Under the shadow of the authoritarian personality

Elias, Fromm, and alternative social psychologies of authoritarianism

Tim Berard

pp. 209-243

in: François Dépelteau, Tatiana Savoia Landini (eds), Norbert Elias and social theory, Basingstoke, Palgrave Macmillan, 2013

Abstract

Norbert Elias, Erich Fromm, and Theodor Adorno all crossed paths at the University of Frankfurt in the pivotal period of the early 1930s, all were haunted by Nazism, and each produced remarkable chapters in the social psychology of authoritarianism. Adorno's (co-authored) The Authoritarian Personality (1950) was the most influential, but perhaps only at the cost of downplaying or hiding underlying theoretical and political interests during a period of significant professional constraints. Currently none of these contributions enjoys much attention, despite enduring academic, political, and national security interests in understanding the origins and nature of popular political ideologies characterized by uncritical submission to militant and intolerant politics. This chapter surveys the neglected social psychologies of authoritarianism offered by Elias and Fromm and offers comparisons and contrasts between these two contributions, and also the more famous publication: The Authoritarian Personality. Elias's The Germans is revealed to have many overlooked and lasting virtues, especially its abilities to avoid troubling reifications and to offer insights that more easily transcend the particular traditions of psychoanalysis, Marxism, and positivism.

Cited authors

Marx Karl

Adorno Theodor

Fromm Erich