Page 98 - Communication and the Evolution of Society

75 Moral Development and Ego Identity

a similar transposition of interaction patterns into intrapsychic patterns
of relation (internalization) .14 With this mechanism is connected the
further principle of achieving independence—whether from external
objects, reference persons, or one’s own impulses—by actively repeat-
ing what one has at first passively experienced or undergone.

In spite of these (admittedly somewhat stylized ) convergent fun-
damental conceptions, none of these three theoretical approaches
has as yet led to an explanatorily powerful theory of develop-
ment, a theory that would permit a precise and empirically mean-
ingful determination of the concept of ego identity (which is,
nevertheless, being used more and more frequently). Taking
analytic ego psychology as her point of departure, Jane Loevinger
has, however, attempted to work out a theory that is meant to
grasp ego development independently of cognitive development
on the one side, and of psychosexual development on the other.’°
According to this conception, ego development and psychosexual
development are together supposed to determine motivational
development (see, Schema 1). I do not want to discuss this pro-
posal in detail, but I shall point out three difficulties.
1. The claim to have grasped, in an analytically sharp way, some-
thing like ego development by employing the dimensions of behavioral
control or superego formations, interactive style, and stage-specific de-
velopmental problems, does not strike me as plausible. For the de-
velopmental problems listed in the third column obviously do not lie
in a single dimension, but touch on cognitive, motivational, and com-
municative tasks. Moreover, the superego formations circumscribed in
the first column can scarcely be analyzed independently of psycho-
sexual development.
2. The claim that the given stages of development follow an inner
logic cannot be made good even intuitively. Nor does each row char-
acterize a structural whole; nor can a hierarchy of increasingly complex
stages of development building one on another be extracted from the
columns.
3. Finally, the relation of the claimed logic of ego development
to the empirical conditions under which it is realized in concrete life
histories is not considered at all. Are there alternative paths of de-
velopment that lead to the same goal? When do deviations occur from
the rationally reconstructible developmental pattern? How great are
the tolerance limits of the personality system and of social structures