instincts to adapt to a changing world; instead, they
Erich Fromm
Humanistic Psychoanalysis
Biography
• Childhood experience that shaped his life: Jewish
Family Life, Suicide of a young woman, extreme
nationalism of Germany
• Heavily influenced by Freud, Marx, Old Testament.
• His first wife was Freida Reichmann (his analyst), 10
years older than him.
• Had a relationship with Karen Horney, who was 15
years older than Fromm.
• He later married Henny Gurland. 2 years younger than
him, she died in 1952.
He then married again a year later to Annis Freeman.
• Fromm died on March 18, 1980, a few days before his
80th birthday.
• He was an eloquent essayist.
Overview of Humanistic Psychoanalysis
• Erich Fromm's basic thesis is that modern- day people
have been torn away from their prehistoric union with
nature and also with one another, yet they have the
power of reasoning, foresight, and imagination.
• Self-awareness contributes to feelings of loneliness,
isolation, and homelessness.
• To escape from these feelings, people strive to
become reunited with nature and with their fellow
human beings.
Overview
• His humanistic psychoanalysis assumes that
humanity's separation from the natural world has
produced feelings of loneliness and isolation, a
condition called basic anxiety
• A more recent event in human history has been the
rise of capitalism, which on one hand has contributed to
the growth of leisure time and personal freedom, but on
the other hand, it has resulted in feelings of anxiety,
isolation, and powerlessness
• The isolation wrought by capitalism has been
unbearable, leaving people with two alternatives:
➔ to escape from freedom into interpersonal
dependencies
➔ to move to self-realization through productive
love and work.
Fromm's Basic Assumption
Human Dilemma - Fromm (1947) believed that humans,
unlike other animals, have been "torn away" from their
prehistoric union with nature. They have no powerful
have acquired the facility to reason.
• Curse and Blessing of Reason - Blessing since we
became more efficient in surviving, it's a curse because
it forces human beings to solve the unsolvable
dichotomies of life which are called Existential
Dichotomies
Existential Dichotomies
• Life and Death - Self-awareness and reason tell us that
we will die, but we try to negate this dichotomy by
postulating life after death, an attempt that does not
alter the fact that our lives end with death. Futile
attempt to solve these two
• Humans are capable of conceptualizing the goal of
complete self-realization, but we also are aware that life
is too short to reach that goal.
• The third existential dichotomy is that people are
ultimately alone, yet we cannot tolerate isolation.
Existential Needs
• As animals, humans are motivated by such
physiological needs as hunger, sex, and safety; but they
can never resolve their human dilemma by satisfying
these animal needs. Only the distinctive human needs
can move people toward a reunion with the natural
world
• These existential needs have emerged during the
evolution of human culture, growing out of their
attempts to find an answer to their existence and to
avoid becoming insane.
• Healthy people are those who found meaning to their
existence and neurotic people are those who are still
confused about their existence.
• Healthy individuals are better able to find ways of
reuniting to the world by productively solving the
human needs of relatedness, transcendence,
rootedness, a sense of identity, and a frame of
orientation
Relatedness
Relatedness - the drive for union with another person
or other persons. Three ways to relate to the world:
• Submission (Negative) - A person can submit to
another, to a group, or to an institution in order to
become one with the world.
• Domination (Negative) - domineering people, power
seekers welcome submissive partners.
• When a submissive person and a domineering person
find each other, they frequently establish a symbiotic
relationship, one that is satisfying to both partners.
• Although such symbiosis may be gratifying, it blocks
growth toward integrity and psychological health.
• Similar to the concept of codependence
• Love (Positive) - the only route by which a person can
become united with the world and, at the same time,
achieve individuality and integrity
• He defined love as a "union with somebody, or
something outside oneself under the condition of
retaining the separateness and integrity of one's own
self"
• In love, two people become one yet remain two.
Transcendence
• Transcendence - defined as the urge to rise above a
passive and accidental existence and into "the realm of
purposefulness and freedom". There are two ways to
transcend.
• Destruction (Negative) - we can transcend life by
destroying it and thus rising above our slain victims
• Malignant Aggression - only humans can kill others
for reasons other than survival
• Creation (Positive) - Although other animals can create
life through reproduction, only humans are aware of
themselves as creators.
• Also, humans can be creative in other ways. They can
create art, religions, ideas, laws, material production,
and love.
Rootedness
• Rootedness - the need to establish roots or to feel at
home again in the world. There are two ways to feel our
home again.
• Independence from Mother (Positive)- people are
weaned from the orbit of their
mother and become fully born; that is, they actively and
creatively relate to the
world and become whole or integrated.
• Fixation (Negative) - a tenacious reluctance to move
beyond the protective security provided by one's
mother. People who strive for rootedness through
fixation are "afraid to take the next step of birth, to be
weaned from the mother's breast. [They]... have a deep
craving to be mothered, nursed, protected by a motherly
figure; they are the externally dependent ones, who are
frightened and insecure when motherly protection is
withdrawn"
Rootedness (Fixation)
• Fromm believed that incestual desire is universal but
not sexual in nature. Incestuous feelings are based in
"the deep-seated craving to remain in, or to return to,
the all- enveloping womb, or to the all-nourishing
breasts."
• He believed that ancients societies are matriarchal
and this tendency of Fromm to revere mother figures is
evident in his relationship with women.
Sense of Identity
• Sense of Identity - the capacity to be aware of
ourselves as a separate entity. Because we have been
torn away from nature, we need to form a concept of
our self, to be able to say, "I am I," or "I am the subject
of my actions."
• Without a sense of identity, people could not retain
their sanity, and this threat provides a powerful
motivation to do almost anything to acquire a sense of
identity. There are two ways to achieve this
• Adjustment to a Group (Negative) - Neurotics try to
attach themselves to powerful people or to social or
political institutions.
• Individuality (Positive) - Healthy people, however,
have less need to conform to the herd, less need to give
up their sense of self.
• They do not have to surrender their freedom and
individuality in order to fit into society because they
possess an authentic sense of identity.
Frame of Orientation
• Frame of Orientation - Being split off from nature,
humans need a road map, a frame of orientation, to
make their way through the world.
• Without such a map, humans would be "confused and
unable to act purposefully and consistently". Basically, a
philosophy in life.
• Irrational Goals (Negative) - those who lack a reliable
frame of orientation will strive to put these events into
some sort of framework in order to make sense of
them.
• People will do nearly anything to acquire and retain a
frame of orientation, even to the extreme of following
irrational or bizarre philosophies such as those
espoused by fanatical political and religious leaders
• Rational Goals (Positive) - People who possess a solid
frame of orientation can make sense of these events
and phenomena.
• According to Fromm, this goal or object of devotion
focuses people's energies in a single direction, enables
us to transcend our isolated existence, and confers
meaning to their lives.
Existential Needs
• Fromm believed that lack of satisfaction of any of
these needs is unbearable and results in insanity.
• Existential needs is the Basic Hostility of Fromm's
Theory.
• Same with Basic Hostility, it also breeds Basic Anxiety
• Some people solve this Basic Anxiety by subordinating
or being subordinated by people or Positive Freedom.
• Most people choose the former rather than the latter.
Why?
Burden of Freedom
• Historically, as people gained more and more
economic and political freedom, they came to feel
increasingly more isolated.
• In the past, the moment you were born, you already
had the role of being an artisan, blacksmith, laborer,
king, queen, nobleman/noblewoman, warrior, scholar,
etc. which is more or less forced on you.
• Nowadays, we have so much freedom to choose what
we want to become and where we want to be. We
became separated from their roots and isolated from
one another.
• On a more personal level, As children become more
independent of their mothers, they gain more freedom
to express their individuality, to move around
unsupervised, to choose their friends, clothes, and so
on.
• On both a social and an individual level, this burden of
freedom results in basic anxiety, the feeling of being
alone in the world.
• Freedom is too tiring, exhausting and daunting that is
why people unconsciously desire to escape from it.
Mechanisms of Escape
• Mechanisms of Escape - Because basic anxiety
produces a frightening sense of isolation and aloneness,
people attempt to flee from freedom through a variety
of escape mechanisms. Fromm's mechanisms of escape
are the driving forces in normal people, both
individually and collectively. There are three primary
mechanisms of escape
• Authoritarianism, Destructiveness, Conformity,
Positive Freedom
Authoritarianism
• Authoritarianism - the "tendency to give up the
independence of one's own individual self and to fuse
one's self with somebody or something outside oneself,
in order to acquire the strength which the individual is
lacking". Can manifest in two forms:
• Masochism results from basic feelings of
powerlessness, weakness, and inferiority and is aimed
at joining the self to a more powerful person or
institution.
• Sadism is aimed at reducing basic anxiety through
achieving unity with another person or persons. Three
kinds of sadistic tendencies:
Authoritarianism - sadism
• the need to make others dependent on oneself and to
gain power over those who are weak
• the compulsion to exploit others, to take advantage of
them, and to use them for one's benefit or pleasure.
• the desire to see others suffer, either physically or
psychologically.
Destructiveness
• Destructiveness - Unlike sadism and masochism,
however, destructiveness does not depend on a
continuous relationship with another person; rather, it
seeks to do away with other people.
• Both individuals and nations can employ
destructiveness as a mechanism of escape (WORLD
WARS)
• Destroying in an individual level is more like being
aggressive to them (Karens)
Conformity
• Conformity - People who conform try to escape from a
sense of aloneness and isolation by giving up their
individuality and becoming whatever other people
desire them to be.
• People in the modern world are free from many
external bonds and are free to act according to their
own will, but at the same time, they do not know what
they want, think, or feel.
• We are free to do what we want, but we are also free
to do what others want us to do.
Positive Freedom
• Positive Freedom - A person "can be free and not
alone, critical and yet not filled with doubts,
independent and yet an integral part of mankind", a
spontaneous and full expression of both their rational
and their emotional potentialities.
• Positive freedom represents a successful solution to
the human dilemma of being part of the natural world
and yet separate from it.
• Through active love and work, humans unite with one
another and with the world without sacrificing their
integrity. They affirm their uniqueness as individuals and
achieve full realization of their potentialities.
Character Orientations
• Character orientations - Similar with Horney's
Neurotic trends, it is defined as the way a person relate
to the world in response to how a person solves his/her
existential dilemma and existential needs that comes
with it.
• Character - "the relatively permanent system of all
noninstinctual strivings through which man relates
himself to the human and natural world"
• Characterized into two: Nonproductive and Productive

Nonproductive Orientation
• Nonproductive Orientations - Fromm used the term
"nonproductive" to suggest strategies that fail to move
people closer to positive freedom and self- realization.
• Personality is always a blend or combination of several
orientations, even though one orientation is dominant.
Receptive Character
• Receptive - Receptive characters feel that the source
of all good lies outside themselves and that the only
way they can relate to the world is to receive things,
including love, knowledge, and material possessions.
• The negative qualities - passivity, submissiveness, and
lack of self-confidence.
• Positive traits - loyalty, acceptance, and trust.
Exploitative Character
• Exploitative - exploitative characters believe that the
source of all good is outside themselves. They
aggressively take what they desire rather than passively
receive it. They steal people, ideas and other properties
from other people just for the joy of it.
• Negative traits - exploitative characters are
egocentric, conceited, arrogant, and seducing
• Positive traits - Impulsive, proud, charming, and
self-confident.
Hoarding Character
• Hoarding - hoarding characters seek to save that
which they have already obtained. They hold everything
inside and do not let go of anything. They keep money,
feelings, and thoughts to themselves. They do not like
change.
• Almost the same with Anal Personality
• Negative Traits - rigidity, sterility, obstinacy,
compulsivity, and lack of creativity
• Positive Traits - orderliness, cleanliness, and
punctuality.
Marketing Character
• Marketing - marketing characters see themselves as
commodities, with their personal value dependent on
their exchange value, that is, their ability to sell
themselves. Their personal security rests on shaky
ground because they must adjust their personality to
that which is currently in fashion.
• Marketing people are without a past or a future and
have no permanent principles or values.
• They have fewer positive traits than the other
orientations because they are basically empty vessels
waiting to be filled with whatever characteristic is most
marketable.
• We see the influence of Karl Marx here
(galit sa kapitalismo si lolo Fromm)
• Negative Traits - aimless, opportunistic, inconsistent,
and wasteful.
• Positive Traits - changeability, open-mindedness,
adaptability, and generosity.
Productive Orientation
• The single productive orientation has three
dimensions-working, loving, and reasoning.
• Only through productive activity can people solve the
basic human dilemma: that is, to unite with the world
and with others while retaining uniqueness and
individuality
• Healthy people value work not as an end in itself, but
as a means of creative self- expression.
• They do not work to exploit others, to market
themselves, to withdraw from others, or to accumulate
needless material possessions. They are neither lazy nor
compulsively active, but use work as a means of
producing life's necessities.
• Productive love is characterized by the four qualities
of love discussed earlier-care, responsibility, respect,
and knowledge.
• Biophilia - a passionate love of life and all that is alive.
Biophilic people desire to further all life-the life of
people, animals, plants, ideas, and cultures. They are
concerned with the growth and development of
themselves as well as others.
• Fromm believed that love of others and self-love are
inseparable but that selflove must come first. All people
have the capacity for productive love, but most do not
achieve it
• Productive thinking, which cannot be separated from
productive work and love, is motivated by a concerned
interest in another person or object. Healthy people see
others as they are and not as they would wish them to
be. Similarly, they know themselves for who they are
and have no need for self-delusion.
• Fromm (1947) believed that healthy people rely on
some combination of all five- character orientations.
Their survival as healthy individuals depend on their
ability to receive things from other people, to take
things when appropriate, to preserve things, to
exchange things, and to work, love, and think
productively.
• Syndrome of Growth - People with biophilia, love,
positive freedom
Personality Disorders
• Personality Disorders - If healthy people are able to
work, love, and think productively, then unhealthy
personalities are marked by problems in these three
areas, especially failure to love productively.
Necrophilia
• Necrophilia - Fromm (1964, 1973) used necrophilia in
a more generalized sense to denote any attraction to
death. Necrophilia is an alternative character
orientation to biophilia.
• Necrophilic personalities hate humanity; they are
racists, warmongers, and bullies; they love bloodshed,
destruction, terror, and torture; and they delight in
destroying life.
They are strong advocates of law and order; love to talk
about sickness, death, and burials; and they are
fascinated by dirt, decay, corpses, and feces.
Malignant Narcissism
• Malignant Narcissism - in its malignant form,
narcissism impedes the perception of reality so that
everything belonging to a narcissistic person is highly
valued and everything belonging to another is devalued
• Preoccupation with one's body often leads to
hypochondriasis, or an obsessive attention to one's
health.
• Fromm (1964) also discussed moral hypochondriasis,
or a preoccupation with guilt
about previous transgressions.
Narcissistic people possess what Horney (see
Incestuous Symbiosis
• Incestuous Symbiosis - an extreme dependence on the
mother or mother surrogate. People are inseparable
from the host person; their personalities are blended
with the other person and their individual identities are
lost.
• Fromm agreed more with Harry Stack Sullivan (see
Chapter 8) than with Freud in suggesting that
attachment to the mother rests on the need for security
and not for sex.
• People living in incestuous symbiotic relationships feel
extremely anxious and frightened if that relationship is
threatened. They believe that they cannot live without
their mother substitute.
• The host need not be another human-it can be a
family, a business, a church, or a nation
Syndrome of Decay
• Syndrome of Decay - Some pathologic individuals
possess all three personality disorders; that is, they are
attracted to death (necrophilia), take pleasure in
destroying those whom they regard as inferiors
(malignant narcissism), and possess a neurotic symbiotic
relationship with their mother or mother substitute
(incestuous symbiosis).
Psychotherapy
• Psychotherapy - Compared with Freud, Fromm was
much more concerned with the interpersonal aspects of
a therapeutic encounter. He believed that the aim of
therapy is for patients to come to know themselves.
• Fromm believed that patients come to therapy seeking
satisfaction of their basic human needs-relatedness,
transcendence, rootedness, a sense of identity, and a
frame of orientation. Therefore, therapy should be built
on a personal relationship between therapist and
patient.
• Because accurate communication is essential to
therapeutic growth, the therapist must relate "as one
human being to another with utter concentration and
utter sincerity"
• His dream analysis is almost the same with Jung with
its cultural/mythological interpretations
• The therapist should not view the patient as an illness
or a thing but as a person with the same human needs
that all people possess.
Fromm's Method of Investigation
• Same with Jung, he also studied many fields in
humanities including sociology, psychohistory and
cultural anthropology.
• Social Character in a Mexican Village - he found out
that marketing character is not present here since
capitalism was not yet heavily influenced by capitalism.
• Psychohistory of Hitler - According to Fromm, Hitler is
the embodiment of syndrome of decay
Critique of Fromm
• Falsifiability of course you know the drill since this is
based in psychoanalysis
• Did not generate much research
• Organizes knowledge well since it is covers much
about human personality
• Guide to action is almost the same with Jung, it is
challenging but far from practical
• Internally consistency is a bit clunky due to unclear
definition of some concepts/terms
• Parsimony is low, same with Jung.
Concept of Humanity
• Determinism and Free will - middle ground
• Pessimistic and Optimistic - middle ground
• Causality and Teleology - slightly on teleology
• Conscious and unconscious - Middle ground
• Social influence and biology - slightly on social
influence
• Similarity and uniqueness - moderately on similarity