Between Determination and Freedom: The Positioning of the Subject in Erich Fromm's Early Works (1929--1936)

Abstract

This study examines how Erich Fromm's analytical social psychology, developed between 1929 and 1936 in response to the crisis of the Weimar Republic and the rise of fascism, particularly in his effort to understand the psychological origins of mass obedience, opens up a space for freedom and agency for the subject between psychoanalytic determinism and historical materialism. In synthesizing Freudian psychoanalysis with Marxist social theory, Fromm positions the concept of "social character'' (Gesellschaftscharakter) as a mediation (Vermittlung) and a connecting element (Bindeglied) between the economic base and the ideological superstructure. This conceptual framework allows us to think of the individual as both determined by social conditions and capable of transforming those conditions. Fromm's understanding of freedom is not an unlimited autonomy but a process of emancipation that takes place within determinations. It is precisely at this point that the tension between active adaptation and passive adaptation shows that the subject can both submit to social conditions and transform them. The study argues that Fromm's theoretical framework overcomes both Freudian instinctual determinism and vulgar Marxist economic determinism, thereby offering an original perspective on the historical agency of the subject.