Correlations between the death drive and war in light of the transition to freud’s second topography

Abstract

The general scope of our article is to provide an exposition that navigates through the notions of drive (Trieb), death drive (Todestrieb), and war (Krieg). Our starting point will be Freud’s work and his correspondence with Albert Einstein. We propose a historical-conceptual and theoretical excursus on the category of the drive, examining it in light of the transition to Freud’s second topography in order to analyze the emergence of the death drive concept and its explanatory power in understanding the historical persistence of large-scale armed conflicts. Our objective is to demonstrate how Freudian metapsychological concepts can provide critical tools for reflecting on war beyond sociopolitical determinisms, thereby underscoring the psychic dimension of human aggressiveness.