for a vast majority of the time, alienated in their life-activity—yet Marcuse distinguishes only a part-time alienated existence during working hours, where “the rest of the time [man] is free for himself.”[39] He focuses on this free time as an instance when the individual may satisfy their pleasure-seeking instinct, providing oneself with a sort of freedom. This can be seen most clearly through imagination and art; the fantasies one imagines for the sake of pleasure may be less fictitious and more of an “‘unconscious memory’ of the [failed] liberation [of repressed instincts]” which is brough into reality by art.[40] Yet, through the governance of aesthetic principles, “the critical function of art [as a medium of liberation] is self-defeating” as art becomes commodified for the enjoyment of others rather than for self- expression.[41]
Thus, this is only freedom by “negation of unfreedom,” a temporary return from alienation, rather than a complete transformation of the root cause of such unfreedom.[42] This time for pleasure serves to negate the dissatisfaction of domination such that “[r]epression disappears in the grand objective order of things which [adequately] rewards . . . the complying individuals.”[43] Tausky argues that this is a fully tenable model when it comes to keeping people at work. Taking for example the ”productive vigor” of Japanese employees, he concludes that it is more a combination of “social control . . . [with] emphasis on duty, obligation, perseverance, and group harmony” and tangible rewards like income bonuses rather than intrinsic motivation which drives this work ethic.[44] However, a key drawback that Tausky regards more lightly than Freud or Marx is the fact that “the Japanese rank lower on work satisfaction than do U.S. workers” despite their greater productivity.[45]
Tausky’s observations about extrinsic motivation to work may accord with Marcuse’s analysis of the negation of unfreedom, but the latter ultimately adopts the more optimistic Marxist view, proposing the possibility of complete libidinal disalienation. Acknowledging the inherent need for a certain degree of restriction upon the instincts in order to overcome the initial struggle for existence, Marcuse brings attention to the ego, as transformed by civilization, “experienc[ing] each existential condition as a restraint that has to be overcome,” conquering its needs through the development of society.[46] Eventually civilization will advance enough such that reality “loses its seriousness” when “wants and needs can be satisfied without alienated labor,” transforming human life into an existence of abundance rather than scarcity.[47]
Thus, the pain of Freud’s reality principle is minimized, if not outright eliminated, and the development of the ego begins to look much more like that of Marx and Engels’ universal individual. This abundance also presupposes the abolition of cultural domination and the unequal distribution of scarcity, so that the love instinct may fully return to the self. Since it is scarcity and necessity which turn the libido against social activity—along with the repression imposed by domination—the love instinct is no longer antagonistic to communal life. Marcuse believes that the material circumstances for this type of society have already been met; the only factor that is stopping us from achieving this mature state of civilization is the continued domination of the ruling elite. If we can topple the power that keeps society held in the past, our future as a species may be one of abundance and pleasure rather than toil and pain.
Endnotes
[1] Sigmund Freud, Civilization and Its Discontents, ed. and trans. James Strachey (New York: W. W. Norton, 2010), 80.
[2] Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, The Marx-Engels Reader, ed. Robert C. Tucker (New York: W. W. Norton, 1978), 74.
[3] Freud, Civilization and Its Discontents, 67.
[4] Ibid., 53.
[5] Ibid., 49n5.
[6] Ibid., 86.
[7] Marx and Engels, The Marx-Engels Reader, 75-6.
[8] Ibid., 76.
[9] Freud, Civilization and Its Discontents, 78, 80.
[10] Marx and Engels, The Marx-Engels Reader, 72.
[11] Freud, Civilization and Its Discontents, 58.
[12] Ibid., 85.
[13] Marx and Engels, The Marx-Engels Reader, 160.
[14] Freud, Civilization and Its Discontents, 90.
[15] Marx and Engels, The Marx-Engels Reader, 478.
[16] Freud, Civilization and Its Discontents, 82.
[17] Marx and Engels, The Marx-Engels Reader, 74.
[18] Freud, Civilization and Its Discontents, 84.
[19] Marx and Engels, The Marx-Engels Reader, 487-8.
[20] Freud, Civilization and Its Discontents, 91.
[21] Ibid., 81.
[22] Marx and Engels, The Marx-Engels Reader, 161.
[23] Ibid., 74.
[24] Ibid., 75.
[25] Freud, Civilization and Its Discontents, 27-8.
[26] Ibid., 28.
[27] Ibid., 44.
[28] Marx and Engels, The Marx-Engels Reader, 75.
[29] Freud, Civilization and Its Discontents, 146.
[30] Ibid., 96.
[31] Ibid., 97.
[32] Curt Tausky, “Work is Desirable/Loathsome: Marx versus Freud,” Work and Occupations 19, no. 1 (February 1992): 7.
[33] Herbert Marcuse, Eros and Civilization: A Philosophical Inquiry into Freud (1955; repr., Boston: Beacon Press, 1974), 35.
[34] Ibid., 36.
[35] Ibid., 37.
[36] Ibid., 150.
[37] Marx and Engels, The Marx-Engels Reader, 172.
[38] Marcuse, Eros and Civilization, 109.
[39] Ibid., 47.
[40] Ibid., 144.
[41] Ibid., 144.
[42] Ibid., 144.
[43] Ibid., 46.
[44] Tausky, “Work is Desirable/Loathsome,” 13.
[45] Ibid., 14.
[46] Marcuse, Eros and Civilization, 110.
[47] Ibid., 188.
Bibliography
Freud, Sigmund. Civilization and Its Discontents. Edited and translated by James Strachey. New York: W. W. Norton, 2010.
Marcuse, Herbert. Eros and Civilization: A Philosophical Inquiry into Freud. 1955. Reprint, with a new preface by the author. Boston: Beacon Press, 1974.
Marx, Karl, and Engels, Friedrich. The Marx-Engels Reader. Edited by Robert C. Tucker. 2nd ed. New York: W. W. Norton, 1978.
Tausky, Curt. “Work is Desirable/Loathsome: Marx versus Freud.” Work and Occupations 19, no. 1 (February 1992): 3–17.