Élisabeth Roudinesco: The Narcissism of Small and Large Differences

António Guerreiro

In this interview, renowned psychoanalyst, essayist and historian Élisabeth Roudinesco speaks about the inflation of ‘identity politics’, which steered social figurations and behaviours towards narcissism and ultimately led to an abandonment of past emancipatory ideals.

Élisabeth Roudinesco is a psychoanalyst and the author of an extensive work on psychoanalytic theory and the history of psychoanalysis. From her work in this area, her biographies of Freud and of Lacan stand out, as well as a dictionary of psychoanalysis (of which Michel Plon is co-author). The dialogue she kept with Derrida resulted in a book entitled For What Tomorrow: A Dialogue.

This interview with her focusses almost exclusively on the subject that constitutes her last book, Soi-même comme un roi. Essai sur les dérives identitaires (2021) [The Sovereign Self: Pitfalls of Identity Politics (2022)]. The book controversially addresses identity issues, which are currently at the heart of a heated and endless debate, with clear ideological divisions and camps. Élisabeth Roudinesco criticises a communitarian logic of identities (the most recent feminist and anti-racist movements are her main target), because she believes they correspond to the abandonment of universalistic claims with an emancipatory dimension. Identifying significant identitarian drifts, Roudinesco defends that these have reached outcomes that completely go against their initial intentions. But this book also draws a few lines that demarcate areas in the contemporary social landscape, such as a generalised narcissism and its exacerbated symptoms.

ANTÓNIO GUERREIRO Your book Soi-même comme un roi is subtitled Essai sur les dérives identitaires. The use of the word ‘drift’ [dérive] already implies the idea of deviation, of a change in direction. I’ll start by asking you about these deviations.

ÉLISABETH ROUDINESCO What has diverged? With good intentions at first, we began studying discriminations and identities, with authors such as Derrida and Foucault, examining the issue of gender as different from sex, and considering social constructs, not just biology, gender, sex, etc. And the same can be said of race, which does not exist, although racism does. In the book, I showed that in the span of two decades, things have gone in the opposite direction. The initial project was to free subjectivities, get a better grasp of collective compromises, study the issues of exploitation and discrimination connected to identity. But there has been a drift that goes in the opposite direction of emancipation. In this way, we have reached the opposite of what had been started with Edward Said, Foucault, Derrida: identitarian classifications. Today we are immersed in them. In my book, I analyse many authors who have come after Derrida and Foucault, such as Homi Bhabha, Judith Butler, Spivak and many others. And I conclude that this resulted in an exclusion and deprivation of freedom. We started with emancipation goals but reached a completely different place – there has been a drift.

AG This is also what happens with political regimes and movements.

ER Yes, this is what happens with all emancipation movements. In the end, a catechism is established, which is generally accompanied by a deplorable vocabulary of absurd dogmas and beliefs. With regards to the far-right nationalistic identitarianism, there’s no drift there: it always goes down the same path, with its references to race, gender, etc. My book had a strange reception, in that it was attacked both by the left and the right.

"Regarding feminism, I must say that I consider neo-feminism very unattractive."

AG It’s easy to understand the reasons for this double attack.

ER It would have certainly been difficult to call me homophobic, reactionary or right-wing in France. I campaigned for same-sex marriage and all emancipation movements. But the trans issue poses different challenges, especially when it comes to children and teenagers. In my opinion, the transgender movement has nothing to do with the emancipation of an identity, and in this respect, it differs from the homosexuals. In my book, I’m very clear about the adults who want to change sex: they should have access to clinics, as well as any necessary surgeries or medicines, and no one should oppose that. This is not about emancipation, since you need surgery to transition. I had asked this question in a previous book: why is the identitarian drive of transgender people so strong that they decide to submit themselves to physically horrible surgeries, of reconstruction and ablation (of the penis, in men, of the breasts, in women) and to hormonal treatments for the rest of their lives? On this question we have nothing to say. It’s not addressed by psychiatry anymore – it is not a psychosis, or a neurosis; it is also not a perversion, or part of the psychiatric nomenclature.

AG Is there any reference to this subject in Freud’s writings?

ER The problem didn’t exist at the time because gender reassignment surgery didn’t exist. The transexuals of today are the transvestites of the past. It was the post-Freudians who raised the question, particularly the great psychoanalyst Robert Stoller, who was interested in what was known as ‘transsexuality’, as soon as the surgery became possible. Before this surgery existed, transsexuality was seen as existing beside bisexuality, transvestism, or the conviction that one belongs to the opposite sex. My position is this: whoever wants to change their sex anatomically can do so as an adult. I’m interested in the children and teenagers who express such a desire. There are laws in Europe that say that minors are below the age of consent. For sexual relations, the legal age is fifteen. Have we the right to direct a minor towards serious treatments and surgeries with irreversible consequences? I’m against that. I think we need to protect the bodies of children. I don’t think we can have a society that protects children from every possible aggression, but that at the same time allows them to act on their own body. There are other ways to treat these children and teenagers. We should wait and see if the desire to change sex is so strong that it’s still there after they turn 18 years old. Reality seems to be on my side, since according to data, 50% of children and teenagers may change their minds. I think we’re walking towards an excessively liberal legislation.

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