Kameradschaftsbund: History of Czech-German relationship – Novotný

“Kameradschaftsbund: Contribution to the history of Czech-German relationship” by Lukáš Novotný (PDF – 2.3 MB & 2.4 MB):

Kameradschaftsbund – Contribution to the history of Czech-German relationship (Part 1)

Kameradschaftsbund – Contribution to the history of Czech-German relationship (Part 2)

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NOVOTNÝ, Lukáš: “Kameradschaftsbund. Contribution to the history of Czech-German relationship (Part one).” In: Prague Papers on the History of International Relations, Prague – Vienna, Institute of World History, Faculty of Arts and Philosophy, Charles University Prague [Filozofická fakulta Univerzity Karlovy v Praze] – Institute of World European History, Faculty of Historical and Cultural Sciences, University of Vienna, 2008, s. 291–309. ISBN 978-80-7308-254-3. <http://usd.ff.cuni.cz/?q=system/files/novotny%20kamerad.pdf >.

NOVOTNÝ, Lukáš: “Kameradschaftsbund. A Contribution to the History of the Czech-German Relationship (Part two).” In: Prague Papers on the History of International Relations, Prague – Vienna, Institute of World History, Faculty of Arts and Philosophy, Charles University Prague [Filozofická fakulta Univerzity Karlovy v Praze] – Institute of World European History, Faculty of Historical and Cultural Sciences, University of Vienna, 2009, s. 387–405. ISSN 1803-7356. ISBN 978-80-7308-296-3. <http://usd.ff.cuni.cz/?q=system/files/novotny%20kamarad.pdf >.

Note: See also “Othmar Spann: A Catholic Radical Traditionalist” by Lucian Tudor: <https://neweuropeanconservative.wordpress.com/2014/06/23/othmar-spann-tudor/ >.

 

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The Real Dugin – Tudor

The Real Dugin: Alexander Dugin’s Political Theories and his Relevance to the New Right

By Lucian Tudor

 

Translations: Čeština, Español, Português

Alexander Dugin is by now well-known in “Right-wing” circles of all sorts across the world—whether we are speaking of nationalists, Fascists, traditionalists, cultural or national conservatives, or New Rightists (also known as Identitarians). Upon the translation of his book The Fourth Political Theory in 2012, Dugin has received a significant amount of international attention from anyone interested in Right-wing or Conservative theory. Since then, a number of other essays by Dugin on the topics of Eurasianism (also spelled “Eurasism”) and also the Theory of the Multipolar World (both of which are interconnected with each other and with what he calls the Fourth Political Theory) have been translated into English, among other languages, allowing us a better view into his thought.

There is no need to discuss Dugin’s theories in any depth here, since his own essays achieve that sufficiently. However, a problem has arisen among Right-wingers in the West in regards to Dugin: while many have appreciated his works, a large number have completely dismissed or attacked him and his theories largely on the basis of misunderstandings or propaganda from Dugin’s political enemies. The situation is certainly not helped by the fact that well-known Identitarian writers such as Greg Johnson, Michael O’Meara, Domitius Corbulo, and some others in Europe have denounced Dugin with reasoning based upon such misunderstandings. Personally, I had once considered these critiques as being essentially valid, but upon a more thorough investigation of Dugin’s writings and thought, I concluded that these critiques were based on flawed premises and assumptions. My intention here is to point out what the most common reasons for denouncing Dugin have been and why they are based on misconceptions and propaganda rather than reality.

Position on Race

First, one of the most difficult issues is the claim that Alexander Dugin believes that race has no substantial reality, that it is a “social construct” and must be completely abandoned as a harmful product of modern Western society. Certainly, he critiques racialist theory, but this is not the same as rejecting race entirely (since one can assert the importance of race without resorting to “racism.” See my essay “Ethnic and Racial Relations”). It must be admitted that Dugin has not taken a clear stance on the matter of race, and occasionally makes statements which imply a dismissal of race (although it is significant that, for the most part, he leaves it an open question). On the other hand, he has also made statements implying an appreciation for racial identity to some extent, such as when he wrote the following:

Being White and Indo-European myself, I recognize the differences of other ethnic groups as being a natural thing, and do not believe in any hierarchy among peoples, because there is not and cannot be any common, universal measure by which to measure and compare the various forms of ethnic societies or their value systems. I am proud to be Russian exactly as Americans, Africans, Arabs or Chinese are proud to be what they are. It is our right and our dignity to affirm our identity, not in opposition to each other but such as it is: without resentment against others or feelings of self-pity. (quoted from “Alexander Dugin on ‘White Nationalism’ & Other Potential Allies in the Global Revolution”)

However, let us assume, for the sake of argument, that Dugin truly does believe that race is a “social construct”, as some have assumed. Would this be enough reason to declare Dugin a subversive intellectual in the Right? If this was the case, it would follow by the same reasoning that any past Right-wing intellectual who did not believe in the importance of race (or at least the biological form of race) must also be denounced. This would include such notable thinkers as Oswald Spengler, Francis Parker Yockey, Othmar Spann, José Antonio Primo de Rivera, Oswald Mosley, and numerous other Fascist or nationalist intellectuals and leaders who did not place much importance upon physical race. Yet, paradoxically, many of those we see denouncing Dugin today would not do the same for such thinkers. This is not to imply that previous Fascist or nationalist intellectuals are entirely agreeable for us today (in fact, most New Rightists reject Fascism and old-fashioned nationalism), it is only to point out the self-contradiction which has gone unnoticed.

Furthermore, it is important to remember that Dugin clearly believes in the importance of ethnicity and culture and advocates ethnic separatism. Similarly to German Revolutionary Conservative and Völkisch thinkers, Dugin has unmistakably placed the Volk or ethnos as one of the highest values of his philosophy: “The subject of this theory [the Fourth Political Theory], in its simple version, is the concept ‘narod,’roughly, ‘Volk’ or ‘people,’ in the sense of ‘peoplehood’ and ‘peoples,’ not ‘masses’” (quoted from “The Fourth Estate: The History and Meaning of the Middle Class”). Thus, it is clear that even if he does not value race, Dugin certainly does value ethno-cultural identity. Of course, this is not to say that rejecting the reality of race is not at all problematic, only that it is not enough to denounce a philosopher. However, those who like to claim that Dugin dismisses race as a “social construct” are reminiscent of those who say the same thing about Alain de Benoist, whereas it is clear that Benoist asserts the reality of race and advocates racial separatism–specifically from a non-racist standpoint–in many of his writings, one of the most notable in English being “What is Racism?”.

Empire vs. Imperialism

The second problematic notion about Dugin is that he is an advocate of a type of Russian imperialism, usually suggested being of a Stalinist and Soviet type. However, this claim has no basis in fact, since he has renounced Soviet imperialism and has also distinguished between true empire and imperialism (which also made by Julius Evola and many other Traditionalist and New Right authors). In his essay “Main Principles of Eurasist Policy,” Dugin has asserted that there are three basic types of policy in modern Russia: Soviet, pro-Western (liberal), and Eurasist. He criticizes the Soviet and Liberal types while advocating the Eurasist policy: “Eurasism, in this way, is an original ‘patriotic pragmatism’, free from any dogmatics – be it Soviet or liberal… The Soviet pattern operates with obsolete political, economic and social realities, it exploits nostalgia and inertness, it lacks a sober analysis of the new international situation and the real development of world economic trends.” It should be clear from Dugin’s analysis of different forms of political approaches that his own viewpoint is not based on the USSR model, which he explicitly rejects and critiques.

Moreover, it is often overlooked that when Dugin advocates a Eurasian empire or union, there is a distinction between a true empire—in the traditionalist sense—and imperialism, and thus an empire is not necessarily an imperialistic state (for a good overview of this concept, see Alain de Benoist’s “The Idea of Empire”). Unlike domineering and imperialistic states, the Eurasian Union envisioned by Dugin grants a partial level of self-government to regions within a federalist system:

The undoubted strategic unity in Eurasist federalism is accompanied by ethnic plurality, by the emphasis on the juridical element of the “rights of the peoples”. The strategic control of the space of the Eurasian Union is ensured by the unity of management and federal strategic districts, in whose composition various formations can enter – from ethno-cultural to territorial. The immediate differentiation of territories into several levels will add flexibility, adaptability and plurality to the system of administrative management in combination with rigid centralism in the strategic sphere. (quoted from “Main Principles of Eurasist Policy”)

Of course, it must also be remembered that Dugin’s vision needs to be differentiated from the policies of the present Russian state, which, at this time, cannot be said to adequately represent the Eurasists’ goals (despite the influence of Eurasism on certain politicians). Furthermore, it should be mentioned that while Dugin currently supports president Putin, it is clear that he does not uncritically accept all of the policies of Putin’s government. Therefore, a sound analysis of Dugin’s proposed policies will not equate them with those of the Russian government, as some of his critics have erroneously done.

The “West” as the Enemy

Another common misconception is that Dugin is hostile to Western European civilization and even advocates its complete destruction. It is important to recognize that Dugin’s conception of the “West” is similar to that advocated by the European New Right (in the works of Pierre Krebs, Alain de Benoist, Guillaume Faye, Tomislav Sunic, etc.). The “West” is not a reference to all of Western-European civilization, but rather to the specific formulation of Western-European civilization founded upon liberalism, egalitarianism, and individualism: “The crisis of identity […] has scrapped all previous identities–civilizational, historical, national, political, ethnic, religious, cultural, in favor of a universal planetary Western-style identity–with its concept of individualism, secularism, representative democracy, economic and political liberalism, cosmopolitanism and the ideology of human rights.” (quoted from the interview with Dugin, “Civilization as Political Concept”).

Thus, Dugin, like the New Right, asserts that the “West” is actually foreign to true European culture—that it is in fact the enemy of Europe: “Atlanticism, liberalism, and individualism are all forms of absolute evil for the Indo-European identity, since they are incompatible with it” (quoted from “Alexander Dugin on ‘White Nationalism’ & Other Potential Allies in the Global Revolution”). Likewise, in his approving citation of Alain de Benoist’s cultural philosophy, he wrote the following:

A. de Benoist was building his political philosophy on radical rejection of liberal and bourgeois values, denying capitalism, individualism, modernism, geopolitical atlanticism and western eurocentrism. Furthermore, he opposed “Europe” and “West” as two antagonistic concepts: “Europe” for him is a field of deployment of a special cultural Logos, coming from the Greeks and actively interacting with the richness of Celtic, Germanic, Latin, Slavic, and other European traditions, and the “West” is the equivalent of the mechanistic, materialistic, rationalist civilization based on the predominance of the technology above everything. After O. Spengler Alain de Benoist understood “the West” as the “decline of the West” and together with Friedrich Nietzsche and Martin Heidegger was convinced of the necessity of overcoming modernity as nihilism and “the abandonment of the world by Being (Sein)” (Seinsverlassenheit). West in this understanding was identical to liberalism, capitalism, and bourgeois society – all that “New Right” claimed to overcome. (quoted from “Counter-hegemony in Theory of Multi-polar World”)

While Dugin attacks the “West” as modern liberal civilization, he simultaneously advocates the resurrection of Europe in his vision of the multipolar world: “We imagine this Greater Europe as a sovereign geopolitical power, with its own strong cultural identity, with its own social and political options…” (quoted from “The Greater Europe Project”). Similarly to the previous statements which we have quoted, he asserts here that European culture has multiple ideological elements and possible pathways in its history which are different from the liberal model: “Liberal democracy and the free market theory account for only part of the European historical heritage and that there have been other options proposed and issues dealt with by great European thinkers, scientists, politicians, ideologists and artists.”

Domitius Corbulo has argued, based on statements Dugin made in The Fourth Political Theory that liberalism and universalism are elements which run throughout Western civilization, that Dugin condemns Western-European culture in its entirety. However, it is important to recognize that these arguments are largely borrowed from Western-European authors such as Spengler, Heidegger, and Evola. These authors also recognized that anti-universalist, anti-liberal, and anti-materialist elements also exist in Western-European culture, and thus that there have always been other paths for the destiny of this culture. It is evident that Dugin would assert the same fact from his essays which we have cited here (as well as books not yet available in English, such as ¿Qué es el eurasismo?, Pour une théorie du monde multipolaire, or in Russian in Четвертый Путь, among others). It is important to remember here that The Fourth Political Theory is not a complete and perfect statement of Dugin’s thought, and that what he says there must be balanced with what he says in his other works.

It is often assumed that, considering his hostility to the liberal “West,” Dugin also advocates a complete destruction of the United States of America, which is seen as the epitome of the “West.” However, the very essence of his theory of the multipolar world is the idea that each civilization and nation must be granted the right to live and to determine its own destiny, political form, and way of life. For this reason, Dugin advocates the global combating of American cultural and economic imperialism, which denatures non-Western cultures. However, in the multipolar scheme, the United States also has the right to exist and to choose its own path, which means allowing the American people the right to continue the liberal model in the future, should they desire to do so. Of course, the liberal model would naturally be discouraged from abroad and be limited in its influence. This position can be drawn from Dugin’s key essays explicating the Theory of the Multipolar World: “The Multipolar World and the Postmodern” and “Multipolarism as an Open Project”.

The Fourth Political Theory vs. Reactionary Traditionalism

Some writers, such as Kenneth Anderson (“Speculating on future political and religious alliances”), have interpreted Alexander Dugin’s thought as a form of Radical Traditionalism (following Julius Evola and Rene Guenon) which is completely reactionary in nature, rejecting everything in the modern world–including all technological and scientific development–as something negative which needs to be eventually undone. This interpretation can be easily revealed to be incorrect when one examines Dugin’s statements on Traditionalism and modernity more closely. It is true that Dugin acknowledges Traditionalist thinkers such as Evola and Guenon among his influences, but it is also clear that he is not in full agreement with their views and advocates his own form of conservatism, which is much more similar to German Revolutionary Conservatism (see The Fourth Political Theory, pp. 86 ff.).

Unlike some Traditionalists, Dugin does not reject scientific and social progress, and thus it can also be said that he does not reject the Enlightenment in toto. When Dugin criticizes Enlightenment philosophy (the ideology of progress, individualism, etc.), it is not so much in the manner of the Radical Traditionalists as it is in the manner of the Conservative Revolution and the New Right, as was also done by Alain de Benoist, Armin Mohler, etc. In this regard, it can be mentioned that critiquing the ideology of progress is, of course, very different from rejecting progress itself. For the most part, he does not advocate the overcoming of the “modern world” in the Traditionalist sense, but in the New Rightist sense, which means eliminating what is bad in the present modern world to create a new cultural order (“postmodernity”) which reconciles what is good in modern society with traditional society. Thus Dugin asserts that one of the most essential ideas of the Eurasist philosophy is the creation of societies which restore traditional and spiritual values without surrendering scientific progress:

The philosophy of Eurasianism proceeds from priority of values of the traditional society, acknowledges the imperative of technical and social modernization (but without breaking off cultural roots), and strives to adapt its ideal program to the situation of a post-industrial, information society called “postmodern”. The formal opposition between tradition and modernity is removed in postmodern. However, postmodernism in the atlantist aspect levels them from the position of indifference and exhaustiveness of contents. The Eurasian postmodern, on the contrary, considers the possibility for an alliance of tradition with modernity to be a creative, optimistic energetic impulse that induces imagination and development. (quote from Eurasian Mission, cited in Dugin, “Multipolarism as an Open Project”)

It should be evident from these statements that Dugin is not a reactionary, despite his sympathy to Radical Traditionalism. In this regard, it is worth mentioning that Dugin also supports a “Third Positionist” form of socialism as well as a non-liberal form of democracy. In regards to socialism, he has written that the “confusion of mankind into the single global proletariat is not a way to a better future, but an incidental and absolutely negative aspect of the global capitalism, which does not open any new prospects and only leads to degradation of cultures, societies, and traditions. If peoples do have a chance to organize effective resistance to the global capitalism, it is only where Socialist ideas are combined with elements of a traditional society…” (from “Multipolarism as an Open Project”). Whereas some have accused Dugin of being anti-democratic, he has plainly advocated the idea of a “democratic empire”: “The political system of the Eurasian Union in the most logical way is founded on the ‘democracy of participation’ (the ‘demotia’ of the classical Eurasists), the accent being not on the quantitative, but on the qualitative aspect of representation” (quoted from “Main Principles of Eurasist Policy”; see also the comments on democracy in his “Milestones of Eurasism”).

References to Leftists and Cultural Marxists

Finally, one of the most recent attacks on Alexander Dugin is based on his reference to Cultural Marxist and “Leftist” philosophers, which is seen by some as an indicator that Dugin himself is sympathetic to Cultural Marxism (see Domitius Corbulo’s “Alexander Dugin’s 4th Political Theory is for the Russian Empire, not for European Ethno-Nationalists”). However, Dugin has clearly pointed out that while he uses ideas from Marxist and “Leftist” theorists, he rejects their ideologies as a whole: “The second and third political theories [Fascism and Marxism] must be reconsidered, selecting in them that which must be discarded and that which has value in itself. As complete ideologies… they are entirely useless, either theoretically or practically.” (quoted from The Fourth Political Theory, p. 24).

If one notes that Dugin occasionally makes use of Marxist thinkers, then it should not be overlooked that he places even more importance on Right-wing thinkers, who clearly form the greater influence on him; the intellectuals of the Conservative Revolution (Heidegger, Schmitt, Moeller van den Bruck, etc.), the Traditionalist School (Evola, Guenon, Schuon, etc.), the New Right (Benoist, Freund, Steuckers, etc.), and the conservative religious scholars (Eliade, Durand, etc.). Furthermore, Corbulo objects to Dugin’s use of Claude Levi-Strauss’s work, yet respected New Right thinkers like Alain de Benoist and Dominique Venner (see Robert Steuckers, “En souvenir de Dominique Venner”, citing Venner’s Le siècle de 1914) have also referenced the ideas of Levi-Strauss on matters of culture and ethnicity, among other authors that Dugin uses, such as Jean Baudrillard.

In a recent interview, Dugin has clearly agreed with the European Right’s position on immigration (which advocates the restriction of non-European immigration), mentioning the threat that liberal cosmopolitanism brings to European culture: “The immigration changes the structure of European society. The Islamic people have very strong cultural identity. The European people weaken their own identity more and more in conscious manner. It is human right and civil society individualistic ideological dogma. So Europe is socially endangered and is on the eve to lose it identity” (quoted from “The West should be rejected”). Thus, when we take a less biased view of Dugin’s writings and statements, it is clear that his overall position is very far from that of the Cultural Marxists and the New Left.

From our examination thus far, it should be obvious that there are too many misconceptions about Alexander Dugin’s thought being circulated among Right-wingers. These misconceptions are being used to dismiss the value of his work and deceive members of Right-wing groups into believing that Dugin is a subversive intellectual who must be rejected as an enemy. Many other important Right-wing intellectuals have been similarly dismissed among certain circles, due to practices of a kind of in-group gleichschaltung, closing off any thinker who is not seen as readily agreeable. It is important to overcome such tendencies and support an intellectual expansion of the Right, which is the only way to overcome the present liberal-egalitarian hegemony. People need to take a more careful and unbiased look at Dugin’s works and ideas, as with other controversial thinkers. Of course, Dugin is not without flaws and imperfections (nor is any other thinker), but these flaws can be overcome when his thought is balanced with that of other intellectuals, especially the Revolutionary Conservatives and the New Rightists.

 

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Tudor, Lucian. “The Real Dugin: Alexander Dugin’s Political Theories and his Relevance to the New Right.” Radix Journal, 30 August 2014. <http://www.radixjournal.com/journal/2014/8/30/the-real-dugin >.

Note: On the issue of bias and hostility towards Dugin and Russia in general, see Michael McGregor’s “Bipolar Russophobia”: <http://www.radixjournal.com/blog/2014/9/13/bipolar-russophobia >.

For an overview of the vision of a Multipolar World from an Identitarian perspective, see also Lucian Tudor, “The Philosophy of Identity: Ethnicity, Culture, and Race in Identitarian Thought,” The Occidental Quarterly, Vol. 14, No. 3 (Fall 2014), pp. 83-112.

 

Interview with Tulaev – Delian Diver

Interview with Pavel Tulaev by “Delian Diver”

 

Pavel Vladimirovich Toulaev is a scholar and a writer, the editor-in-chief of the Russian international magazine “ATHENAEUM”. He is also the vice-president of Moscow department of “Synergy European ” and a member of the Slavic Committee. Toulaev was born in Krasnodar (1959) and is living in Moscow since 1970. By education he is an interpreter from Spanish, English and French (1981), Ph.D. in History (1985). In 1982-1992 he passed his postgraduate studies and worked as a researcher in the Institute of Latin America of the USSR. Then he worked in Spain (1992) and in the USA (1993/1994).

Toulaev is the author of more than 100 publications in different genres about Russia, Europe, Latin and North America. The separate editions published in Moscow are: “The Cross over the Crimean” (1992), “Seven Rays” (1993), “Understanding Russian” (1994), “Franco: the leader of Spain” (1998), “Veneti: ancestors of Slavs” (2000), “Poletajev’s Russian Concert” (2005).

He is the editor of collections: “Russia and Europe: the Experience of Sobor Analysis” (1992), “Russian Perspective” (1996), “Barbarians” (1999), “The White World Futures” (2006) and authors’ works – “Philosophy of the Post-History” by Vitaly Kovaljov (1992), “Sermons” by Dmitry Dudko (1993), “How the Order Creates Wars and Revolutions” by Antony Sutton (1995), “The Priest of the North” by Sergey Yashin (2000); “Veneti: our ancestors” by Jozko Savli (2003); “The Federal Reserve Conspiracy (Russian version as Vlast dollara)” and “The Order of Skull & Bones” by Antony Sutton (2004); “Mother-Land” by Dobroslav; “Rhetra Treasures” by Andreas Gottliebe Masch (2006), “What are we fighting for” by Guillaume Faye (2007).

Some of Toulaev’s works have been published in English, Spanish, German, French, Polish, Slovenian, Serbian, Ukranian.

Interview by Delian diver with Pavel Tulaev,

Moscow, March 18, 2008

Delian diver: There is a lack of information about Russian identitarian movement in Czech republic. Can you briefly describe its history since 1991? Or were there any active organizations (or persons) even in times of USSR?

Pavel Tulaev: First of all, I would like to thank you for the interest in the Russian ATHENAEUM Magazine and my personal works. We are glad to collaborate with a representative of the New Right movement in Czech Republic, because we consider your country one of the key forces in Central Europe.

Czechia traditionally played the leading role in pan-Slavic movement. In my library I have works of prominent Czech scientists and thinkers that influenced modern European thought, such as P. Safarik, F. Dvornik and L. Niederle, translated into Russian, and a wonderful album of Alphonse Mucha.

As for the history of the Russian identitarian movement, it began not in 1991, because the event that took place back then was only a political coup d’etat. Even in the Soviet era several prominent nationalist movements existed in Russia: Orthodox Church, national-patriotic societies, rusofilian art groups etc. The pagan (heathen) movement, which I represent, began with the works or Russian folklore scientists and slavists of XIX-XX centuries, such as A. Afanasiev, A. Fomintsyn, B.Rybakov and many others. Nowadays this Russian heathen line has been extended by the Aryan (Vedic) knowledge, represented in sacred texts and living tradition.

Nowadays there are a lot of political groups of Nationalist and Patriotic direction, of various ideological spectrum. The peak of political activity was in the mid 1990s, but with Putin coming to power, the state has taken some of our key ideas and slogans, and the activity of the nationalists declined. As a result, such organizations as “Pamyat” (radical Orthodox), RNE (National-Socialist), NNP (Russian Nationalist radicals), NBP (National-Bolshevik Party) and many others are now history.

As for the organizations that are active now, I would name NDPR (National-Democratic party of Rusia, led by A. Sevastianov), DPNI (Movement against illegal immigrants, led by Alexander Belov), “Great Russia”(led by Dmitry Rogosin and Andrey Saveliev)

The so-called “Russian March” held every year on Nov, 4 that gathers more than ten thousands supporters in different cities and towns of Russia – can be drawn as an example of our actions.

Delian diver: Your wife (Galyna Lozko) is one of the leading figures of heathenism in Ukraine. Is there any kind of heathen renaissance under way in Slavonic countries? Which Slavonic heathen movements are the most significant ones?

Pavel Tulaev: Yes, Galyna Lozko (Zoreslava) is really the most prominent leading figure of heathenism in Ukraine. She is an outstanding ethnographer with a PhD degree, an author of many important works, including “Europe Awaken” – a book devoted to the European pagan Renaissance. Besides, she has founded and registered at official level the Pagan’s Union of Ukraine (rodnovery), that is publishing “Svarog” Magazine in Kiev.

Together with my wife we have founded a pan-Slavic organization called “Rodovoje Slavyanskoje Vetche”, in which leaders of heathen movement and pagan priests from Russia, Ukraine, Poland, Byelorussia, Serbia, Bulgaria and other Slavonic countries take part. I recommend you to read about it at our multilingual portal http://ateney.ru or in our newspaper “SLAVA!”.

Delian diver: Are you in touch with organisations dedicated to preserving German/Nordic, Celtic or ancient Greek and Roman heritage?

Pavel Tulaev: Yes, of course we are. First of all, I would name the World Congress of Ethnic Religions (WCER), headed by Jonas Trinkunas, an outstanding explorer of the folk traditions in Lithuania.

Also we have direct connections with such organizations and magazines as “Message” (The Druids of France), “Nordische Zeitung” (Germany), “Toporzel” (Poland), “Svevlad” (Serbia), “ARMA” (Greece), “Tierra y Pueblo” (Spain), “Dulo Society” (Bulgaria), “Mesogaia Sarmatia” (Ukraine) and many others.

Delian diver: You suggest the replacement of Faye’s Eurosiberian vision by the idea of Euro-Russia where the Siberian area is to be swapped with White Russia and Ukraine. Who is supposed to be the strategic partner of Euro-Russia in future pan-Europe, and what role will the countries of central Europe play in this new continental block?

Pavel Tulaev: Above all, Guillaume Faye is talking about a futuristic project. It has become more concrete when he visited Russia after our invitation. As a result, I have managed to convince him that the notion of Euro-Russia would be more accurate in ethnopolitical sphere, because Russia is a historical subject, and Siberia is merely a geographical territory.

Naturally, for us, Russia is the heart of the continent. But, all in all, the project of EuroRussia presupposes a polycentric system , when every country, including Czechia, will be an equal partner within the new pan-European geopolitical structure. I mean EuroRussia, not just “United Europe”, because Russia has its own destiny and mission in the World.

As for the possible partnership, it will depend on the hierarchy of values, such as nation (ethnos), super-ethnos (family of the nations), race (ethnically similar nations) and White Civilization (that can be European or post-European in its essence).

Delian diver: What is your opinion on the USA and their white nationalist movement? Do you think the contemporary hysterical anti-Americanism (fed especially by far left) can be an obstacle on the way of Euro-American nationalist cooperation?

Pavel Tulaev: I always distinguished between modern predatory policy of the US (as an ally of Israel) and the American people, within which we have comrades-in-arms from White Nationalist movement. When I taught in one of the universities of the US in early 1990s, this statement was justified by my personal experience.

Not all of the Russian Nationalists, especially, the radical far-right ones, share the anti-Yankee hysteria, provoked by the lefts and the so-called “Eurasians”. Russia has traditionally good relations with America, and it will develop this geopolitical line, especially in the Far East and the Pacific, where China is the primary rival of both USA and Russia. But this does not diminish our pro-European strategy, because we are tied with Europe by historical and genetic connections.

Delian diver: How do you view the effort USA put into Turkey to join the EU? Is this effort the part of broader strategy of USA- their aspiration for Islam to penetrate Europe? How do you think this islamisation of Europe will be developing?

Pavel Tulaev: We do agree that the USA-NATO uses Turkey as a battering ram against the European community. The US counts on the radical Islamic organizations with the same purpose. They are the so-called counter-agents who are to create the local artificial and controlled conflicts. The islamization of Europe is a reality and a very serious threat.

As an answer to this, Russia proposes its own strategy against Islamic extremism, which is aimed at neutralizing the allies of Turkey, such as the Wahhabites and Albanian extremists. But simultaneously we are strengthening our relations with such partners as Serbia, Bulgaria, Armenia and Greece, despite of NATO’s attempts to destabilize the atmosphere in South-Eastern Europe.

Delian diver: Is the adjustment of Kosovo part of USA’s effort for further weakening of Russia, his allies and “disobedient” European states by the support of ethnic separatism?

Pavel Tulaev: The separation of Kosovo is one more step of the NATO’s strategy, aimed at dissolution of Yugoslavia and the Slavic World as a whole. After the reunification of Germany, Czechoslovakia and the USSR, whose heart was the union of Great Russia, Minor Russia (Ukraine) and Byelorussia, have been also divided in parts.

But this policy of supporting the separatism and autonomous states has another aspect: today Abkhazia (in Caucasus), Crimea (in the Ukraine), Basque Country (in Spain), Kurdistan (in Turkey), Breizh (in France) also stand for their independence. This process might lead to the dissolution of Maastricht’s Europe and will undermine the bases of NATO. This process may be continued in the USA and Canada, where Alaska, California, Texas and Quebec claim their rights for independence.

The history is a constant changing in types and forms of State. In a hundred years, the political map of the world will look far from the way it looks today.

Delian diver: Please, try to introduce us the pan-European movement Synergies Europeennes. Is Athenaeum regarded as its independent branch? Are there any differences between it and other European branches?

Pavel Tulaev: Synergies Européennes is a pan-European intellectual movement, led by our friend and constant correspondent Robert Steuckers from Belgium. The Russian ATHENAEUM is an independent review, that I am publishing with my colleges: Anatoly Ivanov, a polyglot translator and a veteran of Russian Nationalist movement, and Vladimir Avdeev, a famous writer and racial scientist.

Of course, there are many differences between us and other European branches, since every country has its own history and traditions. Moreover, each of the members of the Russian team has his own preferences and priorities. I am a Russian Nationalist and a pan-Slavist, Anatoly Ivanov sympathizes with Franco-Roman countries and Vladimir Avdeev is famous for his pro-Germanic sympathies. But we all work on the basis of principle of multiformity and harmonic unity of ideas.

Delian diver: Introduce us, please, the Slavic Committee as well. When did it spring into existence and who has been participating in its running?

Pavel Tulaev: The history of the Slavic Committee dates back to the mid. XIX century, when, as a result of growth of national-liberating movements in Europe (the so-called “Spring of the Nations”), the first historical congress took place in 1848 and gathered in Prague more than 300 delegates from fraternal countries. It stimulated the growth of Slavophilian sympathies all over the world. After that, some similar congress in Moscow, St. Petersburg and Belgrade took place.

In the Soviet times this ideological and cultural movement was banned, its leaders were repressed. But during the war with Hitler’s Germany, the ideas of Pan-Slavism were revealed. In the end of the war, even Stalin, mostly due to diplomatic reasons, had to call himself a Slavophile. In history, this ideology was partially realized by Joseph Broz Tito.

The New wave of Pan-Slavism began in the 1990-s, when the Soviet war veterans, who were disappointed by the dissolution of the Warsaw Treaty states, tried to organize new international organizations. These are: “Slavyansky Sobor” (The Slavic Council) led by a combat correspondent Nikolai Kikeshev (Russia) and the International Slavic Committee, led by Jan Minar (Czech Republic). I am an active member of the Russian affiliation of this organization.

Since then several prominent international congresses and conferences were held: in Prague, Moscow, Kiev, Minsk. We had a lot of support in Byelorussia, since president Lukashenko is leading a pro-Slavic policy.

After the initiative of many activists from Slavic countries, festivals of art and music take place.

The forms, acquired by the pan-Slavic movement are various and in this respect the “Rodovoye Slavyanskoye Vetche”, that we have organized with Galyna Lozko, is one of the forms this movement has acquired.

Delian diver: At the end please sum up your plans for the future.

Pavel Tulaev: This month I am publishing a very important album “The Native Gods painted by modern slavic artists” that included 230 colored illustrations, a special vocabulary and my introduction devoted to the history of heathen art in Russia. In spring I will publish a volume of reports after the conference “Europe and Russia: New Perspectives” (2007), as I did after the “White World’s Future” conference (2006). I am also preparing a special issue of “Slava!” newspaper, dedicated to the conference in Belgrad (2007), as well as the new issue of our “Athenaeum” Magazine. These materials will be partially posted at our multilingual website http://ateney.ru.

All in all we will continue the line of strengthening the brotherhood of the Slavic peoples and our cooperation within the White World. We are preparing a new conference in Bulgaria, in which the representatives of Czech Republic are also welcome to take place.

We are always ready for a positive and constructive collaboration within the framework of today’s laws and political correctness that does not abolish bravery of thought and reality of action.

In the name of our Native Gods!

Slava!

 

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Tulaev, Pavel. “Interview by Delian diver with Pavel Tulaev.” Délský Potápěč, 22 March 2008. <http://deliandiver.org/2008/03/interview-with-pavel-tulaev-the-editor-of-russian-magazine-the-athenaeum.html >.

This article is also available on Tulaev’s personal website: <http://tulaev.ru/html.php?151 >.

 

Hans Freyer – Lucian Tudor

Hans Freyer: The Quest for Collective Meaning

By Lucian Tudor

Translations: Čeština

Hans Freyer was an influential German sociologist who lived during the early half of the 20th century and is associated not only with his role in the development of sociology in German academia but also with the “Far Right.” Freyer was part of the intellectual trend known in Germany during the 1920s and 30s as the Conservative Revolution, and had also worked in universities under the Third Reich government for much of its reign, although it should be clear that Freyer was never an “orthodox” National Socialist.[1] However, outside of Germany he has never been very well known, and it may be of some benefit for the Right today to be more aware of his basic philosophy, for the more aware we become of different philosophical approaches to the problems facing modern society the more prepared we are intellectually to challenge the dominant liberal-egalitarian system.

Community and Society

Classical liberal theory was individualist, holding that the individual human being was the ultimate reality, that individuals existed essentially only as individuals; that is, that they are completely independent from each other except when they choose to “rationally” associate with each other or create a “social contract.” While this notion has been increasingly criticized in more recent times from different academic positions, in much of the 19th and 20th centuries liberal theory was very influential.[2] One of the most important thinkers in early German sociology to provide a social theory which rejected individualism was Ferdinand Tönnies, who was a crucial influence on Hans Freyer.

Tönnies’s work established a fundamental distinction between Gemeinschaft (“Community”) and Gesellschaft (“Society”), a distinction which Freyer and many other German intellectuals would agree with. According to this concept, Gemeinschaft consists of the organic relations and a sense of connection and belonging which arise as a result of natural will, while Gesellschaft consists of mechanical or instrumental relations which are consciously established and thus the result of rational will. As Tönnies wrote:

The theory of Gesellschaft deals with the artificial construction of an aggregate of human beings which superficially resembles the Gemeinschaft insofar as the individuals live and dwell together peacefully. However, in Gemeinschaft they remain essentially united in spite of all separating factors, whereas in Gesellschaft they are essentially separated in spite of all uniting factors. [3]

Tönnies emphasized that in modern urban society the sense of organic solidarity or Gemeinschaft was increasingly reduced (with Gesellschaft having become the more dominant form of relationship), thus harming human social relations. However, it should also be remembered for the sake of clarity that he also clarified that these were types of relationships that are both always present in any human society; the issue was that they existed in varying degrees. Although sociological theory did not reject the importance of the individual person, it clearly revealed that individuals were never completely disconnected, as classical liberal theory so foolishly held, but rather that they always have a social relationship that goes beyond them.

Philosophy of Culture

Hans Freyer’s definition of culture included not only “high culture” (as is the case with Spengler’s work), but as the totality of institutions, beliefs, and customs of a society; that is, the term culture was utilized “in the broadest sense to indicate all the externalized creations of men.”[4] More specifically, Freyer identified culture as “objective spirit,” a concept derived from Simmel’s philosophy. This concept denotes that the creations of human beings – everything which culture comprises, including tools, concepts, institutions, etc. – were created by human minds (the “subjective domain of the psyche”) at some point in history in order to fulfill their needs or desires, and following their creation they obtained an “objective value,” became “objectified.”[5] That is, as a result of being manifested and used over time, concrete cultural creations over time obtained a fixed value independent of the original value given to them by their creator(s) and also of the situation in which they were created.[6]

In Freyer’s theory, culture and its traditions are created, first of all, to provide “stability in the face of the natural flux of life,” for if culture changed as quickly as Life then cultural forms would be constantly replaced and would therefore lose their value for providing stability.[7] Furthermore, traditions gained value with an increase in their “depth” and “weight” (metaphorical terms used by Freyer), i.e. their permanence among the changes of life and human conditions.

Traditions gained “depth” by being re-appropriated over generations; while cultural objects gained a new meaning for each new generation of a people due to changes in life conditions, the subsequent generation still retained an awareness of the older meanings of these objects, thus giving them “weight.” Because of this historical continuity in the re-appropriation of culture, cultural forms or traditions acquire a special meaning-content for the people who bear that culture in the present.

It is also very important to recognize that Freyer asserted that the most crucial purpose of a culture and the social groups associated with it was to “convey a set of delimiting purposes to the individual” in order to provide a sense of “personal meaning,” which was “linked to collective stability, collective integration was linked to collective purpose, and collective purpose was linked to the renewal of tradition.”[8]

Culture, Race, Volk

Additionally, it should be noted that another significant aspect of Freyer’s philosophy is that he held that “the only viable cultural unity in the modern world was the Volk,”[9] which means that although culture exists on multiple levels, the only entity which is a reliable source of cultural identity and which carries relatable traditions is the Volk (a term which is oftentimes translated as “nation” or “people” but is in this sense better rendered as “ethnicity”). The Volk was the collective entity from which particular cultures emerged, which bore the imprint of a particular Volksgeist (technically, “folk spirit”) or collective spirit.

The Volk as an entity was created by an interaction between two forces which Freyer termed Blut (“Blood”) and Heimat (“Home”). Home is the landscape or environment in which the Volk formed, “that place from which we come and which we cannot abandon without becoming sick,” while “Blood is that which comprises our essence, and from which we cannot separate ourselves without degenerating,”[10] meaning the racial constitution of the people whose biological integrity must be upheld. While in order to be healthy, a Volk must have the characteristic of Bodenständigkeit (“groundedness in the soil,” as opposed to the “groundlessness” of liberal society), a key foundation of the Volkstum (“Folkdom”) is race:

It is here [at the Volkstum] that all the talk of race originates and has its truth. When one objects that this is pure biology, that after all spiritual matters cannot be derived from their natural basis, or when one objects that there are no pure races – these objections fail to grasp the concept of race that is a component of the new worldview. Race is understood not in the sense of “mere” biology but rather as the organic involvement of contemporary man in the concrete reality of his Volk, which reaches back through millennia but which is present in its millennial depth; which has deposited itself in man’s bodily and psychic existence, and which confers an intrinsic norm upon all the expressions of a culture, even the highest, most individual creations.[11]

The Loss of Meaning and Particularity

Hans Freyer was, like G. W. F. Hegel and Wilhelm Dilthey (two of his major influences), a historicist, although unlike Hegel he did not believe that history was entirely rational or that positive “progress” would be necessarily determined in history.[12] As a historicist, Freyer believed that all human cultures and values are created by historical circumstances and thus change over time, and also therefore that no Volk or culture is, objectively speaking, superior or inferior to another, and that essentially each culture and tradition is just as valid as any other. That is, “history thinks in plurals, and its teaching is that there is more than one solution for the human equation.”[13]

As result, the question of which cultural tradition would form the basis of collective meaning came into question. Freyer, in the German historicist line of thought, rejected the notion that one could scientifically or rationally choose which culture is better (due to the fact that they are all equally legitimate), and furthermore people in modern times held an awareness of the existence of the multiplicity of human cultures and their historical foundations. This awareness caused many modern people to feel an uncertainty about the full validity of their own culture, something which served as a factor in the loss of a sense of meaning in their own traditions and therefore a loss of a sense of personal meaning in their culture. That is, a loss of that sense of guidance and value in one’s own traditions which was more common in ancient and Medieval societies, where human beings tended to recognize only their own culture as valid. Freyer noted: “We have a bad conscience in regard to our age. We feel ourselves to be unconfirmed, lacking in meaning, unfulfilled, not even obligated.”[14]

However, there was also another source of the lack of a sense of collective meaning in modern societies: the development of industrial society and capitalism. The market economy, without any significant limits placed upon it, along with the emergence of advanced technology, had a universalist thrust, not recognizing national boundaries or cultural barriers. These inherently universalist tendencies in capitalism created another factor in the loss of a sense of cultural uniqueness, collective meaning, and particularity in human beings in the West.

The modern economy was the source of the formation of “secondary systems,” meaning structures which had no connection to any organic ethnic culture and which regarded both the natural world and human beings in a technical manner: as objects to be used as resources or tools to be utilized to increase production and therefore also profit. Because of this, the systems of production, consumption, and administration expanded, resulting in a structure controlled by a complex bureaucracy and in which, “instead of membership in a single community of collective purpose, the individual was associated with others who occupied a similar role in one of the secondary systems. But these associations were partial, shifting, and ‘one-dimensional,’ lacking deeper purpose of commitment… [leaving] the individual lonely and insecure.”[15]

Freyer asserted that history is divisible into three stages of development: Glaube (“Faith”), Stil (“Style”), and Staat (“State”). In the stage known as Glaube, which corresponded to the concept of ancient Gemeinschaft, human beings were “completely surrounded, encircled, and bound up in a culture that ties [them] closely to other members of [their] society.”[16] In the stage known as Stil, society would become hierarchical as a result of the domination of one group over another. While ancestry and a belief in the natural superiority of the ruling class would be valued in the resulting system, in later stages the source of social status would become wealth as a result of the rise of economic motives and capitalistic class society would form. As a result, the loss of meaning previously described occurs and history enters “critical epochs in which the objective cultural forms were unable to contain the flux of life.”[17] This would give rise to the necessity of a revolutionary transformation of the cultural reality: the third impending stage, Staat.

Revolution from the Right

Hans Freyer studied the problem of the failure of radical Leftist socialist movements to overcome bourgeois society in the West, most notably in his Revolution von Rechts (“Revolution from the Right”). He observed that because of compromises on the part of capitalist governments, which introduced welfare policies to appease the workers, many revolutionary socialists had come to merely accommodate the system; that is, they no longer aimed to overcome it by revolution because it provided more or less satisfactory welfare policies. Furthermore, these same policies were basically defusing revolutionary charges among the workers.

Freyer concluded that capitalist bourgeois society could only be overcome by a revolution from the Right, by Right-wing socialists whose guiding purpose would not be class warfare but the restoration of collective meaning in a strong Völkisch (“Folkish” or “ethnic”) state. “A new front is forming on the battlefields of bourgeois society – the revolution from the Right. With that magnetic power inherent in the battle cry of the future even before it has been sounded…”[18] This revolutionary movement would be guided by a utopian vision, yet for Freyer the significance of belief in utopia was not the practicality of fully establishing its vision, “utopia was not a blueprint of the future but the will to actively transform the present… Utopias served to transmute critical epochs into positive ones.”[19]

The primary purpose of the new State which Freyer envisioned was to integrate human beings belonging to the Volk into “a closed totality based upon the reassertion of collective particularity.”[20] Freyer asserted that the only way to restore this sense of collective particularity and a sense of community was to create a closed society in which the state ensures that foreign cultural and ideological influences do not interfere with that of the Volk, for such interferences would harm the unity of the people. As Freyer wrote, “this self-created world should completely, utterly, and objectively enclose a particular group; should so surround it that no alien influences can penetrate its realm.”[21] Freyer’s program also carried with it a complete rejection of all multiculturalism, for the state must be composed solely of one ethnic entity in order to have cultural stability and order.

The state which Freyer anticipated would also not do away with the technological achievements of capitalism but rather make use of them while bringing the economic system under its strict control (essentially “state socialism”), eliminating the existence of the economy as a “secondary system” and reintegrating it into the organic life of the Volk. This Völkisch state also served the necessary purpose of unifying the Volk under a single political force and guidance, for, along with Machiavelli and Carl Schmitt, Freyer believed it was essential that a people is capable and ready to defend itself against the ambitions of other states. For the sake of this unity, Freyer also rejected democracy due to the fact that he believed it inherently harmed the unity of the Volk as a result of the fact that it gave rise to a multiplicity of value systems and interest groups which competed for power; the state must be politically homogeneous. “The state is… the awakening of the Volk out of timeless existence [Dasein] to power over itself and to power in time.”[22]

Freyer also believed in both the inevitability and the importance of conflict in human existence: “War is the father of all things . . . if not in the literal sense then certainly for the thing of all things, the work of all works, that structure in which the creativity of Geist [“Spirit”] reaches its earthly goal, for the hardest, most objective and all-encompassing thing that can ever be created – for the state.”[23] The act of war or the preparation for war also served to integrate the people towards a single purpose, to give meaning to the individual by his duty to a higher power, the State. War was not something to be avoided, for, in Freyer’s philosophy, it had the positive result of intensifying the sense of community and political consciousness, as Freyer himself experienced during his time as a soldier in World War I.[24] Thus, “the state as a state is constituted by war and is continuously reconstituted by the preparation for war.”[25] Of course, this did not imply that the state had to constantly engage in war but rather in the preparation for war; war should be waged when diplomacy and strategy fails to meet the state’s demands.

Freyer’s Later Transformation

Hans Freyer believed, before its rise to power, that Hitler’s National Socialist movement constituted the force which would create the state of which he had written and hoped for. However, by the late 1930s he was disappointed by the repressive and basically “totalitarian” nature of the regime, and after World War II began to advocate a drastically different approach to the problems of modern society. He essentially became a moderate and partially liberal conservative (as opposed to being a “radical conservative,” which is a descriptor for his pre-war views), a change which was probably a result of his disappointment with the Third Reich coupled with the Reich’s downfall and the ensuing political changes thereafter.

Freyer concluded that the state was itself a “secondary system” (like those created by the market economy) and if used to organize the re-appropriation of tradition it would negatively distort cultural life. His new line of thought led him to the conclusion that the state should be limited (hence his subsequent support for democracy) and that welfare-state capitalism should be practiced because “it was less likely to create the degree of concentration of power characteristic of a socialist economy.”[26] Freyer still advocated the necessity of creating a sense of value in one’s own particular culture and traditions and a sense of collective meaning, but he believed that this should be done in the private sphere of life and through “private” institutions such as the family, the church, and local communities. Likewise, he no longer advocated a complete closure of society and he also recognized that the existence of a plurality of groups in the state was unavoidable.

We may conclude by pointing out that this transformation in Freyer’s position, while undoubtedly partly influenced by the existence of a new political regime, was also certainly not unjustified, for there is much to criticize in his earlier work. For example, it is certainly not unreasonable to question whether an authoritarian regime, a constant engagement or preparation for warfare, and a society completely closed to other societies are necessary to restore a sense of community and a value in one’s own culture and ethnicity.[27] On the other hand, one does not necessarily have to agree with all of Freyer’s later conclusions, for one could argue they are also not without imperfections. However, ultimately we gain from a view of his thought and its transformation with a wider, more informed philosophical perspective.

The Relevance of Freyer’s Thought Today

There is much in Freyer’s philosophy which is relevant to the current problems our world is facing (although we make no implication that his ideas are entirely unique to him), in some cases even more relevant today than in the time they were written. While his earlier notion of a complete cultural closure of society may be too extreme, in the face of the complete opening of society experienced in the later 20th Century and early 21st Century, it is quite clear that a partial level of closure, that is some (although not absolute) barriers, are necessary to return to a healthy cultural reality.[28] Likewise, his recognition of the importance of race in the cultural and social realm, going beyond the simplistic notion of race as being merely one’s genetic makeup, is pertinent today as far too many people do not even consciously understand the full role of race in culture and society.

Moreover, in light of the fact that the majority of former radical Leftists in most Western and also some Eastern nations have shifted towards the “Center” and have become merely defenders of the political status quo, Freyer’s commentaries on the compromises made by socialists in his time correspond with the present day situation as well. One may also argue that Freyer’s recognition of the importance of a “utopian” vision to guide political movements is necessary to change societies, for without a dream for a better world to motivate people it is not likely that the status quo could be overcome.

Finally, considering the exacerbated “individualism” (which, we must stress, is not merely recognizing the value of the individual, which is perfectly normal, but rather something extreme and anomalous) common in modern Western societies, Freyer’s stress on “collective meaning,” the most crucial concept at the center of his philosophy, is probably of the greatest importance. For today it is indeed the obsession with the individual, and the placing of the individual over ethnicity and culture, which is undoubtedly one of the most significant roots of the ethnic, cultural, and racial downfall of Europe and European-derived nations. Thus, our own quest corresponds to Freyer’s, for like him we must aim to re-establish collective meaning in order to salvage our ethnic and cultural integrity.

Notes

[1] For more in-depth information on Hans Freyer’s life, see Jerry Z. Muller, The Other God That Failed: Hans Freyer and the Deradicalization of German Conservatism (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1988). We should note here to our readers that Muller’s book, despite its liberal bias, constitutes the single most important and extensive work on Freyer in the English language thus far.

[2] For an explanation of classical liberal theory concerning the individual as well as a critique of it, see Michael O’Meara, New Culture, New Right: Anti-Liberalism in Postmodern Europe (Bloomington, Ind.: 1stBooks, 2004), pp. 57 ff. On the forms of liberalism through history, see also Paul Gottfried, After Liberalism: Mass Democracy in the Managerial State (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2001).

[3] Ferdinand Tönnies, Community and Society (London and New York: Courier Dover Publications, 2002), pp. 64–65.

[4] Muller, The Other God That Failed, p. 93.

[5] Hans Freyer, Theory of Objective Mind: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Culture (Athens: Ohio University Press, 1999), p. 79. This is the only book by Freyer to be translated into English.

[6] Note that this entire general theory was expounded by Freyer in Theory of Objective Mind.

[7] Muller, The Other God That Failed, p. 94. Note that this notion is comparable to the theory of culture and the nature of human beings provided by Arnold Gehlen, who was one of Freyer’s students. See Arnold Gehlen’s Man: His Nature and Place in the World (New York: Columbia University Press, 1988) and also his Man in the Age of Technology (New York: Columbia University Press, 1980).

[8] Muller, The Other God That Failed, pp. 93 and 96.

[9] Colin Loader and David Kettler, Karl Mannheim’s Sociology as Political Education (New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction Publishers, 2002), p. 123.

[10] Hans Freyer, Der Staat (Leipzig, 1925), p. 151. Quoted in Muller, The Other God That Failed, p. 99.

[11] Hans Freyer, “Tradition und Revolution im Weltbild,” Europäische Revue 10 (1934) pp. 74–75. Quoted in Muller, The Other God That Failed, p. 263.

[12] On Freyer’s concept of progress as well as some of his thoughts on economics, see Volker Kruse, Methodology of the Social Sciences, Ethics, and Economics in the Newer Historical School: From Max Weber and Rickert to Sombart and Rothacker (Hannover: Springer, 1997), pp. 196 ff.

[13] Hans Freyer, Prometheus: Ideen zur Philosophie der Kultur (Jena, 1923), p. 78. Quoted in Muller, The Other God That Failed, p. 96.

[14] Freyer, Prometheus, p. 107. Quoted in Muller, The Other God That Failed, pp. 100–101.

[15] Muller, The Other God That Failed, p. 345.

[16] Ibid., p. 101.

[17] Loader and Kettler, Mannheim’s Sociology, p. 131.

[18] Hans Freyer, “Revolution from the Right,” in: The Weimar Republic Sourcebook, edited by Anton Kaes, Martin Jay, and Edward Dimendberg (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1995), p. 347.

[19] Loader and Kettler, Mannheim’s Sociology, pp. 131–32.

[20] Muller, The Other God That Failed, p. 106.

[21] Freyer, Der Staat, p. 99. Quoted in Muller, The Other God That Failed, p. 110.

[22] Hans Freyer, Revolution von Rechts (Jena: Eugen Diederich, 1931), p. 37. Quoted in Loader and Kettler, Mannheim’s Sociology, p. 126.

[23] Freyer, Der Staat, p. 143. Quoted in Muller, The Other God That Failed, p. 113.

[24] See Muller, The Other God That Failed, p. 64.

[25] Freyer, Der Staat, p. 143. Quoted in Muller, The Other God That Failed, p. 113.

[26] Muller, The Other God That Failed, p. 348.

[27] On a “right-wing” perspective in contradistinction with Freyer’s earlier positions on the issue of democracy and social closure, see as noteworthy examples Alain de Benoist, The Problem of Democracy (London: Arktos, 2011) and Pierre Krebs, Fighting for the Essence (London: Arktos, 2012).

[28] On the concept of a balance between total closure and total openness, see also Alain de Benoist, “What is Racism?” Telos, Vol. 1999, No. 114 (Winter 1999), pp. 11–48. Available online here: http://www.alaindebenoist.com/pdf/what_is_racism.pdf.

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Tudor, Lucian. “Hans Freyer: The Quest for Collective Meaning.” Counter-Currents Publishing, 22 February 2013, <http://www.counter-currents.com/2013/02/hans-freyer-the-quest-for-collective-meaning/ >.

Note: Although very little is available by or about Hans Freyer and his thought in English, more translations of his works can be found in other languages, as recorded at the World Catalogue: <http://www.worldcat.org/search?q=Hans+Freyer&fq=dt%3Abks+%3E+ap%3A%22freyer%2C+hans%22&dblist=638&fc=ln:_25&qt=show_more_ln%3A >.

Additional Note: This essay was also republished in updated form in Lucian Tudor’s From the German Conservative Revolution to the New Right: A Collection of Essays on Identitarian Philosophy (Santiago, Chile: Círculo de Investigaciones PanCriollistas, 2015).

 

Manifesto of the New Right – Benoist & Champetier

“Manifesto of the French New Right in the Year 2000” by Alain de Benoist and Charles Champetier (PDF – 264 KB):

Manifesto of the French New Right (English)

The following is the original French version of this work:

Manifeste: la Nouvelle Droite de l’an 2000 (PDF – 208 KB):

Manifeste: la Nouvelle Droite de l’an 2000 (Français)

The following is the Spanish translation of this work:

Manifiesto: La Nueva Derecha del año 2000 (PDF – 204 KB):

Manifiesto: la Nueva Derecha del año 2000 (Español)

The following is the Italian translation of this work:

La Nuova Destra del 2000 (PDF – 202 KB):

La Nuova Destra del 2000 (Italiano)

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Notes on publications and translations of the Manifesto:

Alain de Benoist’s and Charles Champetier’s “Manifesto of the French New Right in the Year 2000” (Telos, Vol. 1999, No. 115, [March-May 1999], pp. 117-144) was the first edition of the English version, which was also published in a second edition as Manifesto for a European Renaissance (London: Arktos, 2012). The full text of this manifesto was also included as an appendix within the third edition of Tomislav Sunic’s Against Democracy and Equality: The European New Right (London: Arktos, 2011). The text used to create the file available on this site was retrieved from: <http://www.amerika.org/texts/manifesto-of-the-french-new-right-in-year-2000-alain-de-benoist-and-charles-champetier >. The text in English is alternatively available in HTML format here: <http://home.alphalink.com.au/~radnat/debenoist/alain9.html >.

The “Manifiesto: la Nueva Derecha del ano 2000” (Hespérides, Vol. IV, No. 19 [March-May 1999], pp. 13-47) was the first edition of the Spanish version, which was also published in a second edition as Manifiesto para un renacimiento europeo (Mollet del Vallès, Barcelona: Grup de recerca i estudi de la cultura europea, 2000), which has in turn been recently republished by Arktos (London, 2013). The text of the Spanish translation was retrieved from: <http://www.red-vertice.com/disidencias/textosdisi19.html >.

The “Manifeste: la Nouvelle Droite de l’an 2000” (Eléments, No. 94, [February 1999], pp. 11-23) was the first edition of the original French version, which was also published in a second edition as Manifeste pour une renaissance européenne (Paris: GRECE, 2000). The text of the French retrieved from: <http://www.grece-fr.net/textes/_txtWeb.php?idArt=71 >.

The “La Nuova Destra del 2000” (“La Nuova Destra del 2000” (Diorama letterario, Firenze, 229-230, October-November 1999) was the first Italian translation of the manifesto, which was published in a newer edition as Manifesto per una Rinascita Europea (Rome: Nuove Idee editore, 2005). The file made available on this site was retrieved from: <http://www.alaindebenoist.com/pdf/la_nuova_destra_del_2000.pdf >.

Other translations: The manifesto was also translated into German as “Manifest: Die Nouvelle Droite des Jahres 2000” (published in Aufstand der Kulturen [Berlin: Edition Junge Freiheit, 1999]), into Dutch as “Manifest voor Europees herstel en vernieuwing” (TeKos, Wijnegem, 95, octobre-décembre 1999), into Danish as “Manifest. Det nye højre år 2000” (Nomos, Valby, III, 2005, 1), into Hungarian as “Manifesztum az európai újjászületésért” (A51 [2002], pp. 239-285), into Czech as “Manifest: Nova pravice v roce 2000” (Tradice budoucnosti. Ed. Orientace 1/2008), into Croatian as “Manifest za Europsku Obnovu, Nova Desnica u 21. Stoljeću” (included as an appendix to Tomislav Sunic, Europska Nova Desnica [Zagreb, Croatia: Hasanbegović, 2009]), into Portuguese as Manifesto Para Um Renascimento Europeu (USA & EU: Editora Contra Corrente, 2014), into Polish as Manifest Grupy Badań i Studiόw nad Cywilizacją Europejską (GRECE) (published online: Konserwatyzm.pl, 2013), and into Ukrainian as Маніфест Нових Правих (published online: Національний альянс, 2009, http://nation.org.ua/)

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Further Reading (Major works by Alain de Benoist):

The following works are considered to be the most important books (along with the above Manifesto) by Alain de Benoist which establish the intellectual foundations of the New Right movement:

Vu de Droite: Anthologie critique des idées contemporaines (Paris: Copernic, 1977), which was translated into German as Aus Rechter Sicht: Eine kritische Anthologie zeitgenössischer Ideen (Tübingen: Grabert, 1983-1984), into Italian as Visito da Destra: Antologia critica delle idee contemporanee (Napoli: Akropolis, 1981), into Portugese as Nova Direita, Nova Cultura: Antologia critica das ideias contemporaneas (Lisboa: Afrodite 1981), and in an abridged format into Romanian as O perspectivâ de dreapta: Anthologie criticâ a ideilor contemporane (Bucarest: coll. « Dreapta europeanâ », 2, Anastasia, 1998).

Les Idées à l’Endroit (Paris: Libres-Hallier, 1979), which was translated into Italian as Le Idee a Posto (Napoli: Akropolis, 1983), into Spanish as La Nueva Derecha: Una respuesta clara, profunda e inteligente (Barcelona: Planeta, 1982), into Greek as Oi ιδέες sta ορθο (Αθήνα: Ελεύθερη Σκέψις, 1980), and partially into German as Kulturrevolution von Rechts: Gramsci und die Nouvelle Droite (Krefeld: Sinus-Verlag, 1985).

Démocratie: le problème (Paris: Le Labyrinthe, 1985), which was translated into English as The Problem of Democracy (London: Arktos, 2011), into German as Demokratie: das Problem (Tübingen & Zürich: Hohenrain, 1986), into Italian as Democrazia: il problema (Firenze: Arnaud, 1985), and into Spanish as ¿Es un Problema la Democracia? (Barcelona: Nueva República, 2013).

Au-delà des droits de l’homme: Pour défendre les libertés (Paris: Krisis, 2004), which was translated into English as Beyond Human Rights: Defending Freedoms (London: Arktos Media, 2011), into German translation as Kritik der Menschenrechte: Warum Universalismus und Globalisierung die Freiheit bedrohen (Berlin: Junge Freiheit, 2004), into Italian as Oltre i diritti dell’uomo: Per difendire le libertà (Rome: Il Settimo Sigillo, 2004), and into Spanish as Más allá de los Derechos Humanos: defender las libertades (published online 2008 at Les Amis d’Alain de Benoist: <http://www.alaindebenoist.com/pdf/mas_alla_de_los_derechos_humanos.pdf >).

In German, an important collection of essays by Alain de Benoist has been published in the book  Schöne Vernetzte Welt: Eine Antwort auf die Globalisierung (Tübingen: Hohenrain-Verlag, 2001). Another German collection had also been published as Aufstand der Kulturen: Europäisches Manifest für das 21. Jahrhundert (Berlin: Edition Junge Freiheit, 1999). In Spanish, see also the following two publications: Benoist’s Más Allá de la Derecha y de la Izquierda: El pensamiento político que rompe esquemas (Barcelona: Ediciones Áltera, 2010), and a collection of essays by Benoist and Guillaume Faye titled Las Ideas de la “Nueva Derecha”: Una respuesta al colonialismo cultural (Barcelona: Nuevo Arte Thor, 1986). In Russian, a notable collection of translated essays by Alain de Benoist (Ален де Бенуа) has been published as Против либерализма: к четвертой политической теории (Санкт-Петербург: Амфора, 2009).

Also worth mentioning is a book by Benoist that is only available in French known as Critiques – Théoriques (Lausanne & Paris: L’Age d’Homme, 2003),  but from which selected essays (two important examples being “A Critique of Liberal Ideology” and “The Idea of Empire”) have been translated into multiple languages – including English, Spanish, Italian, German, Portuguese, Russian, among some others – and published in various magazines or journals. In addition, we would like to make note of a collection of essays on racism and anti-racism, which includes Benoist’s important essay “Racisme: remarques autour d’une définition” (translated into English as “What is Racism?”): the book Racismes, Antiracismes, edited by Andre Béjin and Julien Freund (Paris: Librairie des Méridiens, 1986), translated into Italian as Razzismo e antirazzismo (Firenze: La roccia di Erec, 1992).

Finally, it is worth mentioning the joint work of Alain de Benoist and Alexander Dugin on the theory of Eurasianism and the Fourth Political Theory, L’appel de L’Eurasie, conversation avec Alain de Benoist (Paris: Avatar Éditions, 2013), translated into Spanish as ¿Qué es el eurasismo? Una conversación de Alain de Benoist con Alexander Dugin (Tarragona: Ediciones Fides, 2014).

Read more about Alain de Benoist’s life and work at his official website: <http://www.alaindebenoist.com/ >, and see also F. Roger Devlin’s review of Alain de Benoist’s Memoire Vive: <https://neweuropeanconservative.wordpress.com/2013/02/02/benoists-vivid-memory-devlin/ >.