Erich Fromm
Erich Fromm (1900-1980) was born on March 23, 1900, in Frankfurt am Main, Germany. He received his doctor’s degree in psychology from the University of Heidelberg in 1922 and also studied at the University of Munich and at the Psycho-Analytic Institute in Berlin. In 1925 Fromm began practicing analysis as a follower of Sigmund Freud. Although he always regarded himself as essentially a Freudian psychoanalyst he soon had objections to the Freudian concentration on unconscious drives and its neglect of the influence of economic and social factors on the human mind.
Fromm moved to the United States in 1934 but was ostracised by supporters of Freud because of his unorthodox views. He taught at Columbia University, Bennington College in Vermont, the National Autonomous University of Mexico, and Yale, Michigan State, and New York universities. He also lectured worldwide. One of Fromm ‘s major contributions to psychoanalysis was his confrontational practice, in which he actively pursued patients’ insights into their own conditions in a one-on-one situation. The technique conflicted with the Freudian ideal of the analyst’s role as passive and noncommittal.
A psychoanalyst and social philosopher, Erich Fromm studied the emotional problems common in free societies. He incorporated the effects that economic and social factors have on human behaviour into his concept of Freudian psychoanalysis. Fromm believed that social and historical forces influence human problems, whereas Freudians emphasise unconscious drives rather than the effects of social and economic factors.
Fromm wrote 20 books dealing with such topics as political philosophy, human nature, ethics, and love. His books include ‘Escape from Freedom ‘, published in 1941, ‘Man for Himself’ (1947), ‘The Sane Society’ (1955), ‘The Art of Loving’ (1956), and ‘The Crisis of Psychoanalysis’ (1970). He died on March 18, 1980, in Muralto, Switzerland.
Erich Fromm was a Freudian trained psychoanalyst who was also heavily influenced by Karl Marx. Where before him social scientists and psychoanalysts worked as separate and discrete disciplines Fromm transcended both fields and linked their work together. He described how socio-economic conditions and structures mould our personalities, and how our personalities, in turn, guide our destinies.
Fromm's 1941 treatise Escape from Freedom was among the first to look at a Western society in comprehensive detail. The appendix to Escape from Freedom was perhaps the earliest to formulate how class conditions affect psychology. It did so in a sufficiently sophisticated way to show psychotherapists how it could be useful in their work. Fromm described the connections between specific social practices and their personality manifestations in a Western social class group – this case Nazism in Germany.
Karl Marx's social ideas powerfully informed Fromm's work. Among the clinically useful results was a special alertness to social class differentiations. Fromm proposed that occupational and status differences are associated with different kinds of socialisations and hence with different sorts of personality and did so in sufficient detail to be useful to clinicians. He observed, for example, that "people with a different kind of character structure would hardly understand what a person setting forth such aims of another social group was talking about even if they understood his language" (E. Fromm, 1941, p. 277).
Fromm defined social character as "that part of the character structure that is common to most members of the group ... Different societies or classes within a society, have a specific social character" (Fromm, 1941, p. 280). That definition clearly points to the connection between people and a wide range of influences.
In his books and articles after 1941, Man for Himself (1947), Fromm expanded his views on social character. He translated Freudian psychosexual classifications such as anal and oral personalities, into portraits of the hoarding and receptive orientations (Grey 1992).
Fromm also challenged Freudian concepts of the role of the analyst as passive and noncommittal. One of Fromm 's major contributions to psychoanalysis was his confrontational practice, in which he actively pursued patients' insights into their own conditions in a one-on-one situation.
Erich Fromm’s work gave the Life Orientation™ Model key elements of its structure:
In his ground breaking book Man for Himself (1947) Fromm took Freudian concepts of character traits, which underlie but are not the same as behaviours, and developed an explanation of human behaviour which was rational and placed the person in the context of social and historical influences.
Fromm moved away from the emphasis on the instinctive and biological aspects of personality, feeling that it failed to recognise that people are the products of the society in which they live. He considered personality to be shaped more by the people, society and the culture surrounding the individual than by that individual’s biological needs. He placed less emphasis than Freud on the controlling power of the unconscious, believing that people are more rational in their planning and decisions. He did however acknowledge that the character traits, which drive individual behaviours might operate almost entirely at an unconscious level for some individuals.
In Man for Himself Fromm developed the concept of an orientation to life, which heavily influences each person’s behaviours. He developed a sense of a productive orientation and a non-productive set of orientations, which he describes in the book.
“These orientations by which the individual relates himself to the world constitute the core of his character;” (Page 59)
He also developed a concept described in the Life Orientations® Model as the Strength-Weakness Paradox i.e. that the character drives of each orientation when used appropriately produce positive or productive behaviours but, paradoxically when used to excess or inappropriately, the same drives produce negative or unproductive behaviours.
From the beginning of the 1960’s, Atkins and Katcher worked from these ideas, which struck them as being particularly relevant to the experiences they had had. In Allan Katcher’s words, “we could focus on identifying the strengths and talents each person possessed and then try to determine the sets of conditions and circumstances in which these strengths changed from productive to excessive applications. By recognising the differential reactions, presumably people could learn, through various kinds of awareness training, to control the excesses and modulate their responses so that behaviour could be more constructively redirected and focused. This could be done despite the fact that it had been thrown off track by whatever stress the person had been experiencing.”
Fromm’s orientations are described as the:
Fromm rejected the concept that man is lazy by nature. Hence he developed the productive orientation. This is, in Fromm’s concept “…the fully developed character that is the aim of human development and simultaneously the ideal of humanistic ethics.” Fromm sees human existence as “..characterised by the fact that man is alone and separated from the world;” The productive orientation seeks to relate man to his world and to preserve his independence.
Key elements of the orientation are productive love and productive thinking. Productive love includes care, responsibility and respect[1] for the other person. Productive thinking is rooted in reason rather than intelligence. It essentially “ …penetrates through the surface of things in order to discover their essence, hidden relationships and deeper meanings, their ‘reason’.” He includes both subjective and objective reactions in his concept of productive thinking, which he describes as a polarity that is “characteristic of productiveness in general.”
Receptive Orientation |
|
|
Positive aspect |
Negative aspect |
| accepting | passive, without initiative |
| responsive | opinionless, characterless |
| devoted | submissive |
| modest | without pride |
| charming | parasitical |
| adaptable | unprincipled |
| socially adjusted | servile, without self-confidence |
| idealistic | unrealistic |
| sensitive | cowardly |
| polite | spineless |
| optimistic | wishful thinking |
| trusting | gullible |
| tender | sentimental |
Exploitative Orientation (Taking) |
|
| Positive aspect | Negative aspect |
| active | exploitative |
| able to take initiative | aggressive |
| able to make claims | egocentric |
| proud | conceited |
| impulsive | rash |
| self-confident | arrogant |
| captivating | seducing |
Hoarding Orientation (Preserving) |
|
| Positive aspect | Negative aspect |
| practical | unimaginative |
| economical | stingy |
| reserved | suspicious |
| careful | cold |
| patient | lethargic |
| cautious | anxious |
| steadfast, tenacious | stubborn |
| imperturbable | indolent |
| composed under stress | inert |
| orderly | pedantic |
| methodical | obsessional |
| loyal | possessive |
Marketing Orientation (Exchanging) |
|
| Positive aspect | Negative aspect |
| purposeful | opportunistic |
| able to change | inconsistent |
| youthful | childish |
| forward looking | without a future or a past |
| open-minded | without principle and values |
| social | unable to be alone |
| experimenting | aimless |
| undogmatic | relativistic |
| efficient | overactive |
| curious | tactless |
| intelligent | intellectualistic |
| adaptable | undiscriminating |
| tolerant | indifferent |
| witty | silly |
| generous | wasteful |
In comparing Fromm’s orientations with their own studies, Atkins and Katcher found that in general there was a high consistency between Fromm's model and their own behavioural observations as occupational psychologists. The FourLife Orientations™ have clear antecedents in Fromm’s descriptions:
Katcher and Atkins, based on their own research restructured and modified Fromm’s theories. They:
[1] Respect in Fromm’s usage means “..to see a person as he is, to be aware of his individuality and uniqueness.”