[Is the psyche antiquated? A typology of psychotherapeutic critique of civilization in the works of Alexander Mitscherlich].

In the oeuvre of the psychotherapist Alexander Mitscherlich, one of the founding-fathers of psychosomatic medicine in post-war Germany, three basic types of critique of civilization can be identified. They each imply a specific conception of the relation between modernity and psychological disorder. Mitscherlich's ideas on the topic have evolved in a manner consistent with his appropriation of psychoanalysis and his confrontation with the causes and consequences of human behaviour during the time of national socialism.