Submission, Resistance, Insurrection

Some reflections starting from the reading of Freud’s Group psychology (Massenpsychologie) and the analysis of the ego, from 1921

Abstract

Starting from Freud’s classic text Group Psychology and the analysis of the ego, from 1921, we will examine some of the main questions it raises. We discuss the key concepts of group, in the sense of “mass”, and the concepts of submission and its opposites. resistance and insurrection. The historical example of the Haitian revolution (1791-1804) is examined as something that questions the idea of submission as it represents a case of insurgency of the submissive ones in relation to Hegel’s master-slave dialectic.