Freud vs Adler: Memorable or Meritorious

Artist: Jake Baddeley

 I have thought about this question before, considering whether the answer lies in their merits or more in observing social phenomena. Adler, Freud, and Jung were contemporaries in a shifting cultural landscape. A period in history teeming with national tensions, war, and a burgeoning curiosity for defining intersections between the metaphysical, the taboo, and the scientific. 

    As Gay remarks over and over, Freud was as prolific as he was charismatic and damn proud of being an “outcast.” He positioned himself not only as a scientist and theorist but also as a philosopher, art commentator, and an aggressive critic. Freud's rigid and antagonistic persona invited rebuke and retort of all kinds. His investigations into the Interpretation of Dreams and bold ideas around psycho-sexuality sparked contentions and inquiry across various fields, adding to his magnanimous enigma. 

    Alfred Adler was an accomplished physician who had already made original contributions. These included social medicine, a complete theory of education, and organ inferiority, before his exhaustive work developing individual psychology—a kind of hard-won personal perseverance model. Although according to Elennberger, Adler “assiduously participated,” and was a regular contributor “in Freud's Wednesday evenings,” he, like Jung, began to separate from Freud at the libido junction. Adler was well aware of the implications of all of the theories circulating in Freudian thought. However, his individual psychology does not delve into the abstractions. With an Adlerian results-oriented focus, Adler may have a more productive model, provided that outcomes are valued more than the journey. 

     Collective memory tends to favor those who are memorable, not just meritorious. “Freud was the man to beat,” as Gay stated, which, by virtue of competition, naturally selected Freud as the chosen protagonist in public discourse, galvanizing or crowning Freud, as Downing refers to Robinson, “the dominant intellectual of our century.” 

References

Gay, P. (1995). Introduction. In P. Gay (Ed.), The Freud reader (pp. xiii–xxix). W. W. Norton & Company.

Freud, S. (1995). An autobiographical study; The ego and the id. In P. Gay (Ed.), The Freud reader (pp. 3–41, 628–658). W. W. Norton & Company.

Downing, C. (1997). Sigmund Freud’s mythology of soul. In Myths and mysteries of same-sex love (pp. 1–14). Continuum.

Ellenberger, H. F. (1970). Chapter 6. In The discovery of the unconscious: The history and evolution of dynamic psychiatry. Basic Books.