Julius Evola points out the three possible reactions to the modern world, which he regards as fundamentally “bourgeois”. We may dispute that today in that proletarian values seem to predominate in our time.
- Oppose the bourgeoisie with a “collectivized and materialized humanity,” to which we may add an “undifferentiated” humanity.
- Maintain the bourgeois status quo through focusing on the economic life, solely.
- Oppose the bourgeoisie with a “higher heroic and aristocratic conception of existence”, which is both “anterior and superior” to the current state of affairs.
The position that lies in the zone between culture and custom will finally be made clear. From communism came the rallying cry of the anti-bourgeois that was also picked up in the cultural groups of certain “committed” intellectual circles. As bourgeois society is something intermediate, so there exists a double possibility of surpassing the bourgeois, of saying “no” to the bourgeois type, to bourgeois civilization, to the bourgeois spirit and bourgeois values. One corresponds to the direction that leads even lower than all that, toward a collectivized and materialized humanity with its Marxist “realism”: social and proletarian values against bourgeois and capitalist decadence. But the other is the direction of those who oppose the bourgeoisie in order to actually rise up beyond it. The men of the new arrangement will still be anti-bourgeois, but by way of the aforesaid higher heroic and aristocratic conception of existence; they will be anti-bourgeois because they disdain the comfortable life; anti-bourgeois because they will follow not those who promise material advantages, but those who demand everything from themselves; anti-bourgeois, finally, because they are not preoccupied with security but love the essential union between life and risk, on all planes, making the inexorability of the bare idea and precise action his own. Yet another aspect, through which the new man, cellular substance for the motion of awakening, will be anti-bourgeois and will differentiate himself from the preceding generation, is through his intolerance of every form of rhetoric and false idealism, of all those great words that are written in capital letters, of everyone who is merely a gesture, words intended for effect, scenography. Essentiality, instead, a new realism in pitting itself exactly against the problems that will be imposed, in doing so the value is not appearing, but rather being, not prattling, but rather realizing, in a silent and exact way, in sync with similar forces and in adherence to the command that comes from above.
Those who are able to react against the forces of the left only in the name of idols, of lifestyle and the mediocre conformist morality of the bourgeois world, have already lost the battle beforehand. This is not the case for the man who stands on his feet, having already passed through the purifying fire of internal and external destruction. This man, in the same way that politically he is not the instrument of a false bourgeois reaction, so, in general, he regains forces and ideals anterior and superior to the bourgeois world and the economic era, and it is with them that he creates the lines of defense and consolidates positions when, at the opportune moment, he will strike out with the action of reconstruction.
Even in such regard, we intend to reclaim a delivery not followed: because we know how in the Fascist era there was an anti-bourgeois tendency that had tried to explicate itself in a not dissimilar sense. Unfortunately even there the human element was not up to the task. And they knew how to make rhetoric even out of anti-rhetoric.
I am going to ask you, Jason-Adam, to hold that thought until we begin a review of Dugin’s book The Fourth Political Theory. Despite his vast and deep knowledge of Guenon and Evola, he makes some serious errors. The first and most obvious is confusing the empirical and contingent with principles. Guenon and Evola point to the degeneration of castes, not necessarily to specific ideologies. For example, the problem is not capitalism in itself; rather it is making the values of the bourgeois the dominant values, and so on.
Keep in mind, too, that the USSR was leninist; according to Marx, communism would arise only after capitalism, so the USSR was premature and does not reflect perfectly what Dugin tries to pull from it. Also, there is little doubt that proletarian values are predominating in the USA; this is what we need to ponder, not how we label its economic system. Beyond that, there is the “fifth caste”, the former outcastes, whose values (or lack thereof) predominate. How this manifests is up for discussion.
The worse fault is the metaphysics of Chaos over Logos, a very unfortunate mental error. The reasons should be obvious, but this will be a topic of discussion perhaps later this week.
Dugin wants to argue that the West is “water” and hence Chaos (the Thalassocracy of the Sea). But isn’t Water just one of the Four Elements? Why would (inherently) Water be worse than Earth (Asia)? And does Water have something to do with the spiritual flood God is pouring out over the Earth? And does this make the North “Fire” and the South “Air”? Dugin has some fascinating insights and criticisms of the Anglo imperium, most of which I agree with in point, but I’m waiting for C to review the book before saying more. The destructive Gnostic side of Dugin is evident here:
http://arctogaia.com/public/eng/gnostic.htm
Russia will always be “Red” (Mouravieff emphasizes this) but I see no reason why Dugin would want to characterize the spiritual heritage of Orthodoxy as inherently “Gnostic” in the sense he describes. Part of the problem is with terms, but another part of the problem is that different sections of the globe are going to be “different” while remaining Traditional. Dugin may be deceived by some of his own rhetoric, it’s possible – it wouldn’t be the first time someone extremely bright (eg., Zizek) has gotten carried away by the sound of his own voice and ended up spinning webs of illusion for himself.
The other point to mention is that, in his recent essay THE MISSION of JULIUS EVOLA, Dugin said that Guenon and Evola were wrong to declare capitalism the thought of the third estate, and communism that of the fourth. He makes an intruging thought that since the Kali Yuga concludes with the rise of the Counter Tradition, atheistic communism cannot be the Antichrist. The fact the USSR fell while the USA remains shows that in the world of decline the Soviet Union was not as fallen as America is.
I forget to add that these are not my views but I am arguing Dugin’s case, as part of a Socratic exercise to stimulate Cologero and Logres.
The end goal is to restore Tradition. The perspective Evola took later on in his life was that it was no longer possible to go BACK to the Tradition of our ancestors but that we need to move forward to the start of the new cycle, hence we support the proletariat to speed up the process of destruction.
Over a period of several generations, it is possible that a new aristocracy would emerge from communism, and the system would transform itself from a material system to a metaphysical based one…..the example of north Korea must be mentioned. north Korea has become a quite traditional monarchy based on Confucianism and (according to even its own officials) metaphysics.
Michael, Carvalho himself anticipates a “worldwide united front of Christians [Carvalho does not include Orthodox], Jews, and American nationalists”, whose existence, he believes, is threatened internally by the globalist elite (Syndicate) and externally by the powers Dugin supports: BRIC and international Islam. It is certainly not obvious what would unite those three groups, other than the desire for mere survival. The Catholic Church, such as it is, seems unable, and even unwilling, to do anything to oppose the modern project. However, this is not to say that the Traditional spiritual forces of the West cannot arise again in some other way.
No, Jason-Adam, I hadn’t read it, despite its interesting premise. At the time of its publication, I would have been supporting the Left and would have seen no purpose in such an alliance. As far as its being “first necessary to destroy the West”, every death is a birth; what interregnum of the left born from that destruction would then cede power voluntarily to Tradition?
As Evola makes clear in Point 10, the bourgeoisie can be opposed in two directions: from below and from above. What purpose would be served by adopting the goals of the proletariat? Would “aristocrats of the soul” take to the streets? We agree with Joseph de Maistre that what is necessary is not a revolution in the opposite direction, but rather the opposite of a revolution.
I’ll reconsider it in the forthcoming review of Dugin’s Fourth Political Theory.
On one point, the two men agree: there is a globalist financial elite. Carvalho supports a conspiracy theory, identifying that group as the “Syndicate”, transnationalist, not confined to any particular country. Dugin, OTOH, conflates that group with American power in toto. Whence, their widely divergent views. Carvalho identifies three movements that can oppose the Syndicate: (Section 5)
There is no evidence of them acting in concert, nor even verbally opposing the plans of the “Syndicate”, not even in muted tones. Nevertheless, Carvalho wishes to defend the existence of Catholic-Protestant Christianity, Israel, and the USA as a nation; he sees Dugin as calling for their extinction.
When you said agents of revolution, I thought of the individuals and organizations that initiated and spread Enlightenment ideas, but Carvalho appears to have a broader understanding of what an agent is.
If Carvalho is correct, then the only hope of a return to Tradition in the West is the Catholic Church since it is doubtful that the other entities named (royalty & nobility, initiatory & esoteric organizations) are willing or able to do anything. This is especially true if Guenon was right in saying that initiatory organizations no longer exist in the West.
Not to go tangental, but I think that in order to fully understand what Olavo and Dugin were debating, we first need to consider the ideas of Franco Freda, the follower of Baron Evola, and his book THE DISINTEGRATION OF THE SYSTEM. I am sure Cologero has read the book, but to summarise it, Freda’s argument was that men of Tradition are loyal to timeless principles irrespective of race or culture and thus if the West has become anti-Traditional beyond all hope of recovery, as Evola argued in Ride the Tiger, to restore a Traditional world it is first necessary to destroy the West; hence Freda’s call for the “Right” to ally with the extreme and violent left. This is a huge influence on Dugin’s worldview.
That was an odd debate – I found myself in sympathy with the Westerner, but nodding at points Dugin was making, such as the necessity to love both a country/culture’s flaws as well as excellencies (in a sense). Any comments you care to make further on this debate would be much appreciated, Cologero. Dugin has a Gnostic streak, at least in rhetoric, that is difficult to contextualize, for me.
There is a rather odd debate between Olavo de Carvalho and Alexander Dugin. In Section 9 Carvalho describes the possible historical agents. Although both men are Traditional men of the Right, influenced by Guenon, they are far apart from each other. I don’t believe either one identified fully the revolution; whether their solutions are fully convincing is a matter for debate.
Michael, nothing happens “spontaneously”.
First, the conscious and unconscious agents of revolution need to be identified
Then, of the former, the covert and open agents of revolution
Then there must be an understanding of what revolution is
Then there will be the understanding of the opposite of the revolution
The possible is the real, hence the conditions to make the foregoing possible must be identified.
Will the action of reconstruction happen spontaneously, or will it be the result of an organization? In other words, is it just a matter of living in a certain way (riding the tiger) or the result of a movement?