Lasswell Harold D. The Political Writings of Harold D. Lasswell
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THE
PROLONGED
INTERVIEW
211
conventional
tasks, but
the interviewer is
present
to
pre-
vent
the
individual
from dissipating his energy
in musings
which are
quickly
forgotten.
The
interviewer
is
a prod to
associate
freely, and
a
spur
to
the critical consideration
of
the material
supplied
by the
freely moving fancy.
The
necessity
for verbalization
brings
the
acts
of fantasy into
clearer
focus than usual,
which
is
a
necessary preliminary
to
moments of
sustained logical reflection. Since the in-
terviewer
permits the subject
to
disregard the
usual amen-
ities of
society, and to
let his fantasies
fly for the sake of
finding
where
they
land, regressive responses are permitted
to
appear.
That is, the
individual is
not
required
to adjust
to a
conventional world of adult reality,
but
is permitted
to
reactivate
earlier forms of dealing with the world.
In
the
world of adult
reality, the multiple tendencies of the indi-
vidual are
canalized into
conventionally
acceptable forms,
and
the most maladapted
drives
may
display themselves
in
unobtrusive variations on the pattern. When conven-
tional reality is no
longer present,
and
the individual is
encouraged
to
watch his partly
forming responses, rather
than to
co-ordinate, condense, ignore, or suppress
them,
these tendencies spread
forth diffusely in imagination and
reminiscence. When
this process continues far enough, the
individual achieves
a
high degree of
insight into
the genetic
development
of his
current preoccupations and traits.
Since the analytical process is
a
period of strain for the
subject,
it
may be
wondered why it is bearable. Fortu-
nately
for
the investigator, there
are many
advantages to
the participant which sustain and fortify his conscious pur-
pose to
persevere until
understanding has been substantial-
ly deepened.
The analyst treats every manifestation
of
the
personality, no matter how
trivial, with
respectful in-
terest. This is exaggerated
unconsciously
by the subject.
212
PSYCHOPATHOLOGY AND
POLITICS
who
greatly overestimates the personal affection which
the
interviewer has
for
him.
Some of the energy
of the person-
ality is always
free
to
begin
new
object attachments,
and
this
energy is concentrated upon the interviewer.
The
sub-
ject is
permitted to talk at
length
about himself,
and
when
the
interviewer
listens attentively
and patiently, the
sub-
ject
identifies
himself
with the listener
on
the
basis of
a
common
attitude of
interest in
a
beloved
object. The inter-
viewer's
ascendancy in
technical
knowledge (his authority)
resembles the authority of the
adults who were
once
sup-
posed to
possess
unlimited
knowledge. The
day-by-day
solicitude tends to
reinstate the emotions of
the early fam-
ily
situation in
which the child
could play irresponsibly,
under the
watchful, responsible care of the
adult. The sub-
ject
relaxes
the effort
to
keep
baudy,
disloyal,
mean,
and
revengeful
thoughts
from welling into this
mind. The frank
expression of
these
thoughts
in ordinary social life
would
bring
down
punishment upon his
head,
or
mark him out
as a
victim
of mental
disorder. The
subject is enabled
to
welter
in unsocial
or antisocial ravings
and
imaginings,
and
the
process of
developing these
symptoms in the pres-
ence
of another
person becomes an absorbing
part
of his
daily,
weekly,
and
monthly existence. The subject intensi-
fies his warm
emotional interest in the
one who exempts
him
from society's code of
reticence.
This is
a
mark of the
analyst's tremendous
power,
and also
of
the analyst's
special interest in the subject. The free-fantasy
procedure
even
exempts the individual from
abiding by the ordinary
forms
of
logic and grammar. He is
also able
to enjoy
the
pleasure
of
impressing someone
else with
the brilliance
of
his
language.
From
time
to
time,
new insight
comes into
old
habits
and
worries, and the zest of
intellectual
compre-
hension
is
added to
the other
pleasures.
THE PROLONGED
INTERVIEW
213
At
first sight the teaching
or research
interview
might
seem to
sacrifice the
most powerful motive
upon
which
the
interviewing procedure has relied,
namely, that
of
securing
relief from disturbing symptoms.
The individual
who is
suffering from
some crude pathological
disturbance,
like
a
functional
gastro-intestinal disorder,
psychological
impo-
tence, obsessive ideas
and
compulsions,
comes
to
the inter-
viewer as
a
weak
person seeking aid of
a
stronger. If he
has been
shuttled
from
one
internist
to another perhaps
receiving derisive looks and
contemptuous
preachments,
the
objective interest with which
the
psychotherapist treats
his
symptoms produces
a
keen conscious and unconscious
gratification.
Even
the symptoms are beloved
parts
of
the
self,
and
like the ugly ducklings, they
are sometimes treat-
ed
with special affection (Ferenczi)
.
The hope of being re-
lieved of the annoying symptoms, which is consciously
present
in
many pathological cases, is supported on the
unconscious level
by an old
infantile attitude which expects
the interviewer to work
miracles.
Even
some
of
the
anti-
social impulses of the
personality
may
welcome the thera-
peutic
situation. These aYitisocial tendencies are themselves
not
entirely gratified in the
symptoms, for the nature of
a
symptom
is a
compromise between these antisocial
tenden-
cies
and the socialized impulses
of
the
self. Nunberg has
pointed out
that the unsocialized
portions of the person-
ality
may support the
misguided hope that the outcome
of
therapy
will
be
the boundless and
unlimited
gratification
of
their
demands. There
is
also
evidence
of
the existence
of
a
compulsion to
confess (Reik) to
antisocial tendencies,
which
are
rejected by
the
socialized
self,
and
thus
to
gratify
an
unconscious need
of
punishment.
Now the sense
of
being sick and
the
desire
to get well
are not
entirely
absent
from
any
normal
person.
No one
is
214 PSYCHOPATHOLOGY AND
POLITICS
entirely free
from remnants of his
adjustive problems,
and
no
one is entirely satisfied
with
himself. At the beginning
of the
interview, this motive may
appear
in
consciousness
as
nothing more substantial than the innocuous belief
that
any
increase in
self-knowledge will
enable one
to deal
even more
satisfactorily with personal problems
as they
arise.
Among the
other motives which play into
the analytical
situation, and
enable the subject
to go
through with it, may
be
mentioned
a
few very
primitive
ones.
Life
has meant
the
blocking of many impulses
by
authorities whose power
cannot be
successfully
defied on
the
spot.
Hatreds
can only
express
themselves under these conditions with some
pros-
pects of success when they seek
to
overcome the superior
by
trying
to take
his
power into one's own personality
by
copy-
ing him. That is
to say,
the individual seeks
to
identify
himself
with
the one who possesses
superior
knowledge
in
the analytical situation, and
by
becoming like him, to
secure independence, and thus
to
annihilate
him
as an
in-
timidating and
obstructive external object.
There may
be
a
desire
to secure
a
weapon
by
means of which
other people
may be eviscerated,
and
deprived of their power
to
out-
strip the individual.
On the conscious
level,
these
motives
are
partly
visible in excessive aspirations for self-mastery
and control. This taking-in
and biting-off of the analyst's
power is
also rooted in some
of
the earliest reaction
pat-
terns which the infant
displays toward objects.
The sheer
pleasure
of
talking, and giving and withholding
informa-
tion is also present.
As
the subject withdraws attention from the original
symptoms or motives, concentrates
on the game of dilating
upon
the past,
and indulges
in
prohibited delights,
the
analytical
situation becomes
an
orgy of illicit pleasure.
THE PROLONGED
INTERVIEW
215
Emotions
are
released
from old
channels
and find new
ob-
jects
of
crystallization, especially
in the person of the
analyst.
The interviewer who
permits this "transference"
is
now in
a
position to aid
the subject in coming
to
grips
with the
underlying unsocialized
impulses of the person-
ality.
The
behavior of the subject has by
this time given
a
host
of clues to
the history of his
emotional growth. The
analyst
continues
to
stimulate the individual to
scrutinize
his associations,
to
state
honestly the wayward wishes flit
across his mind, or which lurk
half-seen in the marginal
recesses
of
attention. Back and
forth, bit
by
bit, there is
reconstructed the subjective
history
of
a
life.
To put
it
metaphorically, old sores run anew, smoldering embers of
jealousy and lust flame once more, and ancient wounds
yawn again. Reminiscence reguilds the faded tapestries of
the past, and
restores to the
full glare of consciousness the
cobwebs of the mind which house the spiders
of malevo-
lence
and
lechery.
Primitive meanings,
once appropriate
to a
situation,
and later projected unintentionally
into the
adult world,
are recovered and criticized
in the light of
their
appropriateness
to
society. Regressive
reliving, which
is powerfully
supported
by
narcissism
and
the repetitive
compulsion, is
observed
and
overcome.
It
should not
be supposed that the
secrets
of the mind
are exposed for
the asking.
The
method of
repression is
a
primitive
means
by which
the feeble,
nascent self seeks
protection
from
impulses which,
if
tolerated, if
not shut
out with unreflecting
violence,
would
overrun it (Alex-
ander).
When the self
becomes strong
and stable, primi-
tive impulses
can
be permitted
to develop
farther in
con-
sciousness without
imminent
danger that they will
pass
over into action
by controlling the
motor
apparatus.
Now
the critical,
reflecting,
deciding
self must
not
be
crippled
216
PSYCHOPATHOLOGY AND
POLITICS
by
an unduly strong
conscience. The structure which
we
know as
the
conscience is begun in early childhood,
and
is formed
by
the incorporation
into the self of the orders
and commands
which
are administered
by
authority. When
the
self is weak,
as
during these formative
years, the
con-
science
relies
on crude methods
to
protect its hard-won
ascendancy over the antisocial drives
in the personality.
It
visits
penalties
of anxiety upon the self whenever there
are
any
signs of leniency toward these impulses.
The con-
science keeps its
summary, sadistic quality long
after,
and
neurotics are properly said to
suffer from
an excess
of
conscience.
Blind denial of the existence of fundamental
trends
in the personality must be
supplanted,
and
the
obiter
dicta
of the conscience subjected
to the
criticism
of the
more mature and
experienced
self.
An obstacle to
this
procedure is furnished
by
those
energies of the personality
which
are
specialized in resisting
the antisocial impulses
which have been repressed and
denied
direct
and
undis-
guised access
to
consciousness.
Any lowering of resistance
subjects the individual
to acute
anxiety,
as
the conflict
be-
tween the socialized
and the
unsocialized drives is rein-
stated.
All sorts
of
subterfuges are hit upon
to obviate
the necessity for enduring this
anxiety
and
bringing
the
hidden into consciousness, where
it
can lose its
charge.
The overcoming of
this
resistance'
to
taking
up the
battle
again is
a
major process in the prolonged
analysis.
The recapitulation
of
the drives which the
individual
has experienced throughout his life is the
process
which
lends unique value
to the
psychoanalytic
interview
record.
The literature of psychoanalysis
is
full
of
sample
fan-
tasies
which
are assigned
to
places in the
hypothetical
se-
quence of
personality growth.
Over twenty
years
ago
Freud
wrote
some
preliminary
remarks on
character
types.
THE
PROLONGED
INTERVIEW
217
especially
stressing
the
role of
certain
excretory pleas-
ures
in
the
development of
some
psychological structures.
The
sucking,
biting
and
anal
retention
interests of the
infant and
young
child have
been
the
subject
of theoretical
treatment by
several
analysts,
among
whom Abraham is
the most
important.
Ferenczi has
sketched
a
comprehen-
sive
theory
of the rise of
genital
interests
on
the
part
of
the
child,
and
this has been
amplified in
various directions
by
Reich. The
differences
between male and
female
de-
velopment have
been sketched
by Sachs,
Deutsch, and
Horney.
It is not
within the necessary limits of this discussion to
go
farther
into the nature of the
hypotheses which
have
been
proposed by these
various
investigators.
We
will
be able to
formulate them more precisely when we have
succeeded in
objectifying
what happens in the course
of the
interview, and this is
to be
achieved
along the lines pre-
viously
sketched. Some day we
can state
hypotheses more
definitely
which can
be
taken and tested by
non-analytical
methods.
Some of
these
conceptions can be
confirmed or
eliminated
by the direct observation of
children of all
age
groups.
It is
quite possible,
however, paradoxical though
it
may sound,
that the best way
to
study some phases of
infancy
and childhood
will
be to
study the
adult.
There
is
some
reason
to believe
that
the superior expressive
power of
the adult,
whether
in words
or in drawing, may
render
explicit
many
states which
are beyond the scope
of
one
who
merely
looks
at
movements. If we find
that
the
subjective
reconstructions
during the adult
analysis
check
closely
with the
results secured
by
modified analyt-
ical
and
behavioristic
procedures
applied directly
to older
children,
we will
have
more confidence in
the material
which
purports
to relate
to
very early
experience.
We
may
218
PSYCHOPATHOLOGY
AND
POLITICS
also
test out as
far
as
possible
the
"historicity"
of
the
reminiscences
produced at
different
phases of
the analysis.
It
should
be
said
in
passing that
the
analysis of
children
requires
important
revisions
in the
externals
of the
tech-
nique, as
Anna
Freud
has
shown.
I
want
to
stop
at
this
point
to
comment upon
the signifi-
cance of
the
fact
there
should
be
such a
thing
as
the
psychoanalytic
method
of
dealing
with the
genesis
of
personality.
How does
it
happen
that at
the end of the
nineteenth
century
there
appeared
in
Western European
civilization
this
remarkably
intricate
procedure?
Why do
we
regard it
as
worth
while
to
spend
months
or even
years in
constant
introspection?
Viewed in the large, I
suppose
this is the m.ost
spectac-
ular
sign of the value
crisis in our civilization. Here
is an
effort
to
stimulate the
individual to the
reconstruc-
tion of values, not on
the basis
of imposed authority, but
through prolonged scrutiny of
the self as
a
process. The
processes of the human
personality are subjected
to
the
same
patient,
arduous, and
minute inspection which
has
proved
so
successful
when
applied
to
the
objects of the
physical world
by the
naturalist,
astronomer, and
micro-
scopic specialist. The
end result of
a
long and
successful
analysis is
an
individual
who is
able
to
interpret
his
rela-
tion
to the world in terms of
a
few
master-symbols.
These
symbols
take on
meaning
because they have
been
acquired
in the course of
a
long apprenticeship
under
the
exacting
eye
of another.
These symbols
define for the
individual
in
comprehensive terms
his relation
to unfolding
reality.
They permit
in favorable
instances
added
smoothness
of
adjustment,
and
offer
a
means
of
relief
from
dispropor-
tionate feelings
of futility, despondency,
persecution,
and
omniscience.
THE
PROLONGED
INTERVIEW 219
The
appearance
of
a
system
of
communicable
master-
symbols
for the
definition of
one's
relation to the universe
is
anything but
a
novel
phenomenon in
the culture history
of
mankind.
At one
time
a
leading
question was,
"What
is
God's
will for
me?" The
belief was that
this
could
be
made
manifest after the
reading
of
Holy Writ,
reverent
supplication, and
sudden revelation.
Our Western civili-
zation
has sapped at
the
pillars
of
this structure of think-
ing.
We
are
committed to the
persistent
querying
of the
world of change, and the
problem is always
'"''How does
it
change?" How
do
the
routines of the seeable, sm.ellable,
touchable,
audible, tasteable
universe actually work?
In
what
characteristic
order
do
the
subjective events
of the
mind
follow one
another?
In what
order
do subjective
and
objective
events occur?
And
no
matter
how many
intermediate
links in the sequence have been named
there
always
remain
new
intermediate and new
all-embracing
frames of reference
to be
identified
and
placed
in orderly
relationship.
Values are sought
to be
defined, not on
the
authority
of
another,
but in the act of
scrutinizing
processes.
We
place enormous
value
upon the
quest for
sequences,
and
discover
our
new
values
in the
act
of
broadening
or deep-
ening
our understanding
of change. If
you tell
a sophisti-
cated
carrier of
Western culture
that
God
reveals
his
wisdom
after
the
reading
of
a
printed
passage,
he will
be less
impressed
by
what
is put in than
by what
is
left
out of the
account.
What relation is there
between
what
is
read and
what is decided?
Can you set
up
controlled
repetitions
for
the sake
of testing
the predictive
value
of
these
generalizations?
Are
there other words
which
can
be read
but which
will
result in the same
decisions
when
220
PSYCHOPATHOLOGY
AND POLITICS
the
reader has
the
same
pecuniary
stake
in acting
a
cer-
tain way?
And so
on and
on.
It
is worth
noticing
that the
symbols
supplied
by
analy-
sis are not
"ought"
words
but
"process"
words.
You
are
not
told to
die for
your
country; you
are
told
to
face all
the
values
which you
can find in
the
situation. This
does
not,
however,
eliminate the
"arbitrary"
character of deci-
sions actually
reached.
The
decision comes with all
the
shock
of
revelation, of
inevitability,
of unexpectedness;
the
individual may only
control
decisions by rehearsing
the
pertinent values
until
he
finds himself in the clutches
of
a
judgment.
_
This
willingness to
accept uncertainty,
to
scrutinize
intermediate terms and
pertinent
values, is
an
outcome
of the analytical discipline.
Such
a
procedure grew up in
a
civilization
whose values
have been in confusion since the
medieval cosmology
broke
down. President Masaryk, serious thinker
and scholarly
writer,
began
his sociological work with
a
study of suicide,
which
he found
to be
a
rough
index
of the value
strains in
culture.
When emotional
bonds are forged
with
expo-
nents
of life-patterns
of different design, the
mental
stage
is
set
for
both creative originality
and destructive
disin-
tegration. The
individual
must assume
the load
of work-
ing
out his own
scheme
of values,
and many are
disorgan-
ized
in the
attempt.
The
validation
of the
prolonged
interview
as
a
contribu-
tor to our
dependable
knowledge
about life
depends
upon
objectifying
its
processes;
the
achievement
of its
im-
plications for
the
reconstruction
of
the
hierarchy
of indi-
vidual
values
is
an
impressionistic
and
often
turbulent
ex-
perience."
'
The best
technical
discussions
of the
nature
of the
analytical
situation
are in
the
writings
of Freud,
Rank, Ferenczi,
Nunberg,
and
Alexander.