The Psychoanalysis of War

Reviews the history of psychoanalytic theories of war and discusses the "curative" functions of war with respect to psychotic anxieties. The idea that these theories are no longer valid in the nuclear age, and the need to return to a sense of personal responsibility for war-making are examined. About the Author Franco Fornari was an Italian surgeon, psychiatrist and psychoanalyst, who served as director of the Psychology Institute of the Department of Literature and Philosophy at the State University of Milan. His interests included group dynamics and social conflict, leading him to research war. In The Psychoanalysis of War, Fornari located the anxieties and psychotic fantasies that govern the behavior of individuals in groups. War, he said, arises from the external projection of an internal danger in the face of an alleged external persecutory entity, which compels individuals and societies to destroy in order to survive.