Anal drive
In psychoanalysis, the anal drive (French: pulsion anale) designates the organization of the drive insofar as it is articulated through the anus—retention, expulsion, control, and release. The anal drive does not refer simply to the biological function of defecation or elimination. Rather, it names a libidinal circuit in which enjoyment (jouissance) is bound to acts of holding, giving, withholding, and letting go, independently of physiological necessity.
The concept is introduced by **:contentReference[oaicite:0]{index=0}** within his theory of infantile sexuality and psychosexual development, and later reformulated by **:contentReference[oaicite:1]{index=1}** within a structural theory of the drive. In Lacanian theory, the anal drive exemplifies with particular clarity the non-natural character of satisfaction and the central role of loss, repetition, and the Other in the constitution of desire.
As one of the partial drives, alongside the oral drive, scopic drive, and invocatory drive, the anal drive plays a crucial role in psychoanalytic accounts of character formation, fantasy, and clinical structures. It is especially important for understanding issues of control, order, aggression, and the subject’s relation to law and demand.
The Drive in Psychoanalysis
Drive (Trieb) and Satisfaction
Freud defines the drive (Trieb) as a borderline concept between the somatic and the psychic, characterized by source, pressure, aim, and object.[1] Unlike instinct, the drive is not oriented toward a biologically fixed goal. Its satisfaction lies not in equilibrium or discharge, but in repetition.
This distinction is fundamental for the anal drive. While defecation satisfies a biological need, anal enjoyment persists beyond this function. Acts of retention or expulsion may become sources of satisfaction in their own right, even when they conflict with hygiene, comfort, or social norms.
Partial Drives
In Three Essays on the Theory of Sexuality (1905), Freud introduces the notion of partial drives to account for the non-unified structure of infantile sexuality.[2] These drives are organized around specific bodily zones and activities and are not subordinated to genital reproduction.
The anal drive occupies a central place in this theory because it highlights the role of control, ambivalence, and the relation to the Other in the emergence of libidinal satisfaction.
Freud on the Anal Drive
Anal Eroticism
Freud introduces the concept of anal erotism to describe the libidinal investment of anal functions during early childhood. In this phase, retention and expulsion of feces become sources of pleasure independent of their physiological purpose.[2]
Freud emphasizes that feces are not experienced merely as waste. For the child, they may acquire the status of a valued object, associated with pleasure, pride, or gift-giving. The act of defecation can thus be experienced as an offering to the caregiver or, conversely, as a means of refusal or defiance.
Retention, Expulsion, and Ambivalence
A defining feature of the anal drive is ambivalence. Retention and expulsion represent opposing yet complementary positions within the same libidinal circuit. To hold on and to let go, to give and to withhold, are two sides of the same structure.
Freud links this ambivalence to later character traits, such as orderliness, obstinacy, and parsimony, which he associates with the so-called “anal character.” While these formulations have sometimes been read in a reductive or moralizing way, Freud’s metapsychological point concerns the persistence of early libidinal organizations rather than the derivation of personality types.
The Anal Drive as Structure
Beyond Elimination
From a psychoanalytic perspective, the anal drive cannot be reduced to elimination or hygiene. Toilet training, for example, is not merely a matter of physiological regulation but a crucial moment in the child’s encounter with demand and law. The child learns that bodily satisfaction is subject to the expectations of the Other.
This encounter transforms anal activity into a site of negotiation between enjoyment and prohibition. The anal drive thus becomes a privileged locus for the articulation of obedience, resistance, and control.
Activity, Passivity, and Reversal
As with other drives, the anal drive is characterized by the reversibility of activity and passivity. To expel and to be expelled, to control and to be controlled, represent different positions within the same drive circuit. Freud emphasizes that such reversals do not alter the structure of the drive, but reveal its flexibility and complexity.[1]
This reversibility will later be formalized by Lacan as a general property of the drive.
Lacan’s Reformulation of the Anal Drive
Demand, Law, and the Other
Lacan reinterprets the anal drive by situating it within the field of demand and the Other. The child’s anal activity becomes meaningful only insofar as it is addressed to the Other—most notably in the context of toilet training, where approval, disapproval, and expectation are at stake.
In this sense, the anal drive exemplifies the way in which the drive is structured by the symbolic order. What is at stake is not simply bodily function, but the subject’s relation to law, command, and recognition.
The Anal Object and Object a
In Lacanian theory, the object of the anal drive is not feces as such, but a partial object detached from biological function. Lacan associates this object with a form of object a, emphasizing that what circulates in the anal drive is a remainder that cannot be fully integrated into symbolic exchange.
The anal object is paradigmatic of object $a$ insofar as it is both produced by the body and separated from it. It exemplifies loss in a particularly concrete way, making visible the logic by which enjoyment is organized around what is expelled yet invested.
Anal Drive and Clinical Structures
Neurosis
In neurosis, the anal drive is typically mediated by repression and displacement. Issues of control, order, guilt, and resistance often bear the mark of anal enjoyment that has been symbolically regulated but not eliminated.
Clinically, symptoms such as compulsive orderliness, inhibition around giving or receiving, or excessive concern with rules may be understood as formations through which the anal drive finds indirect expression.
Perversion
In perversion, the subject may attempt to stage or control the anal object and its circulation. As with other drives, the decisive factor is not the presence of specific acts, but the subject’s structural position in relation to the Other’s enjoyment.
The perverse subject may position himself as the object to be expelled or as the agent who controls expulsion, thereby transforming anxiety into a managed source of jouissance.
Psychosis
In psychosis, the anal drive may appear in a less mediated form, particularly when symbolic regulation is compromised. Experiences of bodily intrusion, expulsion, or loss of control may reflect difficulties in situating the anal object within a stable symbolic framework.
Such phenomena underscore the importance of symbolic mediation in organizing the drive.
Transference and Analytic Practice
In psychoanalytic treatment, the anal drive often emerges in transference through issues of resistance, withholding, compliance, or refusal. Silence, missed sessions, or excessive punctuality may all be read as formations in which anal enjoyment is at stake.
Interpretation does not aim to correct or normalize these behaviors, but to articulate the structure of enjoyment that sustains them. By bringing the anal drive into speech, analysis allows a reconfiguration of the subject’s relation to control, loss, and demand.
Conclusion
The anal drive occupies a central position in psychoanalytic theory because it reveals, with particular clarity, the relation between enjoyment and law. From Freud’s early account of anal erotism to Lacan’s structural reformulation of the drive, it demonstrates that satisfaction is not reducible to biological function, and that loss and control are constitutive of desire.
As a partial drive, the anal drive illuminates the logic of repetition, the function of object a, and the subject’s relation to the Other. It therefore remains an indispensable concept for understanding clinical phenomena, character formation, and the ethics of psychoanalysis.
See also
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 Sigmund Freud, “Instincts and Their Vicissitudes” (1915), in The Standard Edition of the Complete Psychological Works of Sigmund Freud, Vol. XIV, trans. James Strachey (London: Hogarth Press, 1957), pp. 117–140.
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 Sigmund Freud, Three Essays on the Theory of Sexuality (1905), in The Standard Edition of the Complete Psychological Works of Sigmund Freud, Vol. VII (London: Hogarth Press, 1953), pp. 123–246.