EDITH KURZWEIL
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Adler was an active socialist, and Wittels believed-and stated-that "one
cannot be a Freuclian and a Social Democrat at the same time." Their ani–
mosi ty surfaced as well when Margarete Hilferding, the wife of the
German socialist leader, asked for admission to the Vienna Psychoanalytic
Society (in 1910), and Wittels argued vehemently against the formal
admission of all women. (You may recall that years later, in 1941, Wittels
was behind the ouster of Horney from the New York Psychoanalytic
Society-and that the rift between Adler and Freud in 1912, although
argued on theoretical grounds, was rooted in this political agenda.)
Indeed, Adler was actively involved in progressive education, and advo–
cated introducing psychoanalytic methods into the Vienna school system.
This social democratic initiative as such eventually succeeded, but it
watered down what Freud called "the gold of psychoanalysis"-that is, the
centrality of the unconscious. (A bit later, Anna Freud's work with chil–
dren in her clinic had similar aims, as did August Aichhorn's and Siegfried
Bernfeld's.) In any event, the very thing that distanced Adler from Freud
was attuned to such feminists as Eugenie Schwarzwald, a Jewish woman
with a doctorate in German literature from the University of Zurich. She
set up a string of progressive private schools, to begin with for girls
between ten and sixteen years of age, that would foster "creative educa–
tion" and spontanei ty, cast teachers not as disci plinarians but as friends, and
expose pupils to Schwarzwald's wide circle of enlightened artists, writers,
and musicians as well.
By then, Bertha Pappenheim had become an active force in many fem–
inist causes. That nowadays she is referred to simply as a social worker must
be attributed to the limits then set on women's accomplishments; to the
fact that feminism gradually petered out; and that since then both psycho–
analysis and social work have become professionalized and for the most
part exist in separate realms. How else can we explain the many miscon–
ceptions about Freud-as a supporter of patriarchy rather than citizen of
his time; as advocating "penis envy" rather than using this as a metaphor
for the consequence of women's submissive role; and so on.
That the Freudians did not openly come out in support of feminist
causes may well have contributed to most feminists' neglect of psycho–
analysis. But during the early part of our century, both Freud's
entourage
and
femini sts gained from social democratic ini tiatives. Most of the women who
joined Freud's circle had done so primarily because they hoped to learn
how psychoanalysis might help liberate women from somatizing their emo–
tional dependence on men. In that sense, both Freudians and feminists were
revolutionaries. Since Jews as well had everything to gain by eradicating
prejudices, and were eager to attain equality in spheres that still were closed
to them, such as holcling public office and teaching, we can understand why
