Europe's Enemy: Islam or America?

Europe’s Enemy: Islam or America?
Guillaume Faye’s Le coup d’Etat mondial

Michael O'MEARA

Ex: http://www.counter-currents.com/

Guillaume Faye
Le coup d’Etat mondial:
Essai sur le Nouvel Impérialisme Américain
(Global Coup d’Etat: An Essay on the New American Imperialism)
Paris: L’Æncre, 2004

 Fas est ab hoste doceri. (It is permitted to learn from the enemy.) — Ovid

This past spring, for the sixth time in six years, Guillaume Faye has published a book that redefines the political contours of European nationalism (“nationalism” here referring not to the defense of the nineteenth-century “nation-state,” but of Magna Europa). Like each of his previous works, Coup d’Etat mondial speaks to the exigencies of the moment, as well as to the perennial concerns of the European ethnos. In this spirit, it offers a scathing critique of the “new American imperialism” and the European anti-Americanism opposing it, while simultaneously contributing to a larger nationalist debate over Europe’s destiny. Framed in terms of Carl Schmitt’s Freund/Feind designation, this debate revolves around the question: Who is Europe’s enemy? For Schmitt, this question is tantamount to asking who threatens Europe’s state system and, by implication, who threatens its unique bioculture.

During the Cold War, the more advanced nationalists rejected the conventional view that Soviet Communism was the principal enemy and instead designated the United States. This is evident in the works of Francis Parker Yockey, Jean Thiriart, Adriano Romualdi, Otto Strasser, Alain de Benoist, and in the politics of the sole European statesman to have defended Europe’s independence in the postwar period: Charles de Gaulle.

It was not, however, America’s occupation of postwar Europe that alone aligned these nationalists against the U.S.—though this was perhaps cause enough. Rather, it was the liberal democratic basis of America’s postwar order, whose deculturating materialism was seen as corrupting the biocultural foundations of European life. The Soviets’ brutal occupation of Eastern Europe may therefore have broken the bodies of those opposing them, but America, for nationalists, threatened their souls.

Today, this anti-American opposition persists, but has come to signify something quite different. What has changed, and this starts to be evident in the late 1980s and even more so in the ’90s, is Third World immigration, which puts the American threat in an entirely altered perspective. In nationalist ranks, Faye stands out as the principal proponent of the view that Islam and its nonwhite immigrants now constitute Europe’s enemy and that America, though still an adversary, has become a less threatening menace.

For Faye, the New American Imperialism (NAI) associated with the Bush administration supplants the earlier, more implicit imperialism of the Cold War era. This imperialism, though, is not specifically Bush’s creation, for it arose in the Cold War’s wake and took form in subsequent aggressions on Somalia, Bosnia, Kosovo, Afghanistan, and now Iraq.

The older imperialism had a Wilsonian facade, legitimated with moral pronouncements and a naive, but occasionally sincere, effort to regulate the world according to its liberal principles. By contrast, the NAI rejects this “softer” (and actually more effective) variant of American power for a policy that aggressively asserts U.S. military might irrespective of “world opinion.” It ceases thus to pursue its interests through international organizations embodying its liberal world view and instead embraces a militaristic unilateralism that defies international convention in the name of America’s “vital interests.”

Against the arguments of its apologists, Faye claims the NAI is not the hard-headed, morally clear assertion of American power that they make it out to be, but rather a puerile, utopian, and unrealistic one based on the notion that tout est permis!— anything goes. The United States may be the world’s dominant power, but it lacks what Aristotle and the conservative tradition of statecraft understood as the enduring basis of power: prudence. For in confusing dominance with omnipotence, the NAI’s neoconservative executors, like all who draw the wages of hubris, inadvertently earn themselves—and America—the likelihood of a tragic fall.

In this vein, U.S. vital interests (what the present administration defines in Zionist, militarist, and globalist terms) are treated as the sole permissible basis of national sovereignty. A state—”rogue” or otherwise—that exercises its autonomy, fabricates weapons of mass destruction (i.e., weapons capable of ensuring its sovereignty), or resists Washington’s dictates is deemed an enemy and risks reprisal. Implicit in this redefinition of America’s world role is the assumption that the United States is the world’s gendarme, its lone sovereign power, obliged to uphold a law which is synonymous with its own strategic interests.

Moreover, the NAI’s assumption that the United States has the capacity to dominate the planet is, if nothing else, simpleminded. Its proponents might think they are breaking with the legalistic or Kantian postulates of liberal internationalism by pursuing hegemonist objectives with military methods (which, in itself, would be unobjectionable), but this readiness to substitute raw power for other forms of power (that is, for power exercised in the “thieves’ den” of the United Nations or through international regulatory agencies the United States created after 1945) is informed by the Judeo-Protestant illusion that America does God’s work in the world. This cannot but disconnect them from all they seek to dominate, for in applying their illusory principles to an intractable reality, they cannot but lurch from disaster to disaster.

The NAI’s peculiar mix of political Machiavellianism and millennial Calvinism has been especially prominent in Iraq, the conquest of which was to be a cakewalk. Not only did Bush and his advisers have no idea of what they were getting into, they completely misread the capacities of American power. If the U.S. Air Force possesses unparalleled firepower, the modern American soldier cannot fight on the ground. With half its army occupying a country with no military capacity and its helicopter gunships, Bradley Fighting Vehicles, and body-armored ground troops arrayed against lightly-armed and untrained insurgents, it is stretched to the breaking-point.

Despite its imperialist ambitions, America is not Rome. Faye argues that it is more like a house of cards—an ephemeral economic-political enterprise—lacking those ethnic, religious, and cultural traits that go into making a great people and a great power.

As any white Californian will attest, there is, in fact, no longer anything particularly American about America, only people like the turbaned Sikh who drives the local cab, the Mexican illegal who mows our neighbors’ lawn, the Indian programmer who replaces his higher-paid white counterpart, the Chinese grocer who sells us beer and cigarettes late at night, the African who empties the bedpans in our nursing homes, the Africans of American birth who run our cities and public agencies, and the white zombies insulated in distant, manicured suburbs, where the voices of children are rarely heard. For Faye, this disparate hodgepodge is not a nation in any historical sense, only an artificial social system, whose members, as Lewis Lapham has written, are “united by little else except the possession of a credit card and password to the internet.” Why, it seems almost unnecessary to ask, would an American Gurkha risk his life for such an entity?

The military technology of Imperial America undoubtedly lacks an equal, but its centrality to U.S. power, Faye claims, testifies to nothing so much as the enfeebled cognitive abilities of its elites, who think their computerized gadgetry is a substitute for those primordial human qualities that go into making a people or a nation—qualities such as those that steeled not just Rome’s republican legions, but the Celtic-Saxon ranks of the Confederacy, the gunmen of the IRA, the indomitable battalions of the Wehrmacht, and the Red Army of the Great Patriotic War. In the absence of these qualities forged by blood and history, the NAI’s space-age military (whose recruiters now slip beneath the border to find the “volunteers” for its imperial missions) is a paper tiger, no match for a nation in arms—not even a pathetic, misbegotten nation like Iraq.

The hubris-ridden neoconservatives leading America into this costly adventure from which it is unlikely to recover did so without the slightest consideration of the toll it would take on the country’s already stressed and overtaxed institutions. Fighting for objectives that are everywhere challenged and with troops that are not only afraid to die, but have no idea of what they are dying for, the only thing they have actually accomplished is what they set out to combat: For they have inflamed the Middle East, enhanced Islam’s prestige, augmented bin Laden’s ranks, accelerated the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, and turned the whole world against them.

Finally, Faye depicts the NAI as America’s last bloom. Both domestically and internationally, the signs of American decline, he observes, are more and more evident. For all that once distinguished America is now tarnished. Its melting pot no longer assimilates, its mixed-race population is inextricably Balkanized, its state is increasingly maniacal in its anti-white, anti-family, anti-community policies, and its market, the one remaining basis of social integration, is in serious difficulty, burdened by massive trade imbalances, unable to generate industrial jobs, hampered by astronomical debts and deficits, and increasingly dependent on the rest of the world. Even the country’s fabled democracy has ceased to work, with elections decided by the courts, fraudulent polling practices, and a pervasive system of spin and simulacrum. The virtuality of the political process seems, actually, to reflect nothing so much as the increasingly illusory authority of its reigning elites, whose oligarchic disposition and incompetent management necessitates a system of smoke and mirrors.

Internationally, America faces a no less bleak situation. Faye points out that the almighty dollar, for sixty years the world’s reserve currency, is now threatened by the euro (which means the country will soon no longer be able to live on credit); the European Union and Asia’s rising economic colossus are undermining its primacy in world markets; it faces the wrath of a billion Muslims worldwide and does nothing to stem the Muslim immigration to the United States; its occupation of Iraq is causing it to hemorrhage monetarily, morally, and militarily; and, not least, its image and integrity have been so damaged that raw power alone sustains its fragile hegemony.

Unlike the implicit imperialism of the Cold War era, the NAI is openly anti-European. In this vein, it opposes the continent’s political unification; treats its allies, even its British poodle, with contempt; practices a divide and conquer tactic which pits the so-called New Europe against the Old; and pursues a strategic orientation aimed at containing Europe and keeping it dependent on the U.S. security system.

In parallel with this anti-Europeanism, there has developed in Europe what Faye calls an “obsessional and hysterical anti-Americanism” (OHAA). He sees this development as so destructive of Europe’s self-interest that he factitiously suggests that it is probably subsidized by the CIA. For this anti-Americanism bears little relation to earlier forms of French anti-Americanism, which sought to defend France’s High Culture from the subversions of America’s culture industry. Nor are its right-wing proponents firmly in the pale of the “new revolutionary nationalism,” which designates liberalism’s cosmopolitan plutocracy as the chief enemy and resists its denationalization of capital, population, and territory. Instead, this OHAA not only does nothing to advance the European project, its fixation on the NAI inadvertently contributes to the Islamization and Third Worldization of the continent, hastening, in effect, its demise as a civilizational entity.

Touching the government and numerous nationalist tendencies, in addition to the perennially anti-identitarian Left, this OHAA is informed by a simpleminded Manichaeanism, which assumes that America’s enemy (Islam) is Europe’s friend. By this logic, America is depicted as a source of evil and Islam as a possible savior. In effect, these anti-Americans adopt not just Islam’s Manichaean world view, but that of the Judeo-Protestants who make up Bush’s political base. For like the neoconservative publicists and propagandists advising the administration and like the mullahs shepherding their submissive, but fanatical flocks, they too paint the world in black and white terms, the axis of good versus the axis of evil, with the enemy (America or Islam) seen as the source of all evil and our side (America or Islam) as the seat of all virtue.

And just as the liberal/neocon image of America is Hebraic, not Greco-European, these European anti-Americans carry in their demonstrations the flags of Iraq, Palestine, Algeria, and Morocco, shout Allah Akbar, and affirm their solidarity with Islam—all without the slightest affirmation of their own people and culture. This simple-minded Manichaeanism influences not only left-wing immigrationists bent on subverting Europe’s bioculture, but French New Rightists around Alain de Benoist, revolutionary nationalists around Christian Bouchet, traditionalists around the Austrian Martin Schwartz and the Italian Claudio Mutti, and various Eurasianists, as well as many lesser known tendencies. Worse, the politicians catering to this anti-Americanism oppose the NAI less for the sake of Europe’s autonomy than for that of its large Muslim minority. They thus refuse to be an American protectorate, but at the same time display the greatest indifference to the fact that they are rapidly becoming an Islamic-Arabic colony: Eurabia.

The economic and cultural war the United States wages on Europe, Faye stresses, ought to warrant the firmest of European ripostes, but to feel the slightest solidarity with Islam, even when “unjustly” attacked, is simply masochistic—for, if the last 1400 years is any guide, it seeks nothing so much as to conquer and destroy Europe. American plutocratic liberalism may be responsible for fostering transnational labor markets that import millions of Third World immigrants into the white Lebensraum, but if the latter are ignored for the sake of resisting the former, the end result may soon be that there will no Europeans left to defend. (Medically, this would be equivalent to fighting typhoid by ignoring the infectious bacillus assaulting the sufferer and instead concentrating exclusively on eliminating the contaminated food and water that transmit it —in which case the disease would be eradicated, but the patient not live to appreciate it).

The OHAA’s simpleminded politics, Faye argues, ends up not just misconceiving Europe’s enemy, but sanctioning its colonization, including the colonization of its mind. Like the “poor African” who is routinely portrayed as the victim of white colonialism, this sort of anti-Americanism makes the European the victim of U.S. imperialism. As we know from experiences on our side of the Atlantic, such a mentality takes responsibility for nothing and attributes everything it finds objectionable to the white man, in this case the American.

More pathetically still, in designating the United States as an irreconcilable enemy and Islam as a friend, these anti-Americans inadvertently dance to Washington’s own tune. Based on his La colonisation de l’Europe: Discours vrai sur l’immigration et l’Islam (2000) and in reference to Alexander del Valle’s Islamisme et Etats-Unis: Une alliance contre l’Europe (1999), Faye contends that since the early 1980s U.S. policy has aggressively promoted Europe’s Third Worldization—through its ideology of human rights, multiculturalism, and multiracialism, through its unrelenting effort to force the European Union to admit Turkey, but above all through its intervention on behalf of Islam in the Yugoslavian civil war. In all these ways fostering social, religious, cultural, and ethnic divisions that neutralize Europe’s potential threat to its own hegemony, it seeks to subvert European unity.

Looking to the Arab world to counter U.S. imperialism can only lead to national suicide. Those who advocate Europe’s alliance with the Third World are thus for Faye not simply naive, but neurotic. America may be a competitor, an adversary, a culturally distorting force, it may even be the principal international force for liberal cosmopolitanism, but in relation to the ethnocidal threat posed by Islam it is almost entirely innocuous. Europeans can always recover from the deculturation that comes from American domination, but not from the destruction of their genetic heritage, which Islam promises. Faye suggests that this anti-American neurosis, like the classic textbook pathology, designates America as its enemy for fear of acknowledging the danger looming under its very nose. As such, the anti-American Islamophiles refuse to see what’s happening in Europe, whose soft, dispirited white population is increasingly cowed by Islam’s conquering life-force. For however much American policy assaults Europe, it does not constitute the life-and-death danger which the invading Islamic colonizers do. To think otherwise is possible only by ignoring the primacy of race and culture. Instead, then, of pursuing chimerical relations with people whose underlying motive is the destruction of Europe as we know it, it would be wiser, Faye claims, for Europeans to view what’s happening in Iraq as the Chinese and Indians do: with cynical detachment and an eye to their own self-interest.

The greatest danger to Europe, and this idea is the axis around which Faye’s argument revolves, comes from the Islamic lands to the “South,” whose nonwhite immigrants are presently colonizing the continent, assuming control of its biosphere, and altering the foundations of European life. For European nationalists and governments to treat America, with its shallow, provisional power, as the enemy and Islam, with its nonwhite multitudes pressing on Europe’s borders, as its friend is the height of folly.

Not coincidentally, such an anti-Americanism is first cousin to the anti-white sensibility one finds in American liberal and neoconservative ranks. For just as those who try to convince us that America is a “creed,” not a white nation, these anti-Americans allying with Islam to fight the ricains betray their patrie—treating it as an abstraction and not a people. If Americans would be better off using their troops to defend their porous border instead of playing cowboy in Mesopotamia, as we white nationalists believe, Europeans loyal to their heritage would do better, Faye advises, to resist rather than to make common cause with those who are presently invading their lands.

To Faye, there can never be a total rupture between Europe and white America, given the blood bonds linking them. They might pursue divergent interests, over which dispute is inevitable, but the racial and cultural differences separating Europe from the Islamic world are insurmountable. In this spirit, he predicts that “the great clashes of the 21st century will not pit the United States against the rest of the world, but rather the Whitemen of the North against all the other racial-civilizational blocs.”

The culturally noxious effects of the liberal-democratic order of money imposed on Europe after 1945 caused European nationalists to define themselves in opposition not just to American-style liberalism, but to America as a nation. For those nationalists who continue to uphold this line, Third World immigration (which they do not favor) is viewed as an offshoot of a techno-economic system that dismisses biocultural qualities for the quantifying ones of the liberal market.

Only in fighting this system, and its chief sponsor, the United States, will Europe, they believe, be able to defend its heritage and its destiny. The Third World immigrants experiencing the deracination that comes with transnational labor markets cannot, then, be Europe’s enemy, for they too are its victim. Besides, their traditionalist, premodern culture makes them prospective allies in what is seen as a common struggle against America’s “cultureless civilization.”

But even in granting that there is a certain logic—even a certain justice—to this position, it rests upon two false premises, which Guillaume Faye has been almost alone in Europe in polemicizing: 1) that culture trumps race and 2) that race is unrelated, if not irrelevant, to culture.

His Coup d’Etat mondial offers, then, a powerful antidote to this false and potentially fatal reasoning. It demystifies the new American imperialism, revealing its tenuous character. It exposes the self-destructive character of an opposition refusing to recognize Europe’s real enemy. And, most important, in designating this enemy—the nonwhite colonizers who hope to turn Europe into a dar-al-Islam—it designates what is the single, most unavoidable, and absolutely necessary duty of white people everywhere: the defense of their homelands.

Source: TOQ, vol. 5, no. 3 (Summer 2005)

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URL to article: http://www.counter-currents.com/2011/08/europes-enemy-islam-or-americaguillaume-fayes-le-coup-detat-mondial/

Apuntes sobre el Mitraismo

Apuntes sobre el Mitraismo

Enrique RAVELLO

Ex: http://identidadytradicion.blogia.com/

La historiografía utiliza el término de «cultos mistéricos» para todo el conjunto de formas religiosas que, procedentes de Oriente, irrumpen en el Imperio romano tardío. El engañoso término de cultos mistéricos podría hacernos pensar en una unidad interna de los mismos; nada más lejos de la realidad, poco tenían que ver entre sí los cultos a Attis, Cibeles, Serapis, Isis o Júpiter - Amón , pero si uno de ellos merece mención aparte es, sin duda, el culto a Mitra.

Es precisamente lo que le diferencia del resto lo que le hace interesante para nosotros y lo que motiva el sentido de este artículo: a diferencia del resto de divinidades «orientales» llegadas a la Urbs desde el cambio de Era, Mitra sólo tiene de «oriental» la procedencia geográfica: Persia, siendo una de las divinidades que los indoeuropeos de origen nordeuropeo (medos, persas, hindúes y mitanios) llevaron a Asia durante sus migraciones e invasiones de aquellas tierras. Divinidad indoeuropea que, como tal no podía ser extraña a los romanos, los que pronto la asimilaron con sus dioses solares; así Mitra no era uno más de los cultos de «religiosidad segunda» del Bajo imperio , sino que propuso una posibilidad de enderezamiento espiritual -siguiendo el concepto evoliano- en un momento en que la Tradición romana parecía haber entrado en una fase de crisis

Mitra y su ascesis son profundamente indoeuropeos :«Los misterios mitraicos nos llevan al seno de la gran tradición mágica occidental , a un mundo todo él de afirmaciones , todo de luz y de grandeza , de una espiritualidad que es realeza y de una realeza que es espiritualidad , a un mundo en el que todo lo que es huída de la realidad , ascesis , mortificación en humildad y devoción , pálida renuncia y abstracción contemplativa , no tienen ningún lugar . Es la vía de la acción de la potencia solar» (1).

 

MITRA : DEL MUNDO INDO-IRANIO A ROMA.

 

Mitra como divinidad ario-irania

 

Para determinar los orígenes de Mitra hay que remontarse a la religión preavéstica donde aparece junto a Varuna y Surya entre los dioses soberanos o de la primera función indoeuropea. Mitra preside las alianzas y asegura la soberanía de los persas en las tierras recientemente conquistadas, asegura también la feliz doma de animales (2). Es un dios común a los indo-arios de la India y Persia, pero entre estos últimos tiene una función más guerrera que entre los primeros. Su nombre significa a la vez «alianza» y «el amigo» (3) . Mitra aparece en el panteón de tres pueblos indoeuropeos étnicamente muy relacionados: indo-arios, iranios y mitanos, de los que todo hace pensar que se trató de una rama de los indo-arios que se desgajó hacia zonas más occidentales. Siempre aparece como divinidad de la primera función junto a Varuna con quien está en una relación de complementariedad, en todos los sentidos «si los principios conjuntos se consideran en su reciprocidad, el Dios manifestado es el poder masculino y la Divinidad no manifestada es el poder femenino, reserva inagotable de toda posibilidad incluida en la manifestación: es pues Mitra, quien fecunda a Varuna (PB XXX10,10)» (4).

 

Etimológicamente la raíz de su nombre sería la indoeuropea *mei/*moi- con la idea de intercambio, seguido del instrumental -tra. Ésta es al menos la opinión de Meillet y la que más consenso tiene entre los estudiosos. Así Mitra inicialmente habría sido el garante de los acuerdos, el orden del mundo y del orden social, en definitiva de la relación de los dioses con los hombres y de éstos entre ellos mismos. Mitra engloba los conceptos de amigo y de contrato, y, siguiendo a G Bonafonte la evolución conceptual habrá comenzado desde esa raíz *mei/* moi (intercambio)  -obligación mutua (por intercambio de bienes) -amigo, amistad - dios Mitra (5). Siendo el garante de la palabra dada, y, en definitiva, de las relaciones entre los dioses y los hombres y de éstos entre sí. Mitra es quien «sostiene el cielo y la tierra» (Rg Veda, 3, 59).

 

En el espacio temporal que va desde la época védica hasta la reforma zoroastriana, la figura de Mitra también experimentará ciertos cambios, más bien matices, en la naturaleza y función de su divinidad.

 

En el mundo védico, Mitra y Varuna son las dos caras complementarias (que no antitéticas) de la función soberana del panteón indoeuropeo, una relación semejante en el mundo latino sería la de Rómulo- Numa (6). El Mitra védico encarna los aspectos jurídico soberanos, luminosos, siendo un dios cercano al mundo y a los hombres «la función de este culto (el de Mitra) es por lo tanto la de orientar religiosamente y consolidar la cohesión familiar, de amistad, social y, por lo tanto, la red de relaciones interpersonales que constituyen el tejido constitutivo de la vida de una tribu, de un pueblo, de una etnia» (7). Por su parte, Varuna encarna el aspecto mágico, violento, invisible y lejano.

 

Para conocer la figura del Mitra del mundo iranio antiguo, tenemos una gran escasez de fuentes para el periodo más arcaico. Durante la predicación de Zaratustra , todos los dioses del panteón persa se subordinan a Ahura Mazda y, aunque el nombre de Mitra aparezca en el Avesta, donde se le dedica un himno , lo hace de forma casi ocasional , esto ha sido interpretado por los estudiosos como un «eclipse» de esta divinidad , «relegada» por Zaratustra a un papel secundario , aunque hay otro tipo de opiniones : «Los estudiosos occidentales han sacado la errónea conclusión de que Mitra había sido rechazado por Zaratustra sólo porque no es mencionado en los Gatha , como si Zaratustra no hubiese compuesto más que los himnos de fragmentario corpus que han llegado a nosotros» (8). Aparece en el décimo Yashts (cántico) del Avesta, y se enfatiza su aspecto guerrero, y su función de guardián de la moral (9).

 

A. Loisy confirma que el origen de Mitra se encuentra en la religión preavéstica , en la que es el mediador entre el mundo superior y luminoso donde impera Ahura Mazda y el inferior donde ejerce su influencia Arimán (10).En el Mitra -Yasht , un himno religioso en su honor fechado entre el siglo V y VI  a. C. aparece como el dios de la luz , de los guerreros , de los pactos y de la palabra dada, algo que protege muy especialmente y cuya alteración o incumplimiento queda determinado como un sacrilegio y una grave perturbación del orden social y cósmico. Está claramente relacionado con la luz y el sol. Es descrito como «el más victorioso de los dioses que marchan sobre esta tierra»,  «el más fuerte de los fuertes» y físicamente como «el dios de los cabellos blancos», siendo -como ya sabemos- muy frecuentes los elementos fenotípicamente nórdicos en las descripciones físicas de las divinidades indo-ario-persas.

 

Bajo el reinado de Aqueménida, es la divinidad principal con la diosa Anahita y Ahura Mazda, siendo al dios que invocan los reyes en sus testamentos y combates. La religión medo-persa no tenía imágenes, que llegaron con la helenización del Asia menor, a la divinidad que más afectó este proceso fue precisamente a Mitra, que desde estos momentos pasó a un primer plano. Además durante el Helenismo muchas divinidades son asimiladas a los dioses greco-latinos, Ahura Mazda lo será con Júpiter; Ahrimán se convertirá en Hades; mientras que Mitra, conservará su nombre, ya que no tiene correspondencia exacta con los dioses greco-latinos, y aunque durante el Helenismo es el segundo dios en importancia, sin duda es el más adorado.

 

F. Cumont pone de relieve la importancia y la admiración que se tuvo entre los griegos y los romanos hacia el Imperio aqueménida , y cómo muchas de sus instituciones fueron adoptadas por los emperadores romanos por ejemplo los amici Augusti, del mismo modo que llevar delante del César el fuego sagrado como emblema de la perennidad del poder (11) . Lo que ya es más difícil es seguir los caminos, bastante más ocultos, por los que se transmitieron las ideas de unos pueblos a otros. Parece cierto que  a comienzos de nuestra Era, determinadas concepciones mazdeas se habían difundido más allá de Asia. La conquista macedónica de Asia Menor puso a los griegos en contacto directo con el mazdeísmo y hubo un interés general entre los filósofos por su conocimiento. Así como la  «ciencia»  que se extendía entre las clases populares con el nombre de magia, tenía, como su propio nombre indica, en gran parte origen persa. Antes de la conquista de Asia por Roma, algunas instituciones persas ya habían hallado en el mundo greco-oriental imitadores y adeptos a sus creencias. Los más activos agentes de esta difusión parecen haber sido para el mazdeísmo -como, por otro lado también para el judaísmo -las colonias de fieles que habían emigrado lejos de la madre patria (12).

 

Aún así es conveniente recordar la opinión de Julius Evola respecto a la relación entre el culto de Mitra y la religión zoroástrica: «Emanación del antiguo mazdeísmo iránico, el mitraísmo retomaba el tema central de una lucha entre las potencias de la luz y las de las tinieblas y el mal. Podía tener también formas religiosas, exotéricas, pero su núcleo central estaba constituido por sus Misterios, o sea por una iniciación en el verdadero sentido. Ello constituía un límite, aunque así se hacía una forma tradicional más completa. Sucesivamente, se debía, sin embargo, asistir a una cada vez más decidida separación entre la religión y la iniciación» (13)

 

De Persia a Roma.

 

Fue F. Cumont el primero en afirmar la continuidad entre el Mitra iranio y el del culto de época romana, tesis admitida por la práctica totalidad de los estudiosos. S. Wikander negó esta identificación, pero su tesis es paradoxal e insostenible, otro en negarla más recientemente ha sido David Ulansey (14) en su libro, The Origins of the Mithraic Mysteries(15) quien centra exclusivamente su interpretación del mitraísmo como religión astrológica y la representación del Mitra tauróctono únicamente desde el punto de vista astrológico zodiacal, si bien los datos que aporta  sí son interesantes , la interpretación de fondo no deja de ser limitada por reduccionista.

 

En cuanto a la propagación propiamente dicha del mitraísmo en Occidente, data de la fecha de la anexión de Asia Menor y Siria. Y aunque parece haber existido ya en Roma , en la época de Pompeyo, una comunidad de adeptos, la auténtica difusión no comenzó hasta el tiempo de los Flavios, y fue cada vez más importante con los Antoninos y los Severos, para ser hasta finales del siglo IV el culto más importante del paganismo. Aunque hay que tener en cuenta que la influencia de Persia, no fue sólo religiosa, sobre todo desde el 88 d. C; con la llegada al poder de la dinastía Sasánida. En la propia corte de Diocleciano se adoptaron las genuflexiones ante el emperador, igualado a la divinidad. Así que la propagación de la religión mitraica, que siempre se proclamó orgullosamente persa, se vio acompañada de una influencia persa en la política, la cultura y el arte.

 

En cuanto al proceso concreto de llegada de Mitra desde Irán a la península itálica, tenemos una dramática ausencia de fuentes, dos líneas de Plutarco, y una referencia de un mediocre escolástico de Estancio, Lactancio Plácido. Ambos autores coinciden en situar en Asia Menor el origen de la religión irania que se difundió por Occidente, así el mitraísmo se había constituido, antes de que fuese descubierto por los romanos, en las monarquías anatólicas de épocas precedentes, allí llego en la época de dominio Aqueménida, donde los persas se convirtieron en la aristocracia dominante de Capadocia, Ponto o Armenia, y seguirían siendo los amos de la zona después de la muerte de Alejandro. Esta aristocracia militar y feudal propició a Mitríades Eupator, un buen número de oficiales que ayudaron a desafiar a Roma y a defender la independencia de Armenia. Estos guerreros adoraban a Mitra como genio militar de sus ejércitos, y es por esto por lo que siguió siendo siempre, incluso en el mundo latino, el dios «invencible», tutelar de los ejércitos y honrado, sobre todo, por los soldados. 

 

Paralelamente a esta nobleza, otra clase también persa se había establecido en Asia Menor, los «magos» estaban diseminados por todo el Levante y conservaron escrupulosamente sus ritos. Sería el máximo fundamento de la grandeza de los misterios de Mitra.

 

La religión mazdeísta fue a los ojos de los griegos puramente bárbara y no tuvo ningún eco entre los helenos, como sí pudo tener el culto de Isis y Serapis, los griegos jamás aceptaron una divinidad que viniera de sus eternos enemigos. Mitra pasó directamente al mundo latino, además la transmisión fue de una rapidez fulminante, pues los romanos nada más conocer la doctrina de los mazdeos, la adoptaron con entusiasmo. Y llevado hacia fines del siglo I por los soldados a todas las fronteras, el culto de Mitra llegó al Danubio, al Rin, Britania, fronteras del Sáhara y valles de Asturias. Mitra conquistó pronto el favor de los altos funcionarios y del propio emperador. A finales del siglo II, Cómodo se hizo iniciar en los misterios, cien años después su poder era tal que eclipsó a todos sus rivales en Occidente y en Oriente. En 307 Diocleciano, Galeno y Licio le consagraron como protector del Imperio, fautori Imperio sui.

 

MISTERIA MITRAE

 

Los mitreos

 

El de Mitra es un culto totalmente mistérico que celebraban los iniciados para sí. Las cofradías mitraicas admitían solamente a hombres. El primitivo lugar de adoración de Mitra debieron ser las grutas de las montañas, especie de cavernas, en la época que nos ocupa, eran ya los mitreos que consistían en una pequeña capilla, pero, en definitiva seguían siendo grutas, a los que los iniciados se referían como specus. La distribución de la nave parece un comedor, pues el rito principal consistía en una comida para los iniciados, «en efecto, el Mithraeum no es, como el templo greco-romano, la casa de dios, sino un lugar de comunión entre los hombres y los dioses» (16). Había en los mitreos una mesa de piedra en la que estaba representado Mitra matando al toro, montado sobre un eje y esculpida a ambos lados, donde se combinaban imágenes del sol. Este pequeño santuario representaba el mundo, además toda su decoración tenía un alto contenido simbólico, aunque difícil de interpretar por la ausencia de textos contemporáneos. El Mitra tauróctono representa el sacrificio del toro, el tauribolio, como principio de la vida bienaventurada prometida al iniciado.

 

El acceso al mitreo era por una sola puerta, para descender algunos escalones, la capacidad no excedía las 100-120 personas, el lugar sagrado estaba reservado a los iniciados, el resto estaba en salas adyacentes. La disposición interna es constante, la imagen de Mitra está siempre en el centro o en la pared del fondo y en las escenas representadas aparece matando al toro y rodeado de los dadóforos, bien visible está el altar o la mesa sobre las que se apoyan las ofrendas y los alimentos, a los lados los bancos para los sacerdotes, destacando siempre el podium para el pater que preside la asamblea. En el mitreo no hay ventanas, y, al ser las reuniones nocturnas, la luz constituía un elemento de suma importancia, siendo el reclamo al Sol. En el ingreso al mitreo había un zodiaco, representando al universo, en el centro se reúne y canta la comunidad iniciática, reforzando la solidaridad fraterna del grupo.

 

El culto a Mitra conocía la semana con consagración de los siete días a las siete esferas planetarias, santificándose especialmente el primer día dedicado al Sol. Había también fiestas estacionales, se cree que tuvo cierta importancia la del equinoccio de primavera, común a otras iniciaciones, pero sin duda la más importante fue la de la Natividad del Sol, fiesta del Sol Invictus, que se celebraba, coincidiendo con el solsticio de invierno, el 25 de Diciembre. Mitra nace entre un buey y una mula en una gruta, con dos pastores de testigos: Cautes y Cautópates, Cautes tiene una antorcha encendida hacia arriba (el día), Cautópates tiene una antorcha encendida hacia abajo (la noche).

 

 

Los grados iniciáticos

 

La religión de Mitra no era un conocimiento sagrado escrito y codificado, que se podía aprender leyendo, la verdad sobre la que se sustenta, la base de sus misterios, son transmitidos de boca a oído entre los fieles y adeptos de las distintas jerarquías internas.

 

Siete eran los grados por los que debía de pasar un iniciado que pretendiera llegar al grado supremo: el cuervo, el oculto, el soldado, el león, el persa, el mensajero del Sol, y el padre. Se piensa que se determinaron según los siete planetas y son las siete esferas planetarias que el alma tendría que atravesar hasta llegar a la morada de los bienaventurados. No ajeno a este concepto es la expresión aún hoy coloquial de «llegar al séptimo cielo», para hacerlo el iniciado mitraísta tenía que atravesar siete puertas anteriores:

 

La primera es de plomo y frente a Saturno, debe despojarse del peso del cuerpo y de su vinculación a la vida y la tierra.

 

Venus le espera en la segunda, hecha de estaño, y le exige el abandono de la belleza física y del placer sexual.

 

En la siguiente puerta, que es de bronce, se encontrará con Júpiter ante el que tendrá que despojarse de la seguridad personal y la confianza en sí mismo y su pequeño yo.

 

La cuarta es de hierro y Mercurio es quien la custodia, ya no sirven ni inteligencia ni cultura, tampoco la antorcha luminosa ilumina nada ante la verdadera luz que es dios.

 

Frente a la puerta de Marte - de bronce y hierro -  nada puede hacer la espada que es sustituida por la fuerza divina.

 

La Luna vela la puerta de plata donde se dejan orgullo, ambiciones y amor a sí mismo, amor que sólo merece dios.

 

La última puerta es de oro y la cuida el Sol, quién tiende la mano al adepto pidiéndose un último gesto, ir más allá de sí mismo aceptando la mano que el propio Sol le está ofreciendo .

 

También, cada uno de los siete grados estaba influenciado por una diferente esfera planetaria:

 

korax  (cuervo)                                      Mercurio

 

nymphus                                              Venus

 

miles (soldado)                                        Marte

 

leo (león)                                              Júpiter

 

perses (persa)                                      Luna

 

Heliodromus                                          Sol

 

Pater                                                    Saturno (17)

 

 

Según Porcino (18) los cuervos serían una especie de auxiliares de los misterios, puede que en algún tiempo fuesen niños.

 

Este primer grado toma su nombre del animal que en la tauroctonía lleva a Mitra el mensaje de dios en el que le ordena matar al toro. Así el iniciado que tiene este grado, protegido por Mercurio, «es portador de mensajes» (19). Téngase presente también la relación entre las aves y el «lenguaje simbólico». Según los restos que nos han llegado, especialmente del mitreo de Capua, sabemos que viste una capa blanca con bandas rojas. En las ceremonias tiene la función de servir los alimentos que él no puede probar, el sentido es desposeer al iniciado de primer grado de los restos de ego profano.

 

El segundo grado tiene dos nombres, el de cryphius y el de nimphos. El primero (el oculto) ha sido relacionado con el hecho de que permanece escondido, no aparece en los bajorrelieves, sólo se les mostraba una vez y parece que era una ceremonia especialmente solemne. Puede que primitivamente fueran adolescentes, antes de llegar a soldados, que vivían en un régimen de separación especial. Pero realmente si hay presencia de este grado en los restos arqueológicos, con lo que habrá que centrarse en su segundo nombre nimphus o nymphos para darle una interpretación correcta. Así mismo, nymphos puede tener dos significados, el de esposo o mejor prometido, que lo relacionaría con Venus, su esfera protectora, y el Amor (en sentido iniciático) que debe tener hacia Mitra. También puede significar ninfa-crisálida, haciéndose referencia a una especie de proceso metamórfico en el que « de gusano»  (= el ser ligado a lo terreno, a las pasiones y a los instintos), pasa al estado de «crisálida» (=el huevo, el estado de clausura de aislamiento y de preparación), para propiciar el nacimiento de esa abeja o «mariposa» (=la capacidad en acto del alma de alzar el vuelo, de desvincularse de las ataduras terrenas)» (20). En este grado viste un velo amarillo sobre su rostro -de ahí lo de oculto -y tiene como atributo una lámpara, símbolo de la luz  necesaria para la consagración de este grado,

 

El soldado, es un iniciado propiamente dicho. En la Antigüedad ya guerreros plenamente dedicados al combate y a la caza. Su iniciación era una especie de bautismo, con la imposición de una marca en la frente, similar al cristiano. Sus símbolos son la espada y la corona. Corona que, simbolizando el poder, se le ofrece y debe rechazar al grito de «Mitra es mi corona ». En los mitreos de Capua y Ostia aparece con una capa ornada en púrpura y un gorro frigio. Su misión es garantizar la justicia y el orden. En los ritos de iniciación es el «liberador» y en las asambleas el encargado de mantener el orden.

 

En la exaltación al grado de los leones, se vierte miel en vez de agua, sobre sus manos y se les invita a conservarlas puras de todo mal, mala acción y de toda mancha, también con la miel se les purifica la lengua de toda falta. La miel tiene una gran importancia en la tradición persa, se cree que es una sustancia celestial, llegada de la luna, es superior al agua en su virtud, y comparable desde el punto de vista místico al brebaje sagrado del haoma. En los restos arqueológicos aparece con una toga roja y un manto rojo, en algunas ocasiones con remates amarillos. Es importante hacer notar que, a diferencia de los grados inferiores, es ahora -como leo- cuando el adepto recibe un nuevo nombre. Para este grado -protegido por Júpiter-  su atributo simbólico es el rayo, símbolo presente en varias tradiciones indoeuropeas: Zeus, Odín, Indra y Varuna también lo tienen como iconografía propia. El rayo, símbolo de la luz y potencia, estaría aludiendo a una experiencia de iluminación interior, el paso a un estado superior de conciencia.

 

El nombre del persa, es una clara referencia a la patria de origen del dios Mitra. También se usa la miel en su consagración, pero con un simbolismo diferente, «es considerado como el guardián de los frutos en amplio sentido (incluidos los cereales) y en la Antigüedad la miel usada de azúcar fue símbolo de conservación» (21). En cierta medida representaría a Mitra en su relación con la vegetación y la fecundidad de la tierra.

 

Sin embargo mucho más interesante nos parece la interpelación de este grado y su relación con la Luna que hace Stefano Arcella en su libro, I Misteri del Sole, aplicando criterios tradicionales y evolianos donde otros autores positivistas se limitan a criterios racionalistas, arqueológicos e incluso artísticos con los que es imposible penetrar y descifrar el mito. Para Arcella la Luna sería su numen titular, al ser el astro que da luz durante la noche, leído interior y simbólicamente, se estaría dando a entender que el iniciado-durante esta fase- tendría que sumergirse en su propio mundo interior «sin luz»  -asimilado con la noche- tomar conciencia de él y ser capaz de dominarlo, ese viaje nocturno sólo podría hacerse bajo la protección de la Luna que ilumina las tinieblas. Así -intuye el autor italiano -habría que pensar que la iniciación de este grado sería durante la noche, y, posiblemente, las pruebas consistieran en cumplir determinadas encomiendas aun a pesar de la nocturnidad y la oscuridad, es decir «venciendo la noche». En las ceremonias del culto llevaba el traje persa y el gorro frigio que también llevaba Mitra.

 

Heliodromus es el corredor del Sol, Arcella también lo califica como «la puerta del Cielo». Se asimila al Sol, pues no corre delante del Sol, sino que sube con él en un carro, es el grado anterior al supremo, y se muestra al adepto sobre el carro del cielo, adonde le basta penetrar con Mitra para alcanzar la esfera de la divinidad. «Heliodromus está subordinado al Pater, como el Sol lo está a Mitra, verdadero Sol Invictus» (22).Viste túnica roja con cinturón amarillo y se le representa con una antorcha encendida. En este grado se le vuelve a ofrecer la corona -rechazada anteriormente-y esta vez la asume, porque ahora la corona no está simbolizado el  poder mundano sino que es la corona-rayo que simboliza los rayos solares y significa la apertura del iniciado a la Luz del Sol espiritual. La corona tiene siete rayos, cifra presente en varias tradiciones, por lo menos desde el Pitagorismo, según el cual cada planeta irradia una propia vibración sonora, siete son los planetas a los que están ligados los adeptos mitraicos, así como siete son los días de la semana. Sin duda el requisito para llegar a Heliodromus era ser capaz de dominar los impulsos concupiscibles e irascibles del alma «La iniciación al grado de Heliodromos sucedía, verosímilmente, cuando cantaba el gallo, a la primera luz del alba, ya que el iniciado debía entrar en sintonía con el sentido anímico de abrirse a la luz» (23). Durante los banquetes guía a los comensales y hace los honores de la casa.

 

El padre es el grado supremo, su dignidad corresponde a la de Mitra en el cielo. Son los perfectos iniciados que participan plenamente de Mitra. A su cabeza está el padre de los padres (24). Cumbre de la jerarquía, lleva un gorro frigio ornado con perlas y un manto púrpura sobre una túnica roja con bandas amarillas, lleva un anillo y en la mano derecha el bastón que simboliza mando y poder. Es el guía de la comunidad. Entre sus atributos estaba la hoz. El cetro del mago y el gorro de persa. En un mitreo encontrado en Mesopotamia los padres estaban representados con hábitos persas, sentados en tronos, el cetro del mago en la mano derecha y en la izquierda un pergamino, que simboliza su conocimiento de los textos rituales y su significado religioso. Eso, y la elección del vocablo Pater los relaciona con la tradición jurídica y religiosa romana, de la misma estirpe que la indo-aria.

 

Lejos de considerar el paso por los diferentes grados iniciáticos como una convención o algo parecido a una representación teatral para adeptos, hay que reflexionar sobre las indicaciones que, al respecto, da Evola: «Existe un nivel en el que resulta por evidencia inmediata que los mitos misteriosóficos son, esencialmente, transcripciones alusivas de una serie de estados de conciencia a lo largo de la autorrealización. Las diferentes gestas y las varias vivencias de los héroes míticos no son ficciones poéticas, sino realidades- son actos bien determinados del ser interior que relampaguean uniformemente en cualquiera que quiere avanzar en la dirección de la iniciación, esto es, en la dirección, de un cumplimiento más allá del estado humano de existencia» (25).

 

Iniciaciones y celebraciones.

 

Aunque se ignora cuál era el ritual de las iniciaciones, se sabe que entre las condiciones preliminares de admisibilidad a los distintos grados había «pruebas» bastante duras y que incluso el ritual de las iniciaciones, sobre todo para el soldado, mantenía cuanto menos un simulacro de luchas y peligros. A juzgar por los restos encontrados en los mitreos los sacrificios de animales debían ser numerosos.

 

Además existía la oblación del pan del brebaje sagrado, imitado luego por los cristianos, y en esta «comunión» se repetían las palabras «éste es mi cuerpo» y «ésta es mi sangre», pues representaban la sustancia del toro mítico y divino que era Mitra, entendido como Ser supremo. El líquido que se servía pudo ser agua o en ocasiones vino, aunque en su inicio era ahoma (el soma de la India védica), que se mantuvo en el ritual ascético, pero ante la imposibilidad de obtener la planta sagrada, se sustituyó el líquido aunque no el significado.

 

Las imágenes que tenemos de escenas iniciáticas corresponden a los frescos del mitreo de Capua, en todas vemos características comunes: el iniciado desnudo, vendado y/o arrodillado; el oficiante poniéndole una túnica blanca, el pater con un gorro y una capa roja.

 

En otro mitreo cercano a Roma, se han encontrado dos series de representaciones que corresponden a las procesiones de los leones; la primera serie está fechada en 202, en ambas los iniciados de cuarto grado, aparecen desfilando ante el Pater, al que le ofrecen algunos dones. En estos tipos de ritos mitraicos dos elementos son constantes y tienen una importante función simbólica; el incienso; común a varias tradiciones espirituales, siempre con un sentido de purificación; y el fuego , como símbolo de luz y vida, doblemente como símbolo de sacralidad solar, y como símbolo de la «cadena» que forman los iniciados en los misterios mitraicos, que-cada uno de ellos individualmente -una vez establecido el contacto con esa Luz son capaces de transformar y dominar su elemento telúrico- lunar- taurino, otro de los significados -y no el menos importante del simbolismo de la tauroctonía mitraica.

 

La comida sagrada, otra celebración importante para la comunidad mitraica, simbolizaba el encuentro entre Mitra y el Sol. El pan consagrado remitía a la unión mística del grupo que, ingiriéndolo se apropiaba de una determinada energía, que les transmutaba en algo diferente (el paralelismo con la eucaristía cristiana es más que evidente). También se consagraba el vino, que en el mitraísmo romano había sustituido definitivamente al ahoma iranio, que ya nadie sabía cómo lograr preparar. Para S. Arcella cabría otra lectura de este banquete: «...inherente a la realización individual: una vez vencida, sacrificada y transformada la propia componente "taurina", el iniciado se encuentra y se reúne con su Principio solar (en el símbolo: el banquete entre Mitra y el Sol): utiliza toda la energía de la naturaleza inferior, a favor de un empuje ascendente y de una estabilidad en la realización espiritual» (26).

 

En cuanto al aspecto de la autorrealización individual , y de la posibilidad de potenciar determinadas facultades innatas en sentido de lograr una identificación ontológica con la divinidad, tenemos pruebas documentales en el llamado Ritual Mitraico del Gran Papiro Mágico de París, en el que se habla claramente de un rito no comunitario sino individual, en el que el iniciado a los «misterios mayores»  -es decir grados superiores- entra en disposición de lograr un contacto unificador con el dios, venciendo el elemento «taurino-telúrico» y lo hace con la pronunciación de nuevo logos, que cada uno de ellos abre sucesivas puertas sutiles, produciéndose los correspondientes saltos de calidad ontológica . Estos logos serían parte de la técnica tradicional de la sonoridad ritual capaz de dar vibraciones «sutiles» que producen cambios a nivel interno y externo, es el mantra hindú.

 

 

Iconografía

 

Mitra nace de una piedra, y siempre -desde el momento de su nacimiento -es representado con un puñal en la mano derecha y una antorcha en la izquierda, los cabellos en forma de rayos solares. También existe otra versión menos extendida en la que el dios nace de un árbol o de la parte inferior del «huevo cósmico». La lectura desde el simbolismo tradicional infiere que el nacimiento de una roca alude a la materialidad que encierra un elemento luminoso y vivificar, que ahora -con el nacimiento- es capaz de regenerar su naturaleza anterior, si Mitra nace de la piedra, su cuerpo es el templo -no la cárcel- de su espíritu desde el cual puede manifestar todo su poder y luminosidad «la organización corpórea es el signo de un cierto núcleo de potencia cualificada, y la iniciación mágica no consiste en disolver tal núcleo en la indistinta fluctuación de la vida universal, al contrario, en potenciarlo, en integrarlo, en llevarlo no hacia atrás, sino adelante» (27) la piedra sería también símbolo de la incorruptibilidad, «estaríamos tentados de establecer una analogía entre esta génesis de Mitra y un tema del ciclo artúrico, en el que figura una espada que hay que extraer de una piedra que flota sobre las aguas» (28). El nacimiento de un árbol podría tener el mismo significado, el de la potencial sacralidad de la naturaleza, pero también podría relacionarse con la imagen del árbol como guardián y fuente de la sabiduría eterna, en paralelo con el caso de Wotan y el Yggdrasil. El nacimiento desde el Huevo Cósmico, símbolo de la potencialidad que origina la Manifestación Universal, remite a la fuerza espiritual parte de esta manifestación.

 

En varias escenas de su nacimiento, vemos que Mitra está acompañado por un grupo de pastores, interpretados por Evola como ciertas «superiores presencias espirituales » que ayudan en el nacimiento iniciático (29). En otras tantas, vemos que en su nacimiento,  Mitra está acompañado de dos personajes: Cautes y Cautópates, el primero, Cautes, lleva una antorcha con el fuego hacia arriba, representa la luz del Sol ascendiente, del día que crece: del solsticio de invierno al solsticio de verano, también el amanecer; la antorcha de Cautópates está hacia abajo representando la luz del Sol que decrece: del solsticio de verano al solsticio de invierno, también el atardecer.

 

 

Ética mitraica. La dexiosis.

 

F. Cumont se pregunta el porqué del éxito del mitraísmo. Según él esta religión, la última de las orientales en llegar a Roma, aporta una nueva idea: el dualismo. Se identificó el principio del Mal, rival del dios supremo; con este sistema, que proporcionaba una solución simple al problema de la existencia del mal-escollo para tantas teologías- sedujo tanto a mentes cultas como a las masas. Pero esta concepción dualista, no basta para que la gente se convirtiera a la nueva religión, además el mitraísmo ofrecía razones para creer, motivos para actuar y temas de esperanza, esta religión fue el fundamento de una ética y una moral muy eficaz y concreta, esto fue lo que en la sociedad romana de los siglos I y III, llena de insatisfechas aspiraciones hacia una justicia y una ética más perfecta, garantizó el éxito de los misterios mitraicos. Según el emperador Juliano, Mitra daba a sus iniciados entolai o mandamientos y recompensas en éste y en el otro mundo a su fiel cumplimento. Y así el mazdeísmo trajo una satisfacción largo tiempo esperada y los latinos vieron en ella una religión con eficacia práctica y que imponía unas reglas de conducta a los individuos que contribuían al bien del Estado.

 

Mitra, antiguo genio de la luz, se convirtió en el zoroastrismo y continuó siéndolo en Occidente, en el dios de la verdad y de la justicia. Fue siempre el dios de la palabra dada y que asegura estrictamente el cumplimiento de los acuerdos y pactos. En su culto, se exaltaba, la lealtad y sin duda se buscaba inspirar sentimientos muy similares a los de la moderna noción de honor. También se predicaba el respeto a la autoridad y la fraternidad, al considerarse los iniciados como hijos de un mismo padre, pero a diferencia de la «fraternidad cristiana» basada en la compasión o en la mansedumbre, la fraternidad de estos iniciados, que tomaban el nombre de soldados era más afín a la camaradería de un regimiento, y se basaba en aspectos viriles y guerreros.

 

En la religión de Mitra tiene gran importancia la lucha y la acción, es loable la resistencia a la sensualidad y la búsqueda de la virtud, pero para llegar a la pureza espiritual, hace falta algo más, es la lucha constante contra la obra del espíritu infernal, sus creaciones demoníacas salen constantemente de los abismos para errar por la superficie de la Tierra, se meten por todas partes y llevan la corrupción, la miseria y la muerte. Los guías celestiales y guardianes de la piedad deben impedir que triunfen. La lucha es continua y se refleja en el corazón y la conciencia del hombre, miniatura del universo, entre la divina ley del poder y las sugestiones de los espíritus perfectos. La vida es una guerra sin cuartel, una continua lucha. Los mitraístas no se perdían en misticismos contemplativos, su moral agonal, favorecía sobre todo la acción y en una época de anarquía y desconcierto los iniciados hallaban en sus preceptos un estímulo en consuelo y orgullo. El cielo se merece, se gana en la guerra, el mismo concepto lo tenemos en otro extremo del mundo indoeuropeo, entre los vikingos y su idea del Walhalla, como morada de los guerreros.

 

El italiano Tullio Ossana dedica la mayor parte de su libro La stretta di mano . Il contenuto etico della Religione di Mitra, -tras la correspondiente explicación de orígenes, difusión, estructura interna y ritos- precisamente a ese rasgo tan propio de la religión mitraica, sin duda una de sus principales activos a la hora de ganar adhesiones, que fue la elaboración de una ética propia de raíz guerrera. Esta ética tendría tres objetivos:

 

- Hacer del hombre un hombre consciente, maduro, comprometido, por lo tanto capaz de actuar según sus capacidades y de poner su vida en acción.

 

- El segundo objetivo sería entrar en armonía en el Cosmos y cumplir su gran misión de ser intermediario entre dioses y hombres, entre hombres y la creación.

 

-Ser parte del plan de Mitra, revelado a el por el Sol. Representar el orden divino allí donde esté presente, con las implicaciones escatológicas y de ultratumba que ello implicaría.

 

Habría, según F. Cumont (30) una especie de decálogo que la religión mitraíca trazaría para que cada uno de sus adeptos fuese capaz de llegar a cumplir los tres objetivos mencionados. Cumont no llega a explicitar dicho decálogo, pero Tulio Ossana sí que nos da pistas para poder hacernos una certera idea de en qué podría haber consistido.

 

-Ética de la luz. Indicando el aporte de la inteligencia a la acción, la sabiduría en toda realización y la fidelidad a la verdad y a la palabra dada.

 

 

- Ética de la espada, como símbolo trascendente de la fuerza física, de la que queda excluido su uso prepotente e irracional.

 

-Ética de la transformación -preferimos este término al de «progreso» utilizado por T. Ossana-. En la acción de Mitra y sus iniciados existe una evidente transformación cuyo objetivo final es la transformación y la gloria.

 

-Ética de la amistad. Que liga a los adeptos con Mitra -el amigo- y a los adeptos entre sí en una fraternidad guerrera: la militia Mithrae.

 

Ética del servicio. Mitra, ejemplo de sus adeptos, pone su superioridad al servicio de la lucha por el bien y el orden. Rechazando cualquier pasividad (auto)-contemplativa.

 

Ética de la salvación. El fiel, salvado por el conocimiento de Mitra, se empeña en la salvación de sus hermanos, como éstos debe entenderse sólo a los miembros de la militia Mithrae.

 

Ética de la acción. La ética mitraica despierta al hombre a la acción, que estará en relación con sus capacidades interiores innatas que ahora debe poner a actuar.

 

Ética de la lucha contra el mal. Recordemos la visión dualista del mitraismo y su implícita obligatoriedad para luchar activa y firmemente frente al mal representado por Ahrimán.

 

Ética de la jerarquía-también aquí preferimos este término que los utilizados por T Ossana: orden y obediencia-. Evidentemente se refiere a la obediencia de los grados inferiores hacia los superiores.

 

Si hay un gesto que resume visualmente todo el contenido ético del que estamos hablando es la destrarum iunctio o dexiosis que convierte a los mitraístas en syndexioi (literalmente «unidos por la mano derecha»). En las civilizaciones arcaicas la mano se considera como un centro de potencia y un punto de focalización de energía (31), especialmente la derecha se ha relacionado con las capacidades creativas y guerreras del hombre. En el zazen la derecha es considerada la mano masculina o yang, en el típico mudra que se utiliza durante la meditación, ésta protege a la izquierda considerada como la femenina o yin. Así el gesto de unir las manos derechas alude tanto a la comunidad de camaradería que era la milicia mitraica como al hecho de abrir circuitos sutiles de energía que circularían entre todos los miembros de la misma, no lejano es el simbolismo de la cadena de algunas sociedades medievales iniciáticas e incorporado-una vez «desactivado» como es típico de esta institución-por la masonería.

 

Siguiendo estos preceptos éticos el adepto mitraista alcanzaba una serie de virtudes que, al parecer realmente, fueron características propias de los miembros de la militia mitraica a lo largo de su existencia: coherencia interna y externa, fidelidad, disponibilidad, coraje, humildad y alegría, entendida como plenitud. Lo que ayudó mucho a que las autoridades romanas vieran en el mitraísmo una religión que aportaba buenos ciudadanos siempre dispuestos a la defensa del Imperio.

 

El dualismo también condicionó las creencias escatológicas de los mitraístas. La oposición entre cielo e infierno continuaba en la existencia de ultratumba. Mitra también es el antagonista de los poderes infernales y asegura la salvación de sus protegidos en el más allá. Según el profesor Gonzalo Fernández de Córdoba, el alma se someterá a un juicio presidido por Mitra si sus méritos pasados en la balanza del dios, son mayores que los fallos, él lo defenderá frente a los agentes de Ahrimán, que tratarán de llevarla a los abismos infernales. Las almas de los justos se van a habitar a la Luz infinita, que se extiende por encima de las estrellas, se despojan de toda sensualidad y codicia al pasar a través de las esferas planetarias y de este modo se convierten en tan puras como las de los dioses, que serán, en adelante, sus compañeros. Al final de los tiempos, resucitará a todos los hombres y dará a los buenos un maravilloso brebaje que les garantizará la inmortalidad definitiva, mientras que los malos serán aniquilados por el fuego junto al propio Ahrimán.

 

El mitraísmo fue el culto mistérico que ofreció un sistema más rico, fue el que alcanzó una mayor elevación espiritual y ética, ninguno de ellos atrajo tantas mentes ni tantos corazones. El mazdeísmo mitráico fue una especie de religión de Estado del Imperio romano en el siglo III, de ahí la conocida frase de Renán: «si el cristianismo se hubiese detenido en su crecimiento por alguna enfermedad mortal, el mundo hubiera sido mitraísta».

 

 

EL MITRAÍSMO EN EL IMPERIO ROMANO.

 

Expansión y relación con el poder.

 

Es en el siglo I d. C. cuando el mitraísmo se instala en la Urbs romana, desde un primer momento, lo hace en círculos cercanos al imperial. La representación más antigua del dios sacrificando al toro data del año 102 bajo el reinado de Trajano. Fuera del Lacio es Etruria meridional la zona con mayor número de mitreos, siendo Campania y la Cisalpina dos importantes zonas de penetración.

 

La difusión del rito mitraísta se manifiesta en Retia y especialmente en Nórica. En el reinado de Adriano, poco antes de 130, llega a Germania, y con Antonino Pío hasta la Panonia. Desde la época de Marco Aurelio hasta los Severos -es decir entre 161-235- los santuarios se suceden a ambos lados del Rin y en las provincias danubianas, siendo también frecuentes en Tracia y Dalmacia, mucho menos en Macedonia y Grecia, donde solo tenemos noticia de un mitreo cercano a Eleusis que había sido consagrado por legionarios claramente itálicos. El Asia helenizada fue muy refractaria a este culto. Por el contrario sí hay constatación de templos consagrados a Mitra en Capadocia, en el Ponto, en Frigia, en Lidia y en Cilicia, cerca del mar Negro hay restos arqueológicos en Crimea, donde habría penetrado desde Trevisonda. También se han encontrado en Siria y en el Eúfrates, casi siempre relacionados con campamentos de legionarios, lo mismo que en Egipto.

 

A finales del siglo II su culto alcanza la cúpula de la jerarquía militar imperial e incluso hay emperadores que se hacen iniciar en estos misterios. El caso de Nerón es aún dudoso, M. Yourcenar en sus célebres Memorias de Adriano, da el dato de este emperador hispano, pero del primer emperador que hay constancia cierta es de Cómodo que habilitó una dependencia subterránea de la residencia imperial de Ostia para la práctica de este culto. También es claro el caso de Séptimo Severo, por el contrario, el emperador oriental y orientalizante Caracalla tuvo como dios a Serapis. La primera mención clara, pública y oficial en la que Galeno, Diocleciano y Licinio, en 307 califican al dios de fautor imperii sui (protector de su poder), el primero de ellos fue, sin duda, adepto al culto de Mitra. Mucho se ha dicho, en este sentido, sobre Juliano el Apóstata, aunque la única prueba concreta de la que se tiene constancia es la mención a Mitra en su Banquete de los Césares, emperador que ha pasado a la historia con el sobrenombre despectivo del Apóstata, aunque otros, con mejor criterio se refieren a Juliano Flavio, como Juliano Emperador (32), «porque en rigor si alguien debe ser llamado "apóstata" debería ser el caso de los que abandonaron las tradiciones sacras y los cultos hacedores del alma y la grandeza de la Roma antigua(...) no debería ser, por el contrario, el caso de quien tuvo el coraje de ser tradicional y de intentar reafirmar el ideal "solar" y sacro del Imperio, como fue el intento de Juliano Flavio» (33).

 

Mitra tuvo numerosos fieles en el orden senatorial de la Urbs. El medio urbano es, a lo largo y  ancho de todo el Imperio, el más propicio para el culto mitraico y donde se encuentra a sus seguidores y adeptos, el medio rural, mucho más conservador, lo rechazó claramente, como posteriormente haría con el cristianismo (34). Socialmente vemos que está presente «en su fase más antigua, entre siervos y libertos, posteriormente, en el curso del siglo II, en el estamento militar. Se difunde, a lo largo del siglo III, en el ordo equester y en el siglo IV en el senatorial»(35). El hecho de que al principio fueran siervos y libertos habla claramente de la gran tolerancia religiosa del mundo romano y de sus clases dirigentes, otro ejemplo curioso es que está datada la existencia de un pater mitraísta que a la vez era sacerdos de la domus Augusta, evidenciando la postura oficial de tolerancia y reconocimiento hacia el culto mitraico. En general las inscripciones del siglo III-IV revelan la gran importancia que tuvo el componente militar en la composición de los adeptos de Mitra y en su difusión por el Imperio.

 

 

 

El culto a Mitra en Hispania

 

En cuanto a la presencia del mitraismo en la península ibérica, según García y Bellido es, de los cultos mistéricos practicados en la Antigüedad, el que menos representado está arqueológicamente. Hispania es el país de Europa occidental más pobre en restos mitraicos. La explicación es bastante sencilla, el culto a Mitra estuvo íntimamente relacionado con el movimiento y el asentamiento de las legiones, e Hispania en los siglos II y III, época de expansión y culto, vive una existencia bastante pacífica y al margen del movimiento de tropas, tan frecuente en otras partes del Imperio, y por tanto al margen de las vías de penetración del mitraísmo (36).

 

Testimonios arqueológicos de presencia mitraica hay en las antiguas tres provincias de la Hispania de época imperial, siempre en zonas periféricas de la Meseta. En el Tarraconense hay ejemplos en sus dos extremos: la zona noroeste y el territorio astur y centros urbanos del litoral mediterráneo, como Barcino, Tarraco, Cabrera del Mar y, en la Comunidad de Valencia hay atestiguada una inscripción encontrada en 1922, en la localidad de Benifayó, en un lugar donde se han encontrado varios restos romanos. El epígrafe allí encontrado, tiene 65 cm de altura y se conserva en el Museo Provincial de Valencia. El texto dice:

 

                    Invicto/Mithrae/Lucanus/Ser(vus)

 

En Lusitania los restos arqueológicos están esparcidos por todo el territorio, pero indudablemente el centro principal e irradiador del mitraísmo estuvo en Emerita Augusta. Para la Bética la zona de hallazgos corresponde a la zona interior: Itálica, Corduba, Munda e Igagrum (actual Capra), donde se encontró una gran estatua de Mitra tauróctono, con Mitra vestido con pantalón persa, túnica con mangas y gorro frigio (37), exceptuando algún dato en la ciudad portuaria de Malaca.

 

 

«En general, el material que disponemos, procede de capitales de provincias, conventus, de colonias y municipios, es decir de zonas fuertemente romanizadas, donde hubo arraigo municipal. Fueron al mismo tiempo ciudades portuarias, administrativas o militares, asiento de soldados y comerciantes que transportaron el culto en su bagaje» (38). Siendo indudablemente el elemento militar el numéricamente más importante entre los adeptos al mitraísmo y el que ejerce principalmente la función de difusor por el territorio hispano. Otra vía fueron los comerciantes llegados a puertos del Mediterráneo hispánico.

 

FINAL Y PERVIVENCIAS DE UN CULTO GUERRERO

 

El fin del mitraísmo.

 

Al no incluir mujeres entre sus adeptos el mitraísmo limitó su campo de crecimiento y se encontró en desventaja frente a otros cultos como por ejemplo el cristianismo. Su segundo problema fue que siempre conservó la «marca persa» y Persia nunca se integró en el imperio, siendo por el contrario, enemigo hereditario y amenaza constante.

 

Constantino, el primer emperador cristiano, manifestó una particular hostilidad hacia el mitraísmo, así en 324 prohibió expresamente el sacrificio a «ídolos» y la celebración de cultos mistéricos. El rito mitraico tenía circunstancias agravantes: el sacrificio terminaba con un banquete con el dios y los emperadores cristianos tenían presentes las palabras de Pablo en su I carta a los corintios: «No quiero que entréis en comunión con los demonios». La legislación se hace más dura en el siglo IV  cuando se prohíbe cualquier sacrificio nocturno, precisamente la hora del ritual mitraico. El culto mitraico está en decadencia cuando Constancio II en 357 llega a Roma, circunstancia que aprovecha la aristocracia senatorial para obligarle a recortar las «leyes antipaganas», el reinado de Juliano el Apóstata (361-363) reactiva los cultos paganos, y de forma muy clara al mitraico, pero esta tendencia dura poco, en 391 una ley prohíbe toda clase de culto o manifestación pagana, y en 394 el mitraísmo desaparecerá de la Urbs, en el resto del Imperio las dos últimas dedicatorias epigráficas a Mitra tendrían fecha de 325 y 367.

Influencias y permanencias mitraicas en el cristianismo.

 

Sin embargo hay testimonios que indican que, aún después de la destrucción de los mitreos, la vitalidad de culto permaneció durante largo tiempo. Es lógico inferir que continuó teniendo influencia en importantes capas de la sociedad, y que el cristianismo- nuevo culto dominante-recogió y adaptó muchos de sus temas e iconografías:

 

La influencia más evidente históricamente confirmadas del culto solar sobre el cristianismo en el Imperio tardío es la elección del 25 de Diciembre como la del nacimiento de Cristo, es decir la misma fecha que Aureliano consagró en 274 al Natalis Sol Invicti, fecha que también era celebrada por los mitraistas, que no dejaban de ser un culto solar particular.

 

Trascendente fue también el cambio del sábado al domingo como «día del Señor», lo que se explica al renunciar al calendario lunar semita y adoptar el solar en que el domingo (día del sol = Sunday en inglés, Sonntag en alemán) da comienzo a la semana.

 

También hubo influencia mitraica directa en los rituales comunitarios, es de resaltar la afinidad entre el ritual de consagración mitraica y los sacramentos cristianos del bautizo, comunión y confirmación, sacramentos que entre ellos no serán autónomos hasta el siglo XI. Según expresión de Santo Tomás de Aquino el bautizado se convierte en «soldado de Cristo» lo que nos recuerda claramente a la idea al adepto como miembro de la «milicia de Mitra», y en la comunión se da la idea espiritual de «luchar contra los enemigos de la fe», en el mismo sentido del culto mitraico.

 

Por otro lado resulta llamativo que los cristianos conservaran el nombre de pater para sus sacerdotes y que los obispos sigan llevando un gorro que recibe el nombre de mitra. No lo es menos la imagen del Arcángel San Miguel con la espada en la mano para matar al dragón que puede recordarnos a la imagen de Mitra, puñal en mano matando al toro; en ambos casos estaríamos ante la imagen de «la lucha victoriosa de una figura trascendente contra una bestia que primero es domada y luego sacrificada» (39).

 

Otra influencia irania y zoroástrica, aunque no es definitivo que sea también mitraica, es la adoración de los Reyes Magos. Herodoto define a los « magos» como una casta sacerdotal irania que ejercía su función primero entre los medas y luego entre los persas. Los regalos que le llevan tienen un claro simbolismo tradicional: el oro siempre ha sido símbolo del sol y, en consecuencia de la realeza, que es la representación en la tierra de lo que el sol es en el sistema solar, precisamente Melchor regala oro por tratarse de un rey, Gaspar incienso por ser un dios y Baltasar mirra por ser un hombre. Siguiendo con los Magos que visitan a Jesucristo recién nacido es obligatorio referirse a los cambios iconográficos que ha hecho la iglesia en su iconografía, mucho han variado desde la representación de los mosaicos de Rávena a la actualidad, en un primer momento son hombres de una misma edad e igualmente de raza blanca, es en el siglo XV cuando Petrus Natalibus establece arbitrariamente que Melchor tiene 60 años, Gaspar 40, y Baltasar 20. Durante la Edad media habían incorporado una iconografía alquímica, representando -por los atributos-cada uno de ellos una de las fases alquímicas: blanco/Melchor-rojo/Gaspar-negro/Baltasar/África, es desde esa fecha cuando se representa a Baltasar como un hombre «negro», en este caso nos negamos a decir: como un hombre «subsahariano».

 

¿Fue posible la supervivencia?

 

Es lógico pensar que una ley no fue suficiente para terminar de un plumazo con un culto tan extendido y con un gran número de adeptos cual fue el mitraísmo. Hay restos y testimonios dispersos que infieren la existencia de núcleos de resistencia mitraísta en el siglo V. En el siglo XX las obras de inspiración tradicional y evoliana se encargan de buscar restos aún vivos de tradiciones europeas precristianas, especialmente de la continuidad de la tradición romana y de pervivencias mitraicas. Así la revista Mos maiorum en un número de 1996(40) llega a afirmar que «el culto mistérico de Mitra, a consecuencia de la hostilidad del Estado, desaparece de la superficie de la historia, conservándose en una tradición oculta y operando invisiblemente sobre las grandes corrientes de la historia occidental. El resurgir de la sacralidad del Imperium en la tradición gibelina medieval, el trasfondo iniciático de los poemas épicos y caballerescos de la Edad Media, los vestigios de la tradición hermética hasta el Renacimiento y el renacimiento espiritual evidenciados en tiempos mucho más recientes, testimonian en modo vivo y concreto la continuidad de la fuerza de la herencia sapiencial pagana en Occidente».

 

También en Oriente se atestiguan presencia mitraica en épocas muy posteriores. En la tradición épica de Armenia hasta el siglo XIX se hace referencia a un gigante de nombre Mehr, cuya descripción y función nos recuerda llamativamente a la del dios Mitra.

 

Varios estudiosos - entre ellos Mircea Eliade (41) y Ellemire Zolla(42)-  han dado certezas de la continuidad del culto zoroástrico en Irán hasta, por lo menos, los años 70 del siglo XX . En este sentido conocido es el hecho de que en 1.964, Mary Boyce visitó una serie de pueblos y aldeas iraníes en los que pervivía la fe en Zaratustra, constatando que veneraban a un dios-héroe llamado Mihr, con enormes paralelismos con Mitra. No se sabe cuál es actualmente la situación de estos parsis bajo el régimen integrista de Teherán. Nos tememos que están atravesando tiempos difíciles que amenazan la perpetuación de su religión, mantenida durante milenios.

 

También conocida es la comunidad parsi de Bombay, es el mismo E. Zolla quien en su libro Aure nos narra su encuentro con un adepto al mitraismo de esta comunidad, que le habla-desde el conocimiento operativo- de los ritos de la llamada «Cámara del Consejo» en el palacio de Darío, así como del poder y la efectividad de la misteriosa secuencia vocálica («mántrica» podríamos decir) del Ritual Mitraico del Gran Papiro Mágico de París(43), que incluye técnicas sobre el dominio de las corrientes de la respiración -cálida y fría - que es necesario armonizar , en mismo modo a cómo las técnicas yóguicas lo determinan .

 

No quisiéramos cerrar este apartado sin hacer mención de una curiosa e interesante entrevista(44) aparecida en el número 4- solsticio de verano 1994 de la revista belga Antaios , número titulado precisamente «Mysteria Mithrae», el entrevistado, se identifica con el nombre de Corax (el cuervo) primer grado de iniciación mitraica, y se define a sí mismo como «joven universitario europeo, me definiría a riesgo de pasar por un provocador , como un seguidor de Mitra, un fiel del Sol Invictus, en la línea espiritual de Akenatón, y del emperador Juliano llamado el Apóstata. Al igual que ellos, mi toma de conciencia solar fue resultado del reencuentro con una tradición y una búsqueda personal», si bien deja claro que «No pretendemos en absoluto, contrariamente a ciertos druidas modernos, ninguna filiación iniciática (aunque hayamos buscado durante años en vano esos "testigos")».

 

Más allá de supervivencias reales, imaginadas o deseadas hemos querido dar las claves del culto mitraico que no hace más que repetir el mundo de valores indoeuropeos. Si pretendemos un verdadero enderezamiento espiritual tendremos necesariamente que recuperarlos y remitirnos a ellos, sea cual sea la forma religiosa exterior que los englobe.

 

Enrique Ravello

 

Notas

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1    J. Evola,  «La via della realizzazione di sé secondo i Misteri di Mitra»(1926) en La via della realizzazione di sé secondo i misteri di Mitra (recop). Quaderni di Testi Evoliani, nº 4. Fundazione Julius Evola . Roma, p.5.

2     J Varenne, Zoroastro. El profeta del Avesta. Ed Edaf, Madrid 1989, p,23.

3      Ibídem, p, 56.

4      A.  Coomaraswamy, El Vedanta y la tradición occidental.

Ed. Siruela, Madrid 2001, p, 269.

5       Cfr: G Bonfante, «The Name of Mitra» en Etudes mitrhriaques (= Acta Iranica,17)-Teherán-Lieja,1978.p.47 y ss.

6        Sobre la realidad de la mitología romana como manifestación de la ideología indoeuropea, v. G Dumézil, Iupiter, Mars, Quirinus. Essai sur la conception indoeuropéene de la Societé et sur les origines de Rome, París 1944, y La religion romaine archaïque. París 1966.

7         S. Arcella I Misteridel Sole. Ed Controcorrente, Nápoles 2002, p.26.

8         S.S Hakim, «I misteri di Mitra visti da un zoroastriano», en Conoscenza religiosa  I 1976.

9          Ibídem, p.87.

10       A. Loisy; Los misterios paganos y el misterio cristiano. Ed Paidos Oriental, Barcelona 1990,p.119.

11        F. Cumont , Las religiones orientales y el paganismo romano. Ed. Akal universitaria. Madrid 1987 p.129.

12        Ibídem, p. 121.

13        J. Evola, «Note sui Misteridi Mithra» en op.cit. (recop) p.18.

14         David Ulansey, profesor de Filosofía y Religión en el Californian Institute of Integral Studies.

15         D. Ulansey, The Origins of the Mithraic Mysteries. Cosmology & Salvation in the Ancient World. Ed Oxford University Press. Nueva York 1989.

16         R. Turcan, op.cit, p.103.

17         Eliade, M y Couliano, I. P, Diccionario de las religiones. Circulo de lectores. Ed. Paidós, Barcelona 1997.

18        A. Loisy: op, cit, p.129

19        T. Ossana, La stretta di mano. Il contenuto etico della Religione di Mitra. Ed Borla, Nápoles 1988.

20        S. Arcella , I Misterio del Sole. Ed. Controcorrente, Nápoles2002,p.119.

21        R.Turcan, Mithra et le Mithriacisme .Ed. Les Belles Lettres . París 2000, p.119

22        R. Turcan.op.cit,p.90.

23        S. Arcella, op.cit,p.134.

24        A. Loisy, op.cit, p.129-135.

25        J. Evola,op.cit, p.5

26        S. Arcella,op.cit,p.102

27        J. Evola ,op.cit, p.7

28        J  Evola «Note sui Misteri di Mithra » (1950).op.cit (recop) p.19.

29        J  Evola ,«La via della realizzazione di sé secondo i Misteri di Mitra» (1926).Recogido en op. cit (recop.) Fundazione Julius Evola. Roma.p.7

30         F. Cumont, Le religione orientali nel paganesimo romano, Bari 1967, p.183 y Les mystéres de Mitra, Bruselas 1919, p.141.

31        Técnicas autocurativas japonesas como el reiki o el katsugen se basan principalmente en esto.

32        Cfr: R. Prati en la traducción al italiano de los escritos de Juliano Imperador con el título: Sugli dei e sugli uomini.

33         J. Evola «Giuliano Imperatore» (1932) en op.cit. (recop.) p.15.

34         R. Turcan ,op. cit, pp.41-43

35         S. Arcella .«I collegi mithraici nella Roma imperiale», en Arthos nº 9 (nueva serie) , 2001.

36         A. García y Bellido. Les religiones orientales dan l Éspagne romaine. Leiden1967, p.21.

37         Cfr JL Jiménez y M. Martín- Bueno, La casa del Mithra, Capra-Córdoba. Ilmo.Ayto de Cabra 1992.

38          Mª Antonia de Francisco Casado, El culto de Mitra en Hispania. Ed Universidad de Granada. Granada 1989. p.64.

39          S. Arcella, op.cit p. 211.

40          Mos maiorum, Revista trimestrale di Studi tradizionali. Año II, nº4,1996,pp.34.

41          M. Eliade, Storia,  pp.338-344.

42          E. Zolla, Il Signore delle grotte, pp.64 y ss.

43          Para un mayor conocimiento sobre la realidad, potencialidad y operatividad del Gran Papiro Mágico de París, cfr: «Apathanatismos. Rituale Mithraico del Gran Papiro Magico di Parigi» en , Grupo UR, Introduzione alla Magia . Vol I . Ed Mediterranee, Roma 1971.pp.114-139.

44           «Corax, entretien avec un adepte du culte socaire» en Antaios nº4, solsticio de verano de 1994, Bruselas.

In der Geiselhaft des Norwegers

von Andreas MÖLZER

 

Ex: http://www.andreas-moelzer.at/

 

Der „Norweger“ hält die Europäer in Geiselhaft. All jene, für die Erhaltung des christlichen Abendlandes eintreten und für die Erhaltung ihrer national-kulturellen Identität als Europäer, sie stehen nun im Verdacht, Gesinnungsgenossen des Herrn Breivik zu sein. 

Gastkommentar von Andreas Mölzer („Wiener Zeitung“, 3. August 2011) 

 

 

 

 

 

Da setzt ein Psychopath, beheimatet in einem der liberalsten Länder Europas, eine 1.500 seitige Kompilation aus den verschiedensten im Internet erhältlichen Texten ins Netz, um wenige Tage später das Regierungsviertel seines Landes in die Luft zu jagen und die Massenhinrichtung von fast 100 wehrlosen Jugendlichen zu inszenieren. So wie er seine Tat durchführte, nämlich kalt, gnadenlos und triumphierend, wahnsinnig eben, so hat er auch die pseudo-ideologische Pseudo-Legitimation seines Mordens via Internet organisiert: Da bringt er gezielt junge Menschen um ihr Leben, dort nimmt er gezielt Millionen andere in politische Geiselhaft.

Ja Geiselhaft ist es, in der sich nunmehr all jene Europäer befinden, welche die Massenzuwanderung in soziokultureller Hinsicht für bedrohlich halten und den nach Europa strömenden radikalen Islam für gefährlich. All jene, die bewusst für die Erhaltung des christlichen Abendlandes eintreten und für die Erhaltung ihrer national-kulturellen Identität als Europäer, sie stehen nun im Verdacht, Gesinnungsgenossen des Herrn Breivik zu sein. An ihrer Spitze die Ikonen der europäischen rechtsdemokratischen Bewegungen wie der Holländer Geert Wilders, die Französin Marine Le Pen, der Österreicher Heinz Christian Strache, der Finne Timo Soini oder eben die Vorsitzende der norwegischen Fortschrittspartei Siv Jensen selbst.

Wer den Fehler begeht, sich angesichts dieser Geiselhaft offensiv in jene Richtung hin wehren zu wollen, die da lautet, alles das was der Norweger in seiner Kompilation zum Besten gibt, sei ja nicht falsch, die Bezugnahme auf Winston Churchill, auf Thomas Jefferson, auf Otto von Bismarck, wäre ja nicht grundsätzlich abzulehnen. Eine Kritik des extremistischen Islamismus, der ja etwa die Anschläge von 9/11 zu verantworten hat, müsse ja erlaubt sein. Und die sozialen, kulturellen und politischen Probleme, die die ungebremste Migration nach Europa gebracht hat, seien ja evident! Eine solche Verteidigung führt gegenwärtig offenbar unmittelbar auf das politisch-mediale Schafott. Vertreter der Lega Nord und des Front National können gegenwärtig ein Lied davon singen. Und selbst die strikte und hoch emotionale Distanzierung, wie sie etwa der Niederländer Wilders praktiziert, ändert nichts daran, dass er der geistigen Komplizenschaft mit dem norwegischen Massenmörder bezichtigt wird. Was Wunder, dass Österreichs Freiheitliche sich da gegenwärtig den erhobenen Zeigefinger ihrer politischen Mitbewerber gefallen lassen müssen und sich die Schelte vom Bundespräsident abwärts über die gesamte Gutmenschen-Gemeinschaft bis hin zu selbsternannten Rechtsextremismus-Experten, wie dem unter falschen Namen segelnden Heribert Schiedel aus dem Dokumentationsarchiv des Österreichischen Widerstands, anhören müssen.

Die Situation erinnert an die Tage des Briefbombenterrors Mitte der 90-er Jahre, als die Haider-FPÖ in ähnlicher Geiselhaft des Briefbombenattentäters Franz Fuchs bzw. seiner nach wie vor nicht völlig auszuschließenden Hintermänner stand. Die indessen längst vergessenen Bekennerschreiben der obskuren Bajuwarischen Befreiungsarmee zitierten ja seitenweise freiheitliche Elaborate, um hier eine zumindest geistige Urheberschaft zu konstruieren. Aus welcher Hexenküche diese Bekennerschreiben wirklich kamen, wurde letztlich nie wirklich geklärt. Nach dem Prinzip „cui bono“ kann jedenfalls gesagt werden, dass sie nur den Gegnern der Freiheitlichen nützten.

Ähnlich ist es mit dem 1.500-seitigen Wirrsinns-Elaborat des norwegischen Psychopathen. Nützen tut dieses primär den Gegnern der rechtspopulistischen Bewegungen Europas. Und diese Gegner zeigen bislang auch kaum Hemmung diesen taktischen Nutzen voll als Wasser auf ihre Mühlen zu leiten.

Was hilft es da, wenn man darauf hinweist, dass Habermas und Marcuse keineswegs für den blutigen Terror der Roten Armeefraktion der 70-er Jahre verantwortlich gemacht werden können? Was nützt es – um weiter in der Geschichte zurück zu gehen – wenn man darauf hinweist, dass der heilige Augustinus und die anderen Kirchenväter wohl kaum für die Hexenverbrennungen oder den jahrhundertelangen blutigen Terror der Inquisition verantwortlich seien? Was ändert es da – um wieder in die jüngere Geschichte zurück zu kehren – wenn man erklärt, dass Friedrich Nietzsche nicht für den Holocaust und Karl Marx nicht für den Archipel Gulag haftbar gemacht werden können?

Das Geschäft des politischen Kleingeldwechselns blüht in diesen Tagen. Und jene eher kleinkarierten Spindoktoren im etablierten Politbereich, die nunmehr eine günstige Gelegenheit für ihren „Kampf gegen Rechts“ sehen, haben eben keine moralische Hemmung, die ideologische Geiselnahme des Norwegers für sich zu nutzen. Es liegt nunmehr an den potentiellen politisch-ideologischen Geiseln, sich moralisch einwandfrei und politisch taktisch klug aus dieser Falle zu befreien. Dies wird sicher nicht gelingen, wenn man radikal-cholerisch auf die Attacken reagiert. Und es wird auch nicht gelingen, wenn man sich kleinmütig von bisherigen politischen Haltungen distanziert. Jene Probleme im Bereich der Massenmigration und der Islamisierung, die man bislang mit großem Beifall des Wählerpublikums thematisierte, sie bleiben bestehen – auch trotz der norwegischen Tragödie. Ob man in der politischen Kommunikation, im Tonfall, eben in der Sprache, beim Aufzeigen dieser Problemfelder nicht maßvoller werden sollte, muss diskutiert werden. Dasselbe betrifft aber auch die Gegner der ach so bösen Rechtspopulisten quer durch Europa. Diese werden ihre Terminologie der Ausgrenzung ebenso mäßigen müssen.

 

  WebBlog von Andreas Mölzer

 

EU-Parlaments-Homepage bestätigt:
Andreas Mölzer ist der fleißigste österreichische EU-Parlamentarier
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Zur Statistik der parl. ErklärungenAuch die unabhängige Internetseite MEPranking.eu bestätigt die äußerst hohe parlamentarische Aktivität von MdEP Andreas Mölzer

 

Vers la tyrannie?

Vers la tyrannie ?

par Maurice Gendre

Ex: http://www.scriptoblog.com/

Avec en toile de fond un effondrement systémique global de la zone transatlantique (le "sauvetage" de la Grèce et le déplafonnement de la dette US n'étant que des pis-aller temporaires), l'élite dirigeante semble prête pour une véritable fuite en avant.

Difficile de dire quels visages prendront ces délires oligarchiques, mais on peut supposer que les "corporate globalists" et leurs laquais vont faire preuve d'une inventivité à toute épreuve.

Premier élément passé totalement inaperçu dans l'euphorie de l'accord Obama-Chambre des Représentants (1) la mise en place d'un Super-Congrès aux États-Unis. De quoi s'agit-il ?

L'activiste larouchiste Debra Freeman l'explique dans un communiqué publié le 1er août :

" Le Super-congrès est un comité de 12 représentants, composé de six démocrates et six républicains, qui auront le pouvoir, l’autorité et la responsabilité de décider, entre la mi et la fin novembre, de coupes supplémentaires de 1,5 mille milliards de dollars. Ces coupes seront ensuite présentées au vote de l’ensemble du Congrès. Cependant, lorsqu’il sera saisi des recommandations de ce groupe de douze, le Congrès n’aura pas le droit d’y apporter le moindre amendement ni même d’entreprendre un « filibuster », procédure d’obstruction parlementaire qui permet de retarder le plus possible, ou même bloquer l’adoption d’une loi. Les élus ne pourront se prononcer sur ce projet que par oui ou par non, et même s’ils votent non, c’est-à-dire contre le projet de loi, des coupes automatiques de l’ordre de 1,500 milliards de dollars auront lieu. Elles seront divisées également entre les dépenses de la défense, et celles des programmes sociaux, sans que plus aucune discussion ne puisse avoir lieu sur le sujet".

Si les mots ont encore un sens, cela s'appelle un coup d’État (anti)constitutionnel.

Oslo

Plus terrible encore : le massacre norvégien. Comme on pouvait le redouter dès les premières heures, cette tragédie exhale de très fortes odeurs de Gladio "scandinave" et de réseau stay-behind nouvelle mouture.

On évoque de plus en plus dans les milieux du renseignement la présence d'un deuxième tireur sur l'île d'Utoeya, ainsi que des "exercices" anti-terroristes qui se déroulaient dans le quartier d'Oslo où ont eu lieu les explosions (même scénario qu'à Londres le 7 juillet 2005 et aux Etats-Unis le 11 septembre 2001).

Des spécialistes mettent également en avant le rôle du SIMAS : une structure mise en place par l'US Intelligence et qui a recruté chez des policiers retraités, des anciens militaires etc.

Opération fausse bannière, dites-vous?

Restrictions des libertés

Il est à craindre qu'après le très mal nommé Patriot Act (concocté par John Ashcroft et le "délicieux" Michael Chertoff) et les iniques lois Perben, les gouvernements occidentaux pour plaire à leurs "employeurs", se lancent dans une nouvelle frénésie législative et liberticide qui mettra un peu plus en cause l'habeas corpus, les droits de la défense et les principes élémentaires de l'Etat de Droit.

Des affaires aussi rocambolesques et grotesques que celles de Tarnac risquent de se multiplier. Mais les prochaines fois, on peut supposer que ce n'est pas l'ultra-gauche qui sera visée mais plutôt les milieux de la droite radicale. Des officines barbouzardes cherchent déjà leur proie et promettent des coups de filet dans les jours ou les semaines à venir. On peut imaginer que le sémillant "frérot" Alain Bauer est déjà en embuscade pour offrir à la mediasphère les explications toutes faites dont il a le secret et dont il avait déjà gratifié la population française lors du scandale Julien Coupat-Yldune Lévy.

Les poulets anti-terroristes trouveront très opportunément des caches d'armes, des plans, des maquettes, des écrits subversifs etc.

Malheureusement on ne connait que trop bien ce genre de montage minable mais qui fonctionne toujours auprès d'un public crédule et totalement lobotomisé.

Port d'armes

Cette stratégie de la tension et ces restrictions des libertés s'accompagneront très probablement d'une guerre aux armes à feu notamment aux Etats-Unis.

Les tentatives multiples de ces derniers mois de mettre à mal le deuxième amendement (Rahm Emanuel, nouveau maire de Chicago, est très en pointe dans ce "combat"), font redouter aux patriotes, aux constitutionnalistes, aux libertariens et aux conservateurs américains une opération faux-drapeau de grande envergure qui mettrait en scène un tireur fou provoquant une fusillade dans une école, un jardin d'enfants ou tout autre lieu public.

Un événement tragique qui remettrait en cause ce droit fondamental et permettrait à l'oligarchie d'obtenir l'appui d'une population américaine traumatisée.

Il faut bien comprendre que les Américains n'ont pas le même regard que les Français sur le port d'armes.

Pour les Français le monopole de la violence légale et légitime est entre les mains des forces coercitives de l'Etat. Les Français ont accepté que leur sécurité soit assurée par la police et la gendarmerie. Pas d'auto-défense en France.(2)

Aux Etats-Unis la logique est différente. Le port d'armes n'est pas seulement envisagé comme une façon de mettre hors d'état de nuire un voyou ou un agresseur mais il est aussi le plus sûr et l'ultime moyen de se prémunir de la tyrannie du gouvernement.(3)

“When governments fear the people, there is liberty. When the people fear the government, there is tyranny. The strongest reason for the people to retain the right to keep and bear arms is, as a last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in government.” — Thomas Jefferson

Le même Jefferson d'ajouter :

"Aucun homme libre ne devrait être désarmé, les lois qui interdisent le port d’armes désarment seulement ceux qui ne sont pas enclins ni déterminés à commettre des crimes. De telles lois rendent les choses pires pour ceux qui sont assaillis et meilleurs pour les assaillants; elles servent plutôt à encourager les homicides que de les prévenir, parce qu’un homme désarmé peut être attaqué avec une plus grande certitude qu’un homme armé".

James Madison de son côté déclarait : "Pour préserver la liberté, il est essentiel que toute la population entière possède des armes en tout temps".

George Washington, lui, nommait sa collection d'armes privées "les dents de la liberté du peuple".

Les partisans du deuxième amendement ont-ils raison de se méfier d'un coup fourré de l’État fédéral?

Absolument. La presse américaine, y compris dominante, a révélé un scandale dont l'ATF (Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and explosives) est partie prenante. L'ATF aurait fourni des armes à des cartels mexicains.

Or, ces gangs de la drogue viennent régler une partie de leur "désaccord" sur le sol américain. Un carnage n'est donc pas impensable.
Depuis quelques jours, on voit déjà sortir du bois tous les opposants au deuxième amendement pour réclamer un contrôle plus drastique et une législation plus dure sur les armes à feu.

Il faut également rappeler l'affaire de la milice Hutaree. Cette milice avait menacé de déclarer la guerre à l'Etat fédéral et de commettre des attentats contre la police du Michigan. Après vérification, on découvrit que la milice Hutaree était infiltrée par le FBI et avait été transformée en simple "joujou" du Homeland Security...

Maurice Gendre

( 1 ) A l'heure où ces lignes sont écrites (lundi 1er août), on attend encore que le Sénat se prononce.

( 2 ) A la vue des troubles à l'ordre public permanents à Marseille et Sevran pour ne citer que ces deux exemples parmi des dizaines d'autres, on peut être désormais persuadé que "le monopole de la violence physique légitime" entre les mains de l’État n'est plus qu'un songe.
Les Français devant faire face à une réglementation sur les armes extrêmement restrictives (décrets du 6 mai 1995 et de décembre 1998), ils ne leur restent plus que trois solutions :
- assurer leur propre défense et ils termineront comme Papy Galinier (embastillé)
- ne rien faire et ils seront à la merci de la voyoucratie et n'auront plus qu'à prier d'être épargnés par la vindicte de la racaille
- s'organiser clandestinement et ils finiront également dans les geôles républicaines traités comme de vulgaires comploteurs qui souhaitent renverser la démocratie et l'Etat de Droit.
Heureuses perspectives, n'est-il pas ? Max Weber aurait de quoi philosopher...

( 3 ) La tyrannie n'est plus une simple crainte. Le congressman Brad Sherman avait raconté comment on l'avait menacé de déclencher la loi martiale si lui et certains de ses collègues ne votaient pas le plan de renflouement Paulson.

On rappellera aussi les tragédies de Waco et Ruby Ridge pour se convaincre que l'Etat fédéral peut traiter les citoyens américains de la plus ignoble des manières. C'est pour cela que des organisations telles que les Oath keepers (Les gardiens du serment fondé par Stewart Rhodes, un ancien proche de Ron Paul) ou les Gun owners of America (adeptes de l'open carry en référence au vieux principe "A right unexercised is a right lost"), se préparent à faire face à des troubles civils graves fomentés par le gouvernement fédéral et à une suspension des libertés constitutionnelles en cas d'écroulement.

Can History Adress the Problems of the Future?

Can History Address the Problems of the Future?

Dominique VENNER

Ex: http://www.counter-currents.com./

Translated by Greg Johnson

Men have always felt the need to peer into the future. The Greeks asked the Pythia of Delphi. The obscurity of the oracle’s pronouncements lent them to multiple interpretations. Bowing to custom, Alexander consulted her before undertaking the conquest of Asia. As she was slow to return to her tripod, the impatient Macedonian dragged her there by force. She exclaimed: “One cannot resist you . . .” Having heard these words, Alexander let her go, saying: “This prediction is enough for me.” He was a sage.

Every age has its prophets, soothsayers, haruspices, astrologers, palmists, futurologists, and other charlatans. Today we use computers. Then, they used mediums. Catherine de Medici consulted Nostradamus. Cromwell listened to William Lily. Stalin questioned Wolf Messing. Hitler questioned Eric Hanussen. Briand and Poincaré shared the talents of Mrs. Fraya . . . The destiny of an individual, however, is one thing; the destiny of a civilization is another.

Preceded by the optimism inherited from the Enlightenment, the 20th century began with promises of a glowing future, in the certitude that science and knowledge led to progress and wisdom. were progress factors and of wisdom.  Man would truly become, “Master and possessor of nature” and acquire self-mastery too. After the victory over things, peace and harmony between the men would establish themselves.

 ^[2]The pitiless 20th century shattered these illusions. Nobody, or almost nobody, had foreseen the catastrophic consequences of the murder in Sarajevo in the Summer of 1914. All the belligerents expected a short, fresh, happy war. It was interminable, terrible, and deadly as never before. It was the unforeseen gift of industrial progress and mass democracy to mankind—two new factors that had transformed the very nature of war. Beginning as a traditional conflict between States, it finished as an ideological crusade, dragging down the old European order, incarnated by the three great empires of the Center and the East. And the butchery of Europe and the conditions imposed on the vanquished after 1919 carried the germ of another more catastrophic war.

At the dawn of a new century and a new millennium, the illusions of progress have been partly dissipated, so much so that one hears about “fatal progress” or “economic horror.” Marxism and its certitudes foundered in the collapse of the system to which it had given birth. The optimism of yore often yields to a kind of overpowering pessimism, nourished by anxiety over a future we have every reason to fear. One turns to History to ask for answers.

But the interpretation of History escapes neither fashion nor reigning ideas. Thus one always needs strength of mind and character to free oneself from the weight of one’s own time. With a little drive, any curious, free, and cultivated spirit can grasp the unforeseeable character of History, which the last hundred years of facts make unavoidably clear, and see through the deterministic theories resulting from the Hegelian vision.

On January 22nd, 1917, a Lenin who was almost unknown and permanently exiled, spoke before a circle of socialist students: “We old men,” he said of himself, “will perhaps never see the decisive battles of the Revolution . . .” Seven weeks later, Tsarism was overthrown, and Lenin and the Bolsheviks had nothing to do with it. The “decisive battles” in which he no longer believed were commencing, to the misfortune of Russia and the whole world. I know few anecdotes so revealing of the difficulty of historical forecasts. This one is in a class by itself.

 ^[3]During the academic year 1975–1976, Raymond Aron, one of the most perspicacious minds of our time, gave a course at the Collège de France on “The Decline of the West,” which was already a whole curriculum. Here is his conclusion: “the decline of the United States of 1945 to 1975 rose from irresistible forces.” Let us note the word “irresistible.” In his Memories, published the year of his death, in 1983, Aron returned to this reflection and amplified it: “What I have observed since 1975 was the threat of disintegration of the American imperial zone . . .” To those who live under the shadow of the American world imperium, this analysis makes one question the author’s lucidity. And yet, he never doubted himself. Our astonishment is due to the fact that History galloped on unbeknownst to us, showing us a world today that is very different from what it was twenty years earlier, which nobody had foreseen.

By no means do I suggest ignoring the threats looming on our horizon: devouring globalization, demographic explosions, massive immigration, the pollution of nature, genetic engineering, etc. During an age of anxiety, it is healthy to repel happy illusions; it is salubrious to practice the virtues of active pessimism, those of Thucydides or Machiavelli. But it is just as necessary to reject the kind of pessimism that turns into fatalism.

The first error regarding future threats would be to regard them as inescapable. History is not the domain of fate but of the unforeseen. A second error would be to imagine the future as a prolongation of the present.  If anything is certain, it is that the future will be different from how one imagines it today. A third error would be to lose hope in intelligence, imagination, will, and finally ourselves.

Source: Le Figaro, January 19th, 2000

Online: http://euro-synergies.hautetfort.com/archive/2011/08/02/l-histoire-repond-elle-aux-problemes-de-l-avenir.html ^[4]

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Article printed from Counter-Currents Publishing: http://www.counter-currents.com

URL to article: http://www.counter-currents.com/2011/08/can-history-address-the-problems-of-the-future/

Zinoviev's Homo Sovieticus: Communism as Social Entropy

Zinoviev’s “Homo Sovieticus”: Communism as Social Entropy

Tomislav Sunic

Ex: http://freespeechproject.com/

 

Students and observers of communism consistently encounter the same paradox: On the one hand they attempt to predict the future of communism, yet on the other they must regularly face up to a system that appears unusually static. At Academic gatherings and seminars, and in scholarly treatises, one often hears and reads that communist systems are marred by economic troubles, power sclerosis, ethnic upheavals, and that it is only a matter of time before communism disintegrates. Numerous authors and observers assert that communist systems are maintained in power by the highly secretive nomenklatura, which consists of party potentates who are intensely disliked by the entire civil society. In addition, a growing number of authors argue that with the so-called economic linkages to Western economies, communist systems will eventually sway into the orbit of liberal democracies, or change their legal structure to the point where ideological differences between liberalism and communism will become almost negligible.

The foregoing analyses and predictions about communism are flatly refuted by Alexander Zinoviev, a Russian sociologist, logician, and satirist, whose analyses of communist systems have gained remarkable popularity among European conservatives in the last several years.

According to Zinoviev, it is impossible to study communist systems without rigorous employment of appropriate methodology, training in logic, and a construction of an entirely new conceptual approach. Zinoviev contends that Western observers of communism are seriously mistaken in using social analyses and a conceptual framework appropriate for studying social phenomena in the West, but inappropriate for the analysis of communist systems. He writes:

A camel cannot exist if one places upon it the criteria of a hippopotamus. The opinion of those in the West who consider the Soviet society unstable, and who hope for its soon disintegration from within (aside that they take their desires for realities), is in part due to the fact that they place upon the phenomenon of Soviet society criteria of Western societies, which are alien to the Soviet society.

Zinoviev’s main thesis is that an average citizen living in a communist system -- whom he labels homo sovieticus -- behaves and responds to social stimuli in a similar manner to the way his Western counterpart responds to stimuli of his own social landscape. In practice this means that in communist systems the immense majority of citizens behave, live, and act in accordance with the logic of social entropy laid out by the dominating Marxist ideology. Contrary to widespread liberal beliefs, social entropy in communism is by no means a sign of the system’s terminal illness; in fact it is a positive sign that the system has developed to a social level that permits its citizenry to better cope with the elementary threats, such as wars, economic chaos, famines, or large-scale cataclysms. In short, communism is a system whose social devolution has enabled the masses of communist citizens to develop defensive mechanisms of political self-protection and indefinite biological survival. Using an example that recalls Charles Darwin and Konrad Lorenz, Zinoviev notes that less-developed species often adapt to their habitat better than species with more intricate biological and behavioral capacities. On the evolutionary tree, writes Zinoviev, rats and bugs appear more fragile than, for example, monkeys or dinosaurs, yet in terms of biological survivability, bugs and rats have demonstrated and astounding degree of adaptability to an endlessly changing and threatening environment. The fundamental mistake of liberal observers of communism is to equate political efficiency with political stability. There are political stability. There are political systems that are efficient, but are at the same time politically unstable; and conversely, there are systems which resilient to external threats. To illustrate the stability of communist systems, Zinoviev writes:

A social system whose organization is dominated by entropic principles possesses a high level od stability. Communist society is indeed such a type of association of millions of people in a common whole in which more secure survival, for a more comfortable course of life, and for a favorable position of success.

Zinoviev notes that to “believe in communism” by no means implies only the adherence to the ruling communist elite of the unquestionable acceptance of the communist credo. The belief in communism presupposes first and foremost a peculiar mental attitude whose historical realization has been made possible as a result of primordial egalitarian impulses congenial to all human beings. Throughout man’s biocultural evolution, egalitarian impulses have been held in check by cultural endeavors and civilizational constraints, yet with the advent of mass democracies, resistance to these impulses has become much more difficult. Here is how Zinoviev sees communism:

Civilization is effort; communality is taking the line if least resistance. Communism is the unruly conduct of nature’s elemental forces; civilization sets them rational bounds.

It is for this reason that it is the greatest mistake to think that communism deceives the masses or uses force on them. As the flower and crowning glory of communality, communism represents a type of society which is nearest and dearest to the masses no matter how dreadful the potential consequences for them might be.

Zinoviev refutes the widespread belief that communist power is vested only among party officials, or the so-called nomenklatura. As dismal as the reality of communism is, the system must be understood as a way of life shared by millions of government official, workers, and countless ordinary people scattered in their basic working units, whose chief function is to operate as protective pillars of the society. Crucial to the stability of the communist system is the blending of the party and the people into one whole, and as Zinoviev observes, “the Soviet saying the party and the people are one and the same, is not just a propagandistic password.” The Communist Party is only the repository of an ideology whose purpose is not only to further the objectives of the party members, but primarily to serve as the operating philosophical principle governing social conduct. Zinoviev remarks that Catholicism in the earlier centuries not only served the Pope and clergy; it also provided a pattern of social behavior countless individuals irrespective of their personal feelings toward Christian dogma. Contrary to the assumption of liberal theorists, in communist societies the cleavage between the people and the party is almost nonexistent since rank-and-file party members are recruited from all walks of life and not just from one specific social stratum. To speculate therefore about a hypothetical line that divides the rulers from the ruled, writes Zinoviev in his usual paradoxical tone, is like comparing how “a disemboweled and carved out animal, destined for gastronomic purposes, differs from its original biological whole.”

Admittedly, continues Zinoviev, per capita income is three to four times lower than in capitalist democracies, and as the daily drudgery and bleakness of communist life indicates, life under communism falls well short of the promised paradise. Yet, does this necessarily indicate that the overall quality in a communist society is inferior to that in Western countries? If one considers that an average worker in a communist system puts in three to four hours to his work (for which he usually never gets reprimanded, let alone fears losing his job), then his earnings make the equivalent of the earnings of a worker in a capitalist democracy. Stated in Marxist terminology, a worker in a communist system is not economically exploited but instead “takes the liberty” of allocating to himself the full surplus value of his labor which the state is unable to allocate to him. Hence this popular joke, so firmly entrenched in communist countries, which vividly explains the longevity of the communist way of life: “Nobody can pay me less than as little as I can work.”

Zinoviev dismisses the liberal reductionist perception of economics, which is based on the premise that the validity or efficiency of a country is best revieled by it high economic output or workers’ standard of living. In describing the economics of the Soviet Union, he observes that “the economy in the Soviet Union continues to thrive, regardless of the smart analyses and prognoses of the Western experts, and is in fact in the process of becoming stronger.” The endless liberal speculations about the future of communism, as well as the frequent evaluations about whether capitalist y resulted in patent failures. The more communism changes the more in fact it remains the same. Yet, despite its visible shortcomings, the communist ideal will likely continue to flourish precisely because it successfully projects the popular demand for security and predictability. By contrast, the fundamental weakness of liberal systems is that they have introduced the principles of security and predictability only theoretically and legally, but for reasons of economic efficiency, have so far been unable to put them into practice. For Claude Polin, a French author whose analyses of communist totalitarianism closely parallel Zinoviev’s views, the very economic inefficiency of communism paradoxically, “provides much more chances to [sic] success for a much larger number of individuals than a system founded on competition and reward of talents.” Communism, in short, liberates each individual from all social effort and responsibility, and its internal stasis only reinforces its awesome political stability.

TERROR AS THE METAPHOR
For Zinoviev, communist terror essentially operates according to the laws of dispersed communalism; that is, though the decentralization of power into the myriad of workers’ collectives. As the fundamental linchpins of communism, these collectives carry out not only coercive but also remunerative measures on behalf of and against their members. Upon joining a collective, each person becomes a transparent being who is closely scrutinized by his coworkers, yet at the same time enjoys absolute protection in cases of professional mistakes, absenteeism, shoddy work, and so forth. In such a system it is not only impossible but also counterproductive to contemplate a coup or a riot because the power of collectives is so pervasive that any attempted dissent is likely to hurt the dissenter more than his collective. Seen on the systemic level, Communist terror, therefore, does not emanate from one central source, but from a multitude of centers from the bottom to the top of society, whose foundations, in additions to myriad of collectives, are made up of “basic units,” brigades, or pioneer organizations. If perchance an individual or a group of people succeeds in destroying one center of power, new centers of power will automatically emerge. In this sense, the notion of “democratic centralism,” derided by many liberal observers as just another verbal gimmick of the communist meta-language, signifies a genuine example of egalitarian democracy -- a democracy in which power derives not from the party but from the people. Zinoviev notes:

Even if you wipe out half the population, the first thing that will be restored in the remaining half will be the system of power and administration. There, power is not organized to serve the population: the population is organized as a material required for the functioning of power.

Consequently, it does not appear likely that communism can ever be “improved,” at least not as Westerners understand improvement, because moral, political, and economic corruption of communism is literally spread throughout all pores of the society, and is in fact encouraged by the party elite on a day-to-day basis. The corruption among workers that takes the form of absenteeism, moonlighting, and low output goes hand in hand with corruption and licentiousness of party elite, so that the corruption of the one justifies and legitimatizes the corruption of the others. That communism is a system of collective irresponsibility is indeed not just an empty saying.

IN THE LAND OF THE “WOODEN LANGUAGE”
The corruption of language in communist societies is a phenomenon that until recently has not been sufficiently explored. According to an elaborate communist meta-language that Marxist dialecticians have skillfully developed over the last hundred years, dissidents and political opponents do not fall into the category of “martyrs,” or “freedom fighters” -- terms usually applied to them by Western well-wishers, yet terms are meaningless in the communist vernacular. Not only for the party elite, but for the overwhelming majority of people, dissidents are primarily traitors of democracy, occasionally branded as “fascist agents” or proverbial “CIA spies.” In any case, as Zinoviev indicates, the number of dissidents is constantly dwindling, while the number of their detractors is growing to astounding proportions. Moreover, the process of expatriation of dissidents is basically just one additional effort to dispose of undesirable elements, and thereby secure a total social consensus.

for the masses of citizens, long accustomed to a system circumventing al political “taboo themes,” the very utterance of the word dissident creates the feeling of insecurity and unpredictability. Consequently, before dissidents turn into targets of official ostracism and legal prosecution, most people, including their family members, will often go to great lengths to disavow them. Moreover, given the omnipotent and transparent character of collectives and distorted semantics, potential dissidents cannot have a lasting impact of society. After all, who wants to be associated with somebody who in the popular jargon is a nuisance to social peace and who threatens the already precarious socioeconomic situation of a system that has only recently emerged from the long darkness of terror? Of course, in order to appear democratic the communist media will often encourage spurious criticism of the domestic bureaucracy, economic shortages, or rampant mismanagement, but any serious attempt to question the tenets of economic determinism and the Marxist vulgate will quickly be met with repression. In a society premised on social and psychological transparency, only when things get out of hand, that is, when collectives are no longer capable of bringing a dissident to “his senses,” -- which at any rate is nowadays a relatively rare occurrence -- the police step in. Hence, the phenomenon of citizens’ self-surveillance, so typical of all communist societies, largely explains the stability of the system.

In conclusion, the complexity of the communist enigma remains awesome, despite some valid insights by sovietologists and other related scholars. In fact, one reason why the study of communist society is still embryonic may be ascribed to the constant proliferation of sovietologists, experts, and observers, who seldom shared a unanimous view of the communist phenomenon. Their true expertise, it appears, is not the analysis of the Soviet Union, but rather how to refute each other’s expertise on the Soviet Union. The merit of Zinoviev’s implacable logic is that the abundance of false diagnoses and prognoses of communism results in part from liberal’s own unwillingness to combat social entropy and egalitarian obsession on their own soil and within their own ranks. If liberal systems are truly interested in containing communism, they must first reexamine their own egalitarian premises and protocommunist appetites.

What causes communism? Why does communism still appear so attractive (albeit in constantly new derivatives) despite its obvious empirical bankruptcy? Why cannot purportedly democratic liberalism come to terms with its ideological opponents despite visible economic advantages? Probably on should first examine the dynamics of all egalitarian and economic beliefs and doctrines, including those of liberalism, before one starts criticizing the gulags and psychiatric hospitals.

Zinoviev rejects the notion that the Soviet of total political consolidation that can now freely permit all kinds of liberal experiments. After all, what threatens communism?

Regardless of what the future holds for communist societies, one must agree with Zinoviev that the much-vaunted affluence of the West is not necessarily a sign of Western stability. The constant reference to affluence as the sole criterion for judging political systems does not often seem persuasive. The received wisdom among (American) conservatives is that the United States must outgun or out spend the Soviet Union to convince the Soviets that capitalism is a superior system. Conservatives and others believe that with this show of affluence, Soviet leaders will gradually come to the conclusion that their systems is obsolete. Yet in the process of competition, liberal democracies may ignore other problems. If one settles for the platitude that the Soviet society is economically bankrupt, then one must also acknowledge that the United States is the world’s largest debtor and that another crash on Wall Street may well lead to the further appeal of various socialistic and pseudosocialist beliefs. Liberal society, despite its material advantages, constantly depends on its “self-evident” economic miracles. Such a society, particularly when it seeks peace at any price, may some day realize that there is also an impossibly high price to pay in order to preserve it.

[The World and I   (Washington Times Co.), June, 1989]

Mr. Sunic, a former US professor and a former Croat diplomat, holds a Ph.D. in political science. He is the author of several books. He currently resides in Europe.

http://doctorsunic.netfirms.com

Dit kapitalisme isgedoemd om te mislukken (Paul Jorion)

Dit kapitalisme is gedoemd om te mislukken - Paul Jorion

Ex: http://www.n-sa.be/

Volgens de Belgische antropoloog Paul Jorion bewijst de Europese schuldencrisis dat het kapitalisme op zijn laatste benen loopt. "Iedereen is de ander geld schuldig, iedereen is kwetsbaar. Daarom loopt het systeem vast.' 'In ons kapitalistische systeem zit een weeffout: alle rijkdom komt in handen van een relatief klein groepje mensen terecht. Dat groepje, dat steeds meer land, bedrijven en grondstoffen bezit, is erbij gebaat dat de anderen consumeren. In plaats van die anderen meer salaris te geven om die consumptie te betalen, lenen zij hen geld uit - tegen rente. Zo vergroten zij hun eigen rijkdom, terwijl de rest meer schulden opbouwt. Dat systeem explodeert nu."
Paul Jorion is een Belgische antropoloog die jaren in de Amerikaanse financiële sector heeft gewerkt. Volgens hem is de Europese schuldencrisis een teken dat het kapitalisme op zijn laatste benen loopt. In zijn jongste boek, Le Capitalisme à l'Agonie ('Doodsstrijd van het Kapitalisme'), - er zijn in Frankrijk sinds eind maart 6.000 exemplaren van verkocht - legt hij uit waarom Marx' voorspelling nu uitkomt. En waarom dat in zijn ogen onontkoombaar is.
In het boek, op zijn blog en in zijn columns voor de economiebijlage van Le Monde koppelt Jorion allerlei disciplines aan elkaar, waaronder filosofie, antropologie en economie. Niet alleen Marx - die volgens Jorion ook kardinale fouten maakte - komt aan bod, ook Schopenhauer, Robespierre, Locke en Hegel passeren de revue. Daarom, denkt hij, lezen ook politici en bankiers hem nu: vroeger vonden ze hem ietwat bizar, nu levert hij onorthodoxe inzichten in een crisis waarmee niemand raad weet.
Jorion (geboren in Brussel in 1946) woont tegenwoordig in Bretagne. Bij een glas Belgisch bier in een Parijse brasserie, naast het gebouw van de publieke radio waar hij een programma op de cultuurzender France Culture presenteert, legt hij uit waar het volgens hem is misgegaan. 'Ons kapitalistische systeem kent ruwweg vier actoren: geldschieters, producenten, handelaars en arbeiders. Zolang wij het communisme als vijand hadden, waren de financiële spelregels redelijk strikt, om te voorkomen dat alle rijkdom in handen kwam van de geldschieters. Als er sociale uitbuiting zou zijn, zouden de arbeiders kunnen 'overlopen' naar de vijand."
"Maar na de val van de Muur in 1989 was het communisme verslagen en was dat risico verdwenen. Onder Ronald Reagan en Margaret Thatcher waren de eerste restricties op financiële transacties die er sinds de crisis in de jaren 1930 waren, al opgeheven. In de jaren 1990 werden de overige beperkingen gesloopt of versoepeld. Daardoor is onze economie zwaar afhankelijk geworden van de financiële sector. De geldschieters, vooral de handelaren die met andermans geld gokten, zijn daar ongelooflijk veel rijker van geworden. In 2007 werd de helft van de winst in de Verenigde Staten uit de financiële sector gehaald. Dat is gigantisch."

Hebben we daar niet allemaal baat bij gehad?
"Neen. Het hart van ons financiële systeem is intussen weggesmolten en de maatschappij betaalt daar een enorme prijs voor. De kern van dit systeem was de laatste tijd de derivatenhandel, het opknippen en doorverkopen van schuld zonder dat er hoegenaamd risico aan kleeft. Die handel voedde bubbles. Nu de zeepbellen uiteengespat zijn, functioneert die derivatenhandel niet meer zoals vroeger. De handelaren hebben daarmee in korte tijd veel geld verdiend. Maar ze kunnen er niet mee doorgaan: de meeste Amerikanen en Europeanen hebben te veel schulden gemaakt. Die doen dus niet meer mee. Dus het systeem bestaat nog, maar daarbinnen gebeurt weinig meer. Als een schelp waaruit het visje verdwenen is. De business verplaatst zich daarom naar het Verre Oosten, China en India, waar veel geld wordt rondgepompt en het procedé zich pijlsnel herhaalt. Geldschieters lenen aan producenten, handelaren en consumenten. Zij verdienen daaraan: ze krijgen het geld met rente terug. De rest waant zich ook even rijk, door het overvloedige krediet waarmee ze alles kunnen kopen.
"Maar de handelaars maken echt sociale promotie. Vroeger waren zij intermediairs tussen geldschieters en consumenten, nu verdienen ze krankzinnig veel met gokken op beurskoersen en dergelijke. Zij belanden in het kamp van de geldschieters. Maar de meeste mensen blijven met schulden zitten. Iedereen is de ander geld schuldig, iedereen is kwetsbaar. Daarom draait het systeem zichzelf uiteindelijk vast."

Proberen handelaren en geldschieters er zoveel mogelijk uit te halen?
"Ja, dit is een soort oorlog. Financieel en sociaal. Vroeger bereikte je sociale en maatschappelijke omwentelingen met geweld. De ene klasse werd afgezet, de andere greep de macht en het bezit. De laatste decennia gebeurde in onze wereld exact hetzelfde. Maar geld heeft de plaats van geweld in onze maatschappij ingenomen. Vreemd genoeg gebeurde dat op de ruïnes van een maatschappij die werd verwoest door excessief geweld, na de Tweede Wereldoorlog. Weinigen zien de parallel, maar de strijd is natuurlijk dezelfde: je verovert de wereld, maar nu op een 'pacifistische' manier, met geld. De heersende klasse van nu is een andere dan die van dertig jaar geleden: de nieuwe aristocratie, dat zijn financiers die de wereld rond vliegen met hun jets, met merken pronken, in gated communities wonen."

Is de globalisering een kapitalistische samenzwering?
"Zover wil ik niet gaan. Warren Buffett heeft het door. Die zei eens: 'There is a class struggle, but the fact is, we are winning.' Maar de meeste mensen, of ze nu arbeiders of geldschieters zijn, handelen niet bewust met het oog op een hogere 'orde'. Ze hebben geen visie. Wel is het zo dat geld ruimte nodig heeft. Vroeger werd geld gestoken in grote projecten als het Suezkanaal of goudmijnen in Afrika, waarvoor overheden de middelen niet hadden. Zulke projecten zijn er nauwelijks meer. De ruimte is 'op'.
"Nu wordt geld gebruikt om bubbles te creëren. Zo verdien je er méér mee. Als de bubble er is, moet het geld naar een andere plek, waar nog geen is. Kijk naar de Amerikaanse huizenmarkt, waarin iedere idioot een hypotheek kon krijgen en de risico's werden uitgesmeerd. Op zeker moment is de boel verzadigd. Er groeit nu een bubble op de Amerikaanse pensioenmarkt. Nu de onroerendgoedmarkt is geklapt, vormen beleggingen voor veel Amerikanen de enige oudedagsvoorziening. Met allerlei techniekjes worden nu beurskoersen gemanipuleerd, door bijvoorbeeld duizend transacties per seconde te doen. Maar, je merkt, de rek is eruit. De beurs is met 1/3 gekrompen nu de derivatenhandel niet goed meer loopt. Financiers worden paniekerig. Je ziet het aan grote beursgenoteerde bedrijven in Frankrijk, die weer winst beginnen te maken. 98% van die winst gaat regelrecht naar de aandeelhouders en een paar topbestuurders - veel meer dan vroeger. Het personeel krijgt vrijwel niets. Investeringen in het bedrijf zijn ook minimaal."

Waarom gebeurt dat?
"Aandeelhouders en bestuurders grijpen wat ze grijpen kunnen. Binnenkort kan het niet meer. Ze vertrouwen het systeem niet meer."

Waarom lenen mensen geld? Dat doen ze toch liever niet?
"Omdat ze anders niet in hun onderhoud kunnen voorzien. Van hun salaris kunnen velen geen goede huisvesting betalen, laat staan levensmiddelen, tv's of smartphones die 'iedereen' moet hebben. 150 jaar geleden al werden debatten gevoerd over de vraag hoe hoog salarissen moesten zijn. Alleen voor de rauwe basisbehoeftes? Of ook om extra's te betalen? Wat het nu is geworden, is net te weinig salaris. Vandaar dat mensen moeten lenen. Je kunt zeggen: ze hebben geen smartphone nodig. Maar de dwang van de commercie is zo groot dat je in de maatschappij niet ver komt zonder zo'n ding."

Moet de staat ingrijpen?
"Ja. Maar de staat liberaliseert alleen maar. Ook in Europa, waar sociale zorg beter is dan in Amerika. Omdat regeringen van hun schuld af willen, bezuinigen ze op sociale en op openbare voorzieningen. In België is kort geleden een man tot zes maanden cel veroordeeld omdat hij eten stal uit de vuilnisbak van een supermarkt. Al zat het in de bak, het was nog altijd bezit van die supermarkt, oordeelde de rechter. In Californië zijn laatst duizenden gevangenen vrijgelaten, omdat het te duur was om ze vast te houden. In zo'n wereld leven wij."

Zei Marx niet: het kapitalisme deugt niet?
"Ja. Wie geld heeft, leent het uit. Stel, ik heb 100 en ik leen het u tegen 7%. Dan heb ik straks 107. Als ik u die weer leen, heb ik 114 of zelfs iets meer. Ten slotte heb ik alles en u niets. Je hoeft geen marxist te zijn om dat probleem te zien. Daar wordt al heel lang over nagedacht: hoe je het systeem zo vormgeeft dat die ingebouwde ongelijkheid niet alsmaar erger wordt. Logische oplossing: je compenseert de verliezers door wat meer salaris te betalen. Zo kunnen ze spullen en diensten consumeren van producenten, waarin de geldschieter geld gestoken heeft. Dan is de hele keten tevreden. Maar wat heeft men gedaan? In plaats van gewone mensen meer salaris te geven, ging men goedkoop consumentenkrediet verstrekken. Dat is het probleem in de kern. Hoe meer geld de financiers verdienen, hoe groter de schuldenberg van anderen. De schuldencrisis toont dat aan. Eerst zat schuld bij consumenten. Toen die niet meer konden afbetalen, kwam het bij de banken. Toen die omvielen, namen overheden de schuld over. Nu moeten die er vanaf, en wentelen ze het af op belastingbetalers. Er komt geen eind aan."

Werkt zelfregulering niet?
"Neen, want ethiek en bezit staan haaks op elkaar. Zij die veel hebben, zijn niet meer de baas over hun bezit. Hun bezit wordt de baas over hén, dicteert hun gedrag. Ze willen alsmaar meer en dat staat ethisch gedrag in de weg. Daarom is het kapitalisme, althans dit kapitalisme, gedoemd te mislukken. Economen hebben dat niet ingecalculeerd toen ze het systeem uitdachten."

Weten politici hoe erg het is?
(Op schampere toon) "O ja."

Hoe weet u dat?
"Omdat ze me dat vertellen. Ze bellen me."

Wie?
"Ik ben in het Elysée geweest. Bij adviseurs van de president. Ook met bankiers heb ik vaak contact. Laatst moest ik een lezing houden voor hen. Ik dacht: ze gaan me levend opvreten. Maar nee: applaus. Na afloop komt de eerste naar me toe en zegt: 'Meneer, niet tegen de anderen zeggen, maar ik ben het helemaal met u eens.' De volgende zegt hetzelfde. En dat zes, zeven keer. Die mensen weten exact hoe het zit. De banken spelen een sleutelrol in de crisis. Bankiers weten precies hoeveel rotzooi er in welke banken zit."

En de politici?
"Die begrijpen het, maar weten niet wat ze moeten doen. Ze wachten af, vingers gekruist."

Wat moeten ze doen?
"Ik weet niet goed wat ik ze moet vertellen,behalve dat ze straks waarschijnlijk regeringen van nationale eenheid zullen vormen. Niemand weet wat hierna komt. Marx had een alternatief, een utopie: het communisme. Dat ging ten onder. Voorlopig zitten we met een Europa dat op maat gesneden is voor het kapitalisme. De verdragen van Maastricht en Lissabon hebben daaraan meegeholpen. Alles gaat veranderen, maar niemand weet hoe. We staan op een keerpunt in de geschiedenis van de mensheid. Interessante tijden."

Overleeft de euro de schuldencrisis?
"Neen. Als Spanje valt, of Italië, kan het snel gaan. De euro kan niet functioneren als landen hun schulden niet afbetalen. Iedereen krijgt straks zijn eigen munt terug. Een compensatiecommissie moet uitzoeken wie wat moet betalen en aan wie. Misschien moet je zelfs denken aan het parallelle monetaire systeem dat Hjalmar Schacht, Hitlers minister van Economie, opzette om de Versailles-herstelbetalingen te voldoen die Duitsland niet kon betalen: met cheques."

Hoe kunt u er zo droogjes tegenaan kijken? Het gaat toch ook om uw continent, uw munt?
"Ja, maar ik word daar niet depressief van. Antropologen als ik bestuderen illusies, structuren die mensen niet zien omdat ze er zelf in zitten. Toen ik in de high finance werkte, speelde ik dezelfde rol. Wij werkten met computermodellen die berekenden hoeveel risico er aan financiële producten zat. Op een dag klopte er een getal niet op de spreadsheet. Ik haalde de leiding erbij: jongens, pas op! Maar alles wat ze deden, was dat getal door een ander getal vervangen. Ze dachten dat het aan het model lag. Dat er een echt risico kon zijn, kwam niet in die hoofden op."

Wat leert de crisis u?
"Dat niet alles rationeel te verklaren valt of in modellen te vangen. Dat de mens dat toch altijd probeert en dus steeds op zijn bek gaat. Toen ik na mijn studie onderzoek deed in een Franse vissersgemeenschap, bleken prijsontwikkelingen niet te verklaren als je domweg naar vraag en aanbod keek. Ik zei: 'Er is iets anders.' Haha, riep iedereen, 'Jorion begrijpt zelfs de wet van vraag en aanbod niet.' Later ontdekte ik het echte systeem dat de prijzen bepaalde: sociale status. De rechter die iets verkoopt, kan meer vragen voor hetzelfde product dan de schoenmaker en de schoenmaker meer dan de metselaar. Niks bijzonders. Iedereen weet dat instinctief, behalve economen. Maar economen hebben wel de hele catechismus van het kapitalisme geschreven. Daarom loopt alles nu spaak."

Bron: Paul Jorion(De Standaard, 16 juli 2011 / NRC Handelsblad, 18 juli 2011)

 

Julius Evola: Um pessimismo justificado?

Julius Evola: Um Pessimismo Justificado?

 

por Franco Rosados

Ex: http://legio-victrix.blogspot.com/

FR: Você acredita que existe uma relação entre a filosofia e a política? Pode influenciar uma filosofia em uma iniciativa de reconstrução política nacional ou européia?

JE: Eu não creio que uma filosofia entendida em sentido estreitamente teórico possa influenciar na política. Para influenciar, necessita que encarne-se em uma ideologia ou em uma concepção do mundo. O que ocorreu, por exemplo, com a Ilustração, com o materialismo dialético marxista e com algumas concepções filosóficas que foram incorporadas à concepção de mundo do nacional-socialismo alemão. Em geral, a época dos grandes sistemas filosóficos conluiu-se; hoje não existem mais que filosofias bastardas e medíocres. Em uma de minhas obras passadas, de meu período filosófico, eu coloquei na dedicatória estas palavras de Jules Lachelier: "A filosofia, moderna, é uma reflexão que acabou por reconhecer a mesma impotência e a necessidade de uma ação que parta do interior." O domínio próprio de uma ação deste tipo tem um caráter metafilosófico. Daí, a transição que observa-se em meus livros, que não falam de "filosofia", senão de "metafísica", de visão do mundo e doutrinas tradicionais.

FR: Você pensa que moral e ética são sinonímicas e que tenham que possuir um fundamento filosófico?

JE: É possível estabelecer uma distinção, se por "moral" entende-se especificamente o costume e por "ética" uma disciplina filosófica (a chamada "filosofia moral"). Em minha opinião, qualquer ética ou qualquer moral que queira ter um fundamento filosófico de caráter absoluto, é ilusória. Sem referência a algo transcendente, a moral não pode ter mais que um alcance relativo, contingente, "social", e não pode resistir a uma crítica do individualismo, do existencialismo ou do niilismo. Eu demonstrei em meu livro Cavalgar o Tigre, no capítulo entitulado No mundo em que Deus morreu. Neste capítulo também abordei a problemática apresentada por Nietzsche e pelo existencialismo.

FR: Você crê que a influência do Cristianismo foi positiva para a civilização européia? Não pensa que ao ter adotado uma religião de origem semítica tenha desnaturalizado alguns valores europeus tradicionais?

JE: Falando de Cristianismo, muitas vezes usei a expressão "a religião que prevaleceu no Ocidente". Em efeito o maior milagre do Cristianismo é ter conseguido afirmar-se entre os povos europeus, inclusive tendo em conta a decadência em que caíram numerosas tradições destes povos. Não obstante, não faz falta esquecer os casos nos quais a cristianização do Ocidente foi exclusivamente exterior. Ademais, se o Cristianismo alterou, sem dúvida alguma, alguns valores europeus, também há casos nos quais estes valores ressurgiram do Cristianismo, retificando-o e modificando-o. De outro modo o catolicismo seria inconcebível em seus diferentes aspectos "romanos"; do mesmo modo seria inconcebível uma parte da civilização medieval com fenômenos como a aparição das grandes ordens cavalheirescas, do tomismo, certa mística de alto nível, por exemplo Mestre Eckhart, o espírito das Cruzadas, etcétera.

FR: Você considera que o conflito entre güelfos e guibelinos no curso da história européia seja algo mais que um simples episódio político e constituía um conflito entre duas formas de espiritualidade? Crê possível um recrudescimento do "guibelinismo"?

JE: A idéia de que as origens da luta entre o Império e a Igreja não foi somente uma rivalidade política, senão que esta luta traduziu a antinomia de dois tipos de espiritualidade, constitui o tema central de meu livro O Mistério do Graal e a tradição guibelina do Império. Este livro foi publicado em alemão e editar-se-á de pronto também em francês. No fundo, o "guibelinismo" atribuiu à autoridade imperial um fundamento de caráter sobrenatural e transcendente, algo que somente a Igreja pretendia possuir, o próprio Dante defende em parte a mesma tese. Assim, alguns teólogos guibelinos puderam falar de "religião real" e, em particular, atribuir um caráter sagrado aos descendentes dos Hohenstaufen. Naturalmente, com o império cristalizou um tipo de espiritualidade que não pode ser identificado com a espiritualidade cristã. Porém se estes são os dados do conflito güelfo-guibelino, está claro, então, que uma ressurreição do "guibelinismo" em nossa época é muito problemático. Onde encontrar, em efeito, as "referências superiores" para opor-se à Igreja, se isso não ocorre em nome de um Estado laico, secularizado, "democrático", ou "social", desprovido da concepção da autoridade procedente de cima? Já o "los von Rom" e o "Kulturkampf" do tempo de Bismarck tiveram somente um caráter político, para não falar das aberrações e da ficção de certo neopaganismo.

FR: Em seu livro O Caminho do Cinabro, onde expõe a gênese de suas obras, admite que o principal defensor contemporâneo da concepção tradicional, René Guénon, exerceu certa influência sobre ela, ao ponto que definiram-te "o Guénon italiano". Existe uma correspondência perfeita entre seu pensamento e o de Guénon? E não crê, a propósito de Guénon, que certos entornos superestimam a filosofia oriental?

JE: Minha orientação não difere da de Guénon no que concerne ao valor atribuído ao Mundo da Tradição. Por Mundo da Tradição entende-se uma civilização orgânica e hierárquica na qual todas as atividades estão orientados pelo alto e para o alto e estão ligadas a valores que não são simplesmente valores humanos. Como Guénon, escrevi muitas obras sobre a sabedoria tradicional, estudando diretamente seus mananciais. A primeira parte de minha obra principal Revolta Contra o Mundo Moderno é precisamente uma "Morfologia do Mundo da Tradição". Também há correspondência entre Guénon e eu no que refere-se à crítica radical do mundo moderno. Sobre este ponto há não obstante divergências menores entre ele e eu. Dada sua "equação pessoal", na espiritualidade tradicional, Guénon assignou ao "conhecimento" e à "contemplação" a primazia sobre a "ação"; subordinou a majestade ao sacerdócio. Eu, ao contrário, esforcei-me em apresentar e valorizar a herança tradicional desde o ponto de vista de uma espiritualidade da "casta guerreira" e de ensinar as possibilidades igualmente oferecidas pela "via" da ação. Uma consequência destes pontos de vista diferentes é que, se Guénon assume como base para uma eventual reconstrução tradicional da Europa uma elite intelectual, eu, de minha parte, sou bastante propenso a falar de Ordem. Também divergem os juízos que Guénon e eu damos sobre o Catolicismo e a Maçonaria. Creio não obstante que a fórmula de Guénon não situa-se na linha do homem ocidental, que apesar de tudo, por sua natureza, está orientado especialmente para a ação.

Não pode-se falar aqui de "filosofia oriental", trata-se, em realidade, de uma modalidade de pensamento oriental que forma parte de um saber tradicional que, também no Oriente, manteve-se mais íntegro e mais puro que tomou o lugar da religião, porém que esteve difundido igualmente no Ocidente pré-moderno. Se estas modalidades de pensamento valorizam o que tem um conteúdo universal metafísico, não pode-se dizer que sejam superestimadas. Quando trata-se de concepção do mundo, faz falta guardar-se das simplificações superficiais. Oriente não compreende somente a Índia do Vedante, da doutrina do Maya, e da contemplação separada pelo mundo; também compreende à Índia que, com o Bhagavad Gita, deu uma justificativa sagrada para a guerra e para o dever do guerreiro; também inclui a concepção dualista e combativa da Pérsia antiga, a concepção imperial cosmocrática da antiga China, a civilização japonesa, tão distante por ser únicamente contemplativa e introvertida, onde uma fração esotérica do budismo deu nascimento à "filosofia" dos Samurais, etcétera.

Desgraçadamente, o que caracteriza o mundo europeu moderno não é a ação senão sua falsificação, quer dizer um ativismo sem fundamento, que limita-se ao domínio das realizações puramente materiais. "Está separada do céu com o pretexto de conquistar a terra", até não saber já o que é realmente a ação.

FR: Seu juízo sobre a ciência e sobre a técnica parece, em sua obra, negativo. Quais são as razões de sua posição? Não acredita que as conquistas materiais e a eliminação da fome e da miséria permitirão afrontar com mais energia os problemas espirituais?

JE: No que concerne o segundo tema que apresenta, dir-lhe-ei que, assim como existe um estado de embrutecimento devido à miséria, assim também existe um estado de embrutecimento devido ao bem-estar e à prosperidade. As "sociedades" do bem-estar, nas quais não pode-se falar de existência de fome e de miséria, estão longe de engendrar um aumento da verdadeira espiritualidade; mais bem, ali consta uma forma violenta e destrutiva de revolta das novas gerações contra o sistema em seu conjunto e contra uma existência desprovida de sentido, Estados Unidos-Inglaterra-Escandinávia. O problema consiste em fixar um limite justo, freando o frenesi de uma economia capitalista criadora de necessidades artificiais e liberando o indivíduo de sua crescente dependência da engrenagem social e produtiva. Faria falta estabelecer um equilíbrio. Até pouco tempo, o Japão deu o exemplo de um equilíbrio deste tipo; modernizou-se e não deixou-se distanciar do Ocidente nos domínios científicos e técnicos, inclusive salvaguardando suas tradições específicas. Porém hoje a situação é bem diferente.

Há um outro ponto fundamental a sublinhar: é difícil adotar a ciência e a técnica circunscrevendo-as dentro dos limites materiais e como instrumentos de uma civilização; ao revés, é praticamente inevitável que empapem-se da concepção do mundo sobre que baseia-se a moderna ciência profana, concepção praticamente inculcada em nossos espíritos pelos métodos de instrução habitual que tem, sobre o plano espiritual, um efeito destrutivo. O conceito mesmo do verdadeiro conhecimento vem assim a ser falseado totalmente.

FR: Você também falou de seu "racismo espiritual". Qual é o sentido exato dessa expressão?

JE: Em minha fase anterior, acredito necessário formular uma doutrina racial que teriam impedido que o racismo alemão e italiano concluíssem como uma forma de "materialismo biológico". Meu ponto de partida foi a concepção do homem como ser constituído de corpo, de alma e de espírito, com a primazia da parte espiritual sobre a parte corpórea. O problema da raça devia pois considerar cada um destes três elementos. Daí a possibilidade de falar de uma raça do espírito e da alma, ademais de uma raça biológica. A oportunidade desta formulação reside no fato de que uma raça pode degenerar, ainda permanecendo biologicamente pura, se a parte interior e espiritual morreu, minguou ou obscureceu,  se perdeu a própria força, como ocorre com alguns tipos nórdicos atuais. Ademais os cruzamentos, dos quais hoje poucas estirpes ficam fora podem ter como resultado que a um corpo de determinada raça estejam ligados em um indivíduo dado, o caráter e a orientação espiritual própria de outra raça, de onde deriva-se uma concepção mais complexa de mestiçagem. A "raça interior" manifesta-se pelo modo de ser, por um comportamento específico, pelo caráter, sem falar da maneira de conceber a realidade espiritual, os muitos tipos de religiões, de ética, de visões do mundo etcétera, podem expressar "raças interiores" bem ajustadas. Este ponto de vista permite superar muitas concepções unilaterais e ampliar o campo das investigações. Por exemplo, o judaísmo define-se acima de tudo nos termos de uma "raça" da alma, de uma conduta, única, observável em individuos que, desde o ponto de vista da raça do corpo, são muito diferentes. De outra parte, para dizer-se "ários", no sentido completo da palavra, não é necessário não possuir a mínima gota de sangue hebreu ou de uma raça de cor; faz falta acima de tudo examinar qual é a verdadeira "raça interior" ou seja o conjunto de qualidade que na origem corresponderam ao ideal do homem ariano. Tive ocasião de declarar que, hoje em dia, não deveria insistir-se demasiadamente no problema hebreu; em efeito, as qualidades que dominaram e dominam hoje em muitos tipos de judeus são, assim mesmo, evidentes em tipos "arianos", sem que nestes últimos possa-se invocar como atenuante a mínima circunstância hereditária.

FR: Na história da Europa, tem sido muitas as tentativas de formar um "Império Europeu": Carlos Magno, Frederico I e Frederico II, Carlos V, Napoleão, Hitler, porém ninguém logrou refazer, de maneira estável, o Império de Roma. Quais tem sido, segundo você, as causas destes fracassos? Pensa que hoje a reconstrução de um Império europeu seja possível? Se não, quais são as razões de seu pessimismo?

JE: Para responder, inclusive de maneira sumária, a esta pergunta, faria falta poder contar com um espaço maior que o de uma entrevista. Limitar-me-ei a dizer que os obstáculos principais, no caso do Sacro Império Romano, foi a oposição da Igreja, o início da revolta do Terceiro Estado, como no caso das Comunas italianas, o nacimento de Estados nacionais centralizados que não admitiam nenhuma autoridade superior e, por fim, a política, não imperial, senão imperialista da dinastia francesa. Eu não atribuiria, à  tentativa de Napoleão, um verdadeiro caráter imperial. Apesar de tudo, Napoleão foi o exportador das idéias da Revolução francesa, idéias que foram utilizadas contra a Europa dinástica e tradicional.

No que refere-se a Hitler, teria que fazer algumas reservar na medida em que sua concepção de Império baseou-se no mito do Povo, Volk = Povo-Raça, concepção que revestiu um aspecto de coletivização e exclusivismo nacionalista, etnocentrismo. Somente no último período do Terceiro Reich os pontos de vista estenderam-se, de uma parte graças à idéia de uma Ordem, defendida por alguns entornos da SS, de outra graças à unidade internacional das divisões européias de voluntários que combateram na frente oriental.

Pelo contrário, convém recordar o princípio de uma Ordem européia que existiu com a Santa Aliança, cuja decadência fiu imputável em grande parte à Inglaterra e também com o projeto chamado Drei Kaiserbund, nos tempos de Bismarck: a linha defensiva dos três imperadores que teria tido que englobar também à Itália, com a Tríplice Aliança e o Vaticano e opor-se às manobtas antieuropéias da Inglaterra e da própria América.

Um "Reich Europeu", não uma "Nação Européia", seria a única fórmula aceitável desde o ponto de vista tradicional para a realização de uma unificação autêntica e orgânica da Europa. Quanto à possibilidade de realizar a unidade européia desse modo, não posso não ser pessimista pelas mesmas razões que induziram-me a dizer que hoje, há pouco espaço para um renascimento do "guibelinismo": não há um ponto de referência superior, não existe um fundamento para dar solidez e legitimidade a um princípio de autoridade supranacional. Não pode-se em efeito descuidar deste ponto fundamental e conformar-se em recorrer à "solidariedade ativa" dos europeus contra as potências antieuropéias, passando por cima das divergências ideológicas. Inclusive quando chegara-se, com este método pragmático, a fazer da Europa uma unidade, sempre existiria o perigo de ver nascer, nesta Europa, novas contradições desagregadoras, em particular no que concerne às divergências ideológicas e e as causadas pela falta de um princípio de autoridade superior. Hoje é difícil falar de uma "cultura comum européia": a cultura moderna não conhece fronteiras; a Europa importa e exporta "bens culturais"; não somente no domínio da cultura, senão também no domínio do modo de vida, manifesta cada vez mais uma nivelação geral que, conjugada com a nivelação produzida pela ciência e pela técnica, providencia argumentos não aos que querem uma Europa unitária, senão aos que desejariam edificar um Estado mundial. Novamente, nos deparamos com o obstáculo constituído pela inexistência de uma verdadeira idéia superior diferenciadora, que deveria ser o núcleo do império europeu. Mais além de tudo isto, o clima geral é desfavorável: o estado espiritual de devoção, de heroísmo, de fidelidade, de honra na unidade, que deveria servir de cimento ao sistema orgânico de uma Ordem européia imperial é hoje, por assim dizer, inexistente. O primeiro a fazer deveria ser uma purificação sistemática dos espíritos, antidemocráta e antimarxista, nas nações européias. Sucessivamente, far-se-ia necessário poder sacudir as grandes massas de nossos povos com meios diferentes, seja recorrendo aos interesses materiais, seja com uma ação de caráter demagógico e fanático, que necessariamente, influiria na capa subpessoal e irracional do homem. Estes meios implicariam fatalmente certos riscos. Porém todos estes problemas são extremadamente difíceis de solucionar na prática; por outra parte, já tive ocasião de falar disso em um de meus livros, Homens Entre as Ruínas.

Démondialisation = survie des peuples européens

Démondialisation = Survie des Peuples Européens...

Par Marc Rousset (*)

Ex: http://synthesenationale.hautetfort.com/

Un mot nouveau, le plus souvent critiqué dans les médias, a fait son apparition : la démondialisation. Selon Pascal Lamy, socialiste carriériste à l’OMC  baignant dans le libre échangisme anglo-saxon, style Dominique Strauss-Kahn et Christine Lagarde,  la démondialisation est un concept réactionnaire (1). Les droits de douane nourriraient la xénophobie et le nationalisme, bref  la démondialisation ne serait rien d’autre que « l’horreur national-protectionniste ».

Quant à Patrick Artus, suite aux fonctions rémunérées qu’il exerce chez dans le Système, il n’est pas à une contradiction près ! Après avoir écrit « Globalisation, le pire est à  prévoir » (2), il pense désormais qu’il serait fou de « refuser la mondialisation » (3).

Frédéric  Lordon (4), lui, se demande, à juste titre, si la Chine dont le salaire mensuel moyen est de 150 euros, ne deviendra pas à son tour victime de délocalisation au Vietnam, au salaire moitié moindre de 75 euros !... à moins que la mondialisation ne connaisse un rebond en direction du continent africain « encore entièrement à enrôler et qui cassera tous les prix ». Il s’interroge aussi pour savoir (5) si les rapports entre les nations doivent se concevoir sous l’exclusive perspective de la marchandise et constate que les libéraux lessivent les entendements au point de faire oublier qu’entraver un peu la circulation des conteneurs et des capitaux n’interdit nullement de « promouvoir la plus grande circulation des œuvres, des étudiants, des artistes, des chercheurs, des touristes, comme si la circulation marchande était devenue la jauge exclusive du degré  d’ouverture des nations »

Avec la même approche que  le Prix Nobel Maurice Allais, je suis intervenu plusieurs fois dans tous mes ouvrages (6) et de multiples chroniques pour montrer que le libre échange mondialiste était en fait un véritable suicide économique de l’Occident orchestré par les sociétés multinationales. Ce  qui est bon pour les entreprises multinationales  est de plus en plus nuisible aujourd’hui pour les Etats-Unis (taux de chômage réel de 17,2%) et les salariés européens qui perdent leurs emplois industriels ! Un protectionnisme européen salvateur, afin de garder les économies d’échelle compétitives que ne peut offrir un espace national, s’imposera donc lors des révolutions nationales à venir ! L’Union Européenne n’est aujourd’hui qu’un agent de la décadence industrielle et de la mondialisation, « un sas de décompression » selon Régis Debray, au service des entreprises multinationales avec des conséquences gravissimes pour les peuples européens : désindustrialisation, précarisation, perte de « savoir faire » industriel, paupérisation, déqualification des emplois, développement des services à la personne sans aucun intérêt technologique, perte d’identité et immigration extra-européenne.

Au-delà du dogme libre échangiste mondialiste, il est possible de concevoir une économie mondiale avec plusieurs espaces autarciques autocentrés et des flux d’échanges maitrisés entre ces espaces. La démondialisation correspond au simple bon sens de nos pères et à la nécessité de défense urgente, de survie identitaire et économique des peuples européens !

(*) économiste, écrivain, auteur de « La Nouvelle Europe Paris-Berlin-Moscou »

Notes 

(1) Le Monde éditorial du 1^er Juillet 2011

(2) La Découverte, Paris 2008

(3) Patrick Artus, « Ce n’est pas le moment de refuser la mondialisation », Flash Economie Natixis, n°472-21 juin 2011

(4) Frédéric Lordon, Le Monde Diplomatique, août 2011, p. 8

(5) Ibid p 9

(6) La Nouvelle  Europe Paris-Berlin-Moscou - pp. 47-65, Godefroy de Bouillon, 2009

Towards a New World Order: Carl Schmitt's "The LandAppropriation of a New World"

 

Towards a New World Order: Carl Schmitt's "The Land Appropriation of a New World"

Gary Ulmen

Ex: http://freespeechproject.com/

 

The end of the Cold War and of the bipolar division of the world has posed again the question of a viable international law grounded in a new world order. This question was already urgent before WWI, given the decline of the ius publicum Europaeum at the end of the 19th century. It resurfaced again after WWII with the defeat of the Third Reich. If the 20th century is defined politically as the period beginning with the "Great War" in 1914 and ending with the collapse of the Soviet empire in 1989, it may be seen as a long interval during which the question of a new world order was suspended primarily because of the confrontation and resulting stalemate between Wilsonianism and Leninism. Far from defining that period, as claimed by the last defenders of Left ideology now reconstituted as "anti-fascism," and despite their devastating impact at the time, within such a context fascism and Nazism end up automatically redimensioned primarily as epiphenomenal reactions of no lasting historical significance. In retrospect, they appear more and more as violent geopolitical answers to Wilsonianism's (and, to a lesser extent, Leninism's) failure to establish a new world order.

Both the League of Nations and the United Nations have sought to reconstitute international law and the nomos of the earth, but neither succeeded. What has passed for international law throughout the 20th century has been largely a transitory semblance rather than a true system of universally accepted rules governing international behavior. The geopolitical paralysis resulting from the unresolved conflict between the two superpowers created a balance of terror that provided the functional equivalent of a stable world order. But this state of affairs merely postponed coming to terms with the consequences of the collapse of the ius publicum Europaeum and the need to constitute a new world order. What is most significant about the end of the Cold War is not so much that it brought about a premature closure of the 20th century or a return to the geopolitical predicament obtaining before WWI, but that it has signaled the end of the modern age--evident in the eclipse of the nation state, the search for new political forms, the explosion of new types of conflicts, and radical changes in the nature of war. Given this state of affairs, today it may be easier to develop a new world order than at any time since the end of the last century.

At the beginning of the 20th century, Ernest Nys wrote that the discovery of the New World was historically unprecedented since it not only added an immense area to what Europeans thought the world was but unified the whole globe.(n1) It also resulted in the European equilibrium of land and sea that made possible the ius publicum Europaeum and a viable world order. In his "Introduction" to The Nomos of the Earth, Carl Schmitt observes that another event of this kind, such as the discovery of some new inhabitable planet able to trigger the creation of a new world order, is highly unlikely, which is why thinking "must once again be directed to the elemental orders of concrete terrestrial existence."(n2) Despite all the spatial exploration and the popular obsession with extra-terrestrial life, today there is no event in sight comparable to the discovery of a New World. Moreover, the end of the Cold War has paved the way for the further expansion of capitalism, economic globalization, and massive advances in communication technologies. Yet the imagination of those most concerned with these developments has failed so far to find any new alternatives to the prevailing thinking of the past decades.

Beyond the Cold War

The two most prominent recent attempts to prefigure a new world order adequate to contemporary political realities have been made by Francis Fukuyama and Samuel P. Huntington.(n3) Fukuyama thinks the West has not only won the Cold War but also brought about the end of history, while Huntington retreats to a kind of "bunker mentality" in view of an alleged decline of the West.(n4) While the one suffers from excessive optimism and the other from excessive pessimism, both fail primarily because they do not deal with the "elemental orders of concrete terrestrial existence" and troth remain trapped in an updated version of Wilsonianism assuming liberal democracy to be the highest achievement of Western culture. While Fukuyama wants to universalize liberal democracy in the global marketplace, If Huntington identifies liberalism with Western civilization. But Huntington is somewhat more realistic than Fukuyama. He not only acknowledges the impossibility of universalizing liberalism but exposes its particularistic nature. Thus he opts for a defense of Western civilization within an international helium omnium contra omnes. In the process, however, he invents an "American national identity" and extrapolates from the decline of liberal democracy to the decline of the West.

Fukuyama's thesis is derived from Alexandre Kojeve's Heideggerian reading of Hegel and supports the dubious notion that the last stage in human history will be a universal and homogeneous state of affairs satisfying all human needs. This prospect is predicated on the arbitrary assumption of the primacy of thymos--the desire for recognition--which both Kojeve and Fukuyama regard as the most fundamental human longing. Ultimately, according to Fukuyama, "Kojeve's claim that we are at the end of history . . . stands or falls on the strength of the assertion that the recognition provided by the contemporary liberal democratic state adequately satisfies the human desire for recognition."(n5) Fukuyama's own claim thus stands or falls on his assumption that at the end of history "there are no serious ideological competitors to liberal democracy."(n6) This conclusion is based on a whole series of highly dubious ideological assumptions, such as that "the logic of modern natural science would seem to dictate a universal evolution in the direction of capitalism"(n7) and that the desire for recognition "is the missing link between liberal economics and liberal politics."(n8)

According to Fukuyama, the 20th century has turned everyone into "historical pessimists."(n9) To reverse this state of affairs, he challenges "the pessimistic view of international relations . . . that goes variously under the titles 'realism,' realpolitik, or 'power politics'."(n10) He is apparently unaware of the difference between a pessimistic view of human nature, on which political realism is based, and a pessimistic view of international relations, never held by political realists such as Niccolo Machiavelli or Hans Morgenthau--two thinkers Fukuyama "analyzes" in order to "understand the impact of spreading democracy on international politics." As a "prescriptive doctrine," he finds the realist perspective on international relations still relevant. As a "descriptive model," however, it leaves much to be desired because: "There was no 'objective' national interest that provided a common thread to the behavior of states in different times and places, but a plurality of national interests defined by the principle of legitimacy in play and the individuals who interpreted it." This betrays a misunderstanding of political realism or, more plausibly, a deliberate attempt to misrepresent it in order to appear original. Although he draws different and even antithetical conclusions, Fukuyama's claim is not inconsistent with political realism.(n11)

Following this ploy, Fukuyama reiterates his main argument that: "Peace will arise instead out of the specific nature of democratic legitimacy, and its ability to satisfy the human longings for recognition."(n12) He is apparently unaware of the distinction between legality and legitimacy, and of the tendency within liberal democracies for legality to become its own mode of legitimation.(n13) Even in countries in which legality remains determined independently by a democratic legislative body, there is no reason to believe it will be concerned primarily or at all with satisfying any "human longing for recognition"; rather, it will pursue whatever goals the predominant culture deems desirable. Consequently, it does not necessarily follow that, were democratic legitimacy to become universalized with the end of the Cold War, international conflict would also end and history along with it. Even Fukuyama admits that: "For the foreseeable future, the world will be divided between a post-historical part, and a part that is still stuck in history. Within the post-historical part, the chief axis of interaction between states would be economic, and the old rules of power politics would have decreasing relevance."(n14)

This is nothing more than the reconfiguration of a standard liberal argument in a new metaphysical guise: the old historical world determined by politics will be displaced by the new post-historical world determined by economics. Schmitt rejected this argument in the 1920s: according to liberals, the "concept of the state should be determined by political means, the concept of society (in essence nonpolitical) by economic means," but this distinction is prejudiced by the liberal aversion to politics understood as a domain of domination and corruption resulting in the privileging of economics understood as "reciprocity of production and consumption, therefore mutuality, equality, justice, and freedom, and finally, nothing less than the spiritual union of fellowship, brotherhood, and justice."(n15) In effect, Fukuyama is simply recycling traditional liberal efforts to eliminate the political(n16)--a maneuver essential for his thesis of the arrival of "the end of history" with the end of the Cold War. Accordingly: "The United States and other liberal democracies will have to come to grips with the fact that, with the collapse of the communist world, the world in which they live is less and less the old one of geopolitics, and that the rules and methods of the historical world are not appropriate to life in the post-historical one. For the latter, the major issues will be economic."(n17) Responding to Walter Rathenau's claim in the 1920s that the destiny then was not politics but economics, Schmitt said "what has occurred is that economics has become political and thereby the destiny."(n18)

For Fukuyama, the old historical world is none other than the European world: "Imperialism and war were historically the product of aristocratic societies. If liberal democracy abolished the class distinction between masters and slaves by making the slaves their own masters, then it too should eventually abolish imperialism."(n19) This inference is based on a faulty analogy between social and international relations. Not surprisingly, Fukuyama really believes that "international law is merely domestic law writ large."(n20) Compounded with an uncritical belief in the theory of progress and teleological history, this leads him to generalize his own and Kojeve's questionable interpretation of the master-slave dialectic (understood as the logic of all social relations) to include international relations: "If the advent of the universal and homogeneous state means the establishment of rational recognition on the level of individuals living within one society, and the abolition of the relationship of lordship and bondage between them, then the spread of that type of state throughout the international system of states should imply the end of relationships of lordship and bondage between nations as well--i.e., the end of imperialism, and with it, a decrease in the likelihood of wars based on imperialism."(n21) Even if a "universal and homogeneous state" were possible today, in an age when all nation-states are becoming ethnically, racially, linguistically and culturally heterogeneous, it is unclear why domestic and international relations should be isomorphic. Rather, the opposite may very well be the case: increasing domestic heterogeneity is matched by an increasingly heterogeneous international scene where "the other" is not regarded as an equal but as "a paper tiger," "the Great Satan," "religious fanatics," etc.

At any rate, imperialism for Fukuyama is not a particular historical phenomenon which came about because of the discovery of the New World at the beginning of the age of exploration by the European powers. Rather, it is seen as the result of some metaphysical ahistorical "struggle for recognition among states."(n22) It "arises directly out of the aristocratic master's desire to be recognized as superior--his megalothymia."(n23) Ergo: "The persistence of imperialism and war after the great bourgeois revolutions of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries is therefore due not only to the survival of an atavistic warrior ethos, but also to the fact that the master's megalothymia was incompletely sublimated into economic activity."(n24) Thus the formal market relation between buyer and seller, both reduced to the level of the hyper-rational and calculating homo oeconomicus, comes to displace the master-slave dialectic whereby, miraculously, the interaction between these economic abstractions generates as much recognition as anyone would want, rendering conflict obsolete and putting an end to history.

In terms of Fukuyama's own formulation, the real end of history, as he understands it, is not even close. In his scenario, since there are still a lot of unresolved conflicts between the historical and the post-historical worlds, there will be a whole series of "world order" problems and "many post-historical countries will formulate an abstract interest in preventing the spread of certain technologies to the historical world, on the grounds that world will be most prone to conflict and violence."(n25) Although the failure of the League of Nations and the UN has led to the general discrediting of "Kantian internationalism and international law," in the final analysis, despite his Heideggerian Hegelianism, Fukuyama does not find the answer to the end of history in Hegel, Nietzsche or even Kojeve,(n26) but rather in Kant, who argued that the gains realized when man moved from the state of nature to civilization were largely nullified by wars between nations. According to Fukuyama, what has not been understood is that "the actual incarnations of the Kantian idea have been seriously flawed from the start by not following Kant's own precepts," by which he means that states based on republican principles are less likely than despotisms to accept the costs of war and that an international federation is only viable if it is based on liberal principles.

Although Huntington has a much better grasp of international relations than Fukuyama, his decline of the West scenario is equally unconvincing. The central theme of his book is that "culture and cultural identities, which at the broadest level are civilization identities, are shaping the patterns of cohesion, disintegration, and conflict in the post-Cold War world."(n27) But whereas Fukuyama couches his thesis in terms of a universal desire for recognition, Huntington couches his thesis in terms of a global search for identity: "Peoples and nations are attempting to answer the most basic question humans can face: Who are we?"(n28) The result is a "multipolar and multi-civilizational" world within which the West should abandon its presumed universalism and defend its own particular identity: "In the clash of civilizations, Europe and America will hang together or hang separately. In the greater clash, the global 'real clash,' between Civilization and barbarism, the worlds great civilizations . . . will also hang together or hang separately. In the emerging era, clashes of civilizations are the greatest threat to world peace, and an international order based on civilizations is the surest safeguard against world war."(n29)

In Huntington's new world, "societies sharing civilizational affinities cooperate with each other."(n30) Leaving aside his cavalier blurring of the differences between cultures, civilizations and societies, what does Huntington regard as the essence of Western particularism? Here he is ambiguous: he first mentions Christianity, then some secular residues of Christianity, but when he adds up the civilizational core of the West it turns out to be none other than liberalism. As Stephen Holmes points out, it is "the same old ideology, plucked inexplicably from the waste-bin of history that once united the West against Soviet Communism."(n31) But Huntington also claims that the West had a distinct identity long before it was modern (since he insists that modernization is distinct from Westernization, so that non-Western societies can modernize without Westernizing, thus retaining their civilizational distinctiveness). In this case, however, the West cannot really be identified with liberalism, nor can its heritage be equated sic et nunc with "American national identity." While liberalism may very well be declining, this need not translate into a decline of the West as such. Similarly, if "American national identity" is threatened by "multiculturalism,"(n32) it need not signal the arrival of barbarians at the gates but may only mark another stage in the statist involution of liberalism. Huntington's fears of a decline of the West at a time when it is actually at the acme of its power and vigor is the result of the unwarranted identification of Western civilization with liberalism and what he understands by "American national identity." Today liberalism has degenerated into an opportunistic statist program of "a small but influential number of intellectuals and publicists," and "American national identity" into a fiction invented as part of a failed project after the War between the States to reconfigure the American federation into a nation-state.(n33)

According to Huntington? the assumption of the universality of Western culture is: false, because others civilizations have other ideals and norms; immoral, because "imperialism is the logical result of universalism"; and dangerous, because it could lead to major civilizational wars.(n34) His equation of universalism and imperialism, however, misses the point of both it misunderstands the philosophical foundations of Western culture and the historical roots of Western imperialism. Other civilizations do have their own ideals and norms, but only Western civilization has an outlook broad enough to embrace all other cultures, which explains why it can readily sponsor and accommodate even confused and counterproductive projects such as "multiculturalism." Of course, Europeans set forth on their journeys of discovery and conquest not only in order to bring Christianity and "civilization" to the world but also to plunder whatever riches they could find. But whatever the reasons, Europeans were the ones who opened the world to global consciousness and what Schmitt called "awakened occidental rationalism."

Until recently, largely because of American cultural hegemony and technological supremacy, the goal of the rest of the world has been "Westernization," which has come to be regarded as synonymous with modernization. In Huntington's "realist" view, however: "A universal civilization requires universal power. Roman power created a near universal civilization within the limited confines of the Classical world. Western power in the form of European colonialism in the nineteenth century and American hegemony in the twentieth century extended Western culture throughout much of the contemporary world. European colonialism is over; American hegemony is receding."(n35) The real question is whether continued American world hegemony is primarily a function of the persistence of colonialism. Despite his emphasis on culture and civilization, Huntington does not appreciate the importance of cultural hegemony.? Had he not restricted the Western tradition to late 20th century liberalism, he may have appreciated the extent to which the rest of the world is becoming increasingly more, rather than less dependent on the US--in communication technologies, financial matters and even aesthetic forms. Today the Internet is potentially a more formidable agency of cultural domination and control than was the British Navy at the peak of the Empire. Here McNeill is right: Huntington's gloomy perception of the decline of the West may merely mistake growing pains for death throes.

If Huntington's salon Spenglerianism were not bad enough, he also adopts a kind of simplistic Schmittianism (without ever mentioning Schmitt). Complementing his "birds of a feather flock together" concept of civilizations --with "core states" assuming a dominant position in relation to "fault line" states--he pictures an "us versus them" type of friend/enemy relations based on ethnic and religious identities. But Schmitt's friend/enemy antithesis is concerned with relations between political groups: first and foremost, states. Accordingly, any organized group that can distinguish between friends and enemies in an existential sense becomes thereby political. Unlike Huntington (or Kojeve, who also explicitly drew geopolitical lines primarily along religious lines(n36), Schmitt did not think in terms of ethnic or religious categories but rather territorial and geopolitical concepts. For Schmitt, the state was the greatest achievement of Western civilization because, as the main agency of secularization, it ended the religious civil wars of the Middle Ages by limiting war to a conflict between states.(n37) In view of the decline of the state, Schmitt analyzed political realities and provided a prognosis of possible future territorial aggregations and new types of political forms.

Huntington finds the "realist" school of international affairs "a highly useful starting point," but then proceeds to criticize a straw man version of it, according to which "all states perceive their interests in the same way and act in the same way." Against it, not only power but also "values, culture, and institutions pervasively influence how states define their interests.... In the post-Cold War world, states increasingly define their interests in civilizational terms."(n38) Had Huntington paid more careful attention to hans Morgenthau, George Kennan or other reputable political realists, he would have concluded that their concept of power is not as limited as his caricature of it. In particular, had he read Schmitt more closely he would not have claimed that nation-states "are and will remain the most important actors in world affairs"(n39)--at a time when economic globalization has severely eroded their former sovereignty and they are practically everywhere threatened with internal disintegration and new geopolitical organizations. At any rate, political realism has been concerned primarily with the behavior of states because they were the main subjects of political life for the past three centuries.(n40) If and when they are displaced by other political forms, political realism then shifts its focus accordingly.

Huntington attempts to think beyond the Cold War. But since he cannot think beyond the nation-state, he cannot conceive of new political forms. When he writes that cultural commonality "legitimates the leadership and order-imposing role of the core state for both member states and for the external powers and institutions,"(n41) he seems to have in mind something akin to the concept of GroBraum.(n42) But Schmitt's model was the American Monroe Doctrine excluding European meddling in the Western Hemisphere. At that time (and well into the 20th century), the US was not a nation-state in the European sense, although it assumed some of these trappings thereafter. Thus it generally followed George Washington's policy--because of the "detached and distant situation" of the US, it should avoid entangling alliances with foreign (primarily European) powers. The Monroe Doctrine simply expanded on the reality and advantages of this situation. Schmitt rightly saw the global line of the Western Hemisphere drawn by the Monroe Doctrine as the first major challenge to the international law of the ius publicum Europaeum.

Given the current understanding of national sovereignty, it is difficult to see what Huntington means by "core state." Despite the title of his book, he has no concept of international law or of world order. Not only does he abandon hope for global regulations governing the behavior of states and civilizations, but he reverts to a kind of anthropological primitivism: "Civilizations are the ultimate human tribes, and the clash of civilizations is tribal conflict on a global scale."(n43) All he can suggest for avoiding major inter-civilizational wars is the "abstention rule" (core states abstain from conflicts in other civilizations), and the "mediation rule" (core states negotiate with each other to halt fault line wars).(n44) Huntington's vision is thus surprisingly conformist--it merely cautions the US from becoming embroiled in the Realpolitik of countries belonging to other civilizational blocs while defending a contrived liberal notion of"Western" civilization.

Anti-Colonialism and Appropriation
The anti-colonialism of both Fukuyama and Huntington is consistent with the predominant 20th century ideology directed primarily against Europe. Anti-colonialism is more historically significant than either anti-fascism and anti-communism. As Schmitt pointed out in 1962: "Both in theory and practice, anti-colonialism has an ideological objective. Above all, it is propaganda--more specifically, anti-European propaganda. Most of the history of propaganda consists of propaganda campaigns which, unfortunately, began as internal European squabbles. First there was France's and England's anti-Spanish propaganda--the leyenda negra of the 15th and 16th centuries. Then this propaganda became generalized during the 18th century. Finally, in the historical view of Arnold Toynbee, a UN consultant, the whole of Europe is indicted as a world aggressor."(n45) Thus it is not surprising that the 500th anniversary of the "discovery" of America was greeted with more condemnation than celebration.(n46)

Anti-colonialism is primarily anti-European propaganda because it unduly castigates the European powers for having sponsored colonialism.(n47) Given that there was no international law forbidding the appropriation of the newly discovered lands--in fact, European international and ecclesiastical law made it legal and established rules for doing so--the moral and legal basis for this judgment is unclear. On closer analysis, however, it turns out to be none other than the West's own universalistic pretenses. Only by ontologizing their particular Western humanist morality--various versions of secularized Christianity--as universally valid for all times and all places can Western intellectuals indict colonialism after the fact as an international "crime." Worse yet, this indictment eventually turns into a wholesale condemnation of Western culture (branded as "Eurocentrism") from an abstract, deterritorialized and deracinated humanist perspective hypostatized to the level of a universally binding absolute morality. Thus the original impulse to vindicate the particularity and otherness of the victims of colonialism turns full circle by subsuming all within a foreign Western frame-work, thereby obliterating the otherness of the original victims. The ideology of anti-colonialism is thus not only anti-European propaganda but an invention of Europeans themselves, although it has been appropriated wholesale and politically customized by the rest of the world.

As for world order, this propaganda has even more fundamental roots: "The odium of colonialism, which today confronts all Europeans, is the odium of appropriation,"(n48) since now everything understood as nomos is allegedly concerned only with distribution and production, even though appropriation remains one of its fundamental, if not the most fundamental, attributes. As Schmitt notes: "World history is a history of progress in the means and methods of appropriation: from land appropriations of nomadic and agricultural-feudal times, to sea appropriations of the 16th and 17th centuries, to the industrial appropriations of the industrial-technical age and its distinction between developed and undeveloped areas, to the present day appropriations of air and space."(n49) More to the point, however, is that "until now, things have somehow been appropriated, distributed and produced. Prior to every legal, economic and social order, prior to every legal, economic or social theory, there is the simple question: Where and how was it appropriated? Where and how was it divided? Where and how was it produced ? But the sequence of these processes is the major problem. It has often changed in accordance with how appropriation, distribution and production are emphasized and evaluated practically and morally in human consciousness. The sequence and evaluation follow changes in historical situations and general world history, methods of production and manufacture--even the image human beings have of themselves, of their world and of their historical situation."(n50) Thus the odium of appropriation exemplified by the rise of anti-colonialism is symptomatic of a changed world situation and changed attitudes. But this state of affairs should not prevent our understanding of what occurred in the past or what is occurring in the present.

In order to dispel the "fog of this anti-European ideology," Schmitt recalls that "everything that can be called international law has for centuries been European international law. . . [and that] all the classical concepts of existing international law are those of European international law, the ius publicum Europaeum. In particular, these are the concepts of war and peace. as well as two fundamental conceptual distinctions: first, the distinction between war and peace, i.e., the exclusion of an in-between situation of neither war nor peace so characteristic of the Cold War; and second, the conceptual distinction between enemy and criminal, i.e. exclusion of the discrimination and criminalization of the opponent so characteristic of revolutionary war--a war closely tied to the Cold War."(n51) But Schmitt was more concerned with the "spatial" aspect of the phenomenon: "What remains of the classical ideas of international law has its roots in a purely Eurocentric spatial order. Anti-colonialism is a phenomenon related to its destruction.... Aside from ... the criminalization of European nations, it has not generated one single idea about a new order. Still rooted, if only negatively, in a spatial idea, it cannot positively propose even the beginning of a new spatial order."(n52)

Having discovered the world as a globe, Europeans also developed the Law of Nations. Hugo Grotius is usually credited with establishing this new discipline with his De lure belli ac pacts (Paris: 1625), since he was the first to deal with the subject as a whole (although various European scholars had dealt at length with themes such as the justice of war, the right of plunder, the treatment of captives, etc.). Nys writes: ". . . from the I 1th to the 1 2th century the genius of Europe developed an association of republics, principalities and kingdoms, which was the beginning of the society of nations. Undoubtedly, some elements of it had been borrowed from Greek and Roman antiquity, from Byzantine institutions, from the Arabo-Berber sultanates on the coast of Africa and from the Moorish kingdoms of Spain. But at the time new sentiments developed, longing for political liberty. The members of this association were united by religious bonds; they had the same faith; they were not widely separated by speech and, at any rate, they had access to Latin, the language of the Church; they admitted a certain equality or at least none of them claimed the right to dominate and rule over the others. A formula came into use to describe this state of affairs: respublica a Christiana, res Christina."(n53)

Steeped in Roman law, 1 3th and 1 4th century jurists opposed any "Law of Nations" recognizing political distinctions between different peoples. In the Roman system, different peoples were only "parts of the Roman Empire." Thus, in a wider sense, ius gentium extended to all civilized peoples and included both public and private law. In a narrower sense, however, it also dealt with the rules governing relations between Romans and foreigners. Understood in this narrower sense, ius gentium promoted the constitution of distinct peoples and consequently kingdoms, intercourse and conflicts between different political communities, and ultimately wars. For this reason, those who still believed in the viability of the Holy Roman Empire thought that this interpretation of ius gentium led to disintegration. This is why the Law of Nations--European public law and international law--did not become a distinct "science" until the Middle Ages.

Spanish theologians first articulated the theoretical and practical problems of ius gentium understood as the Law of Nations. Chief among them was Francisco de Vitoria, whose Relectiones theologicae on the Indians and the right of a "just war" have become classics.(n54) In his lectures, Vitoria invokes the Law of Nations--the ius gentium. At the beginning of the third section of his account of the Spaniards' relations with the aborigines in the New World, he treats them as one people among others, and therefore subject to ius gentium: "The Spaniards have a right to travel into the lands in question and to sojourn there, provided they do no harm to the natives, and the natives may not prevent them. Proof of this may in the first place be derived from the law of nations (ius gentium), which either is natural law or is derived from natural law."(n55) That he understands peoples in the sense of "nations" becomes even more clear when he speaks about gentes nationes. He distinguishes between the political community--the respublica--and the private individual. The latter may defend his person and his property, but he may not avenge wrongs or retake goods after the passage of time. This is the respublica's prerogative--it alone has authority to defend itself and its members. Here Vitoria identifies the prince's authority with that of the state: "The prince is the issue of the election made by the respublica.... The state, properly so called, is a perfect community, that is to say, a community which forms a whole in itself, which, in other words, is not a part of another community, but which possesses its own laws, its own council, its own magistrates."(n56)

Clearly, what developed in Europe from antiquity to the respublica Christiana, from the origin of the sovereign state and ius publicum Europaeum to the Enlightenment and beyond, was as unique and significant as the discovery of the "New World." Yet, given today's predominant ideology, European culture has almost become the truth that dare not speak its name. Not only is Columbus demonized, but the whole Age of Discovery and all of European (Western) culture is dismissed as "imperialistic," "racist?" "sexist," etc. The Nomos of the Earth is a much needed antidote to this anti-European propaganda, which is only a symptom of the crisis of European identity and consciousness.(n57) All the major themes of Schmitt's book are either implicit or explicit in "The Land Appropriation of a New World": the origin and significance of the European and Eurocentric epoch of world history; the discovery of the New World and the American challenge to the European order; the search for a new nomos of the earth; the critique of the discriminatory concept of war; the critique of universalism and the danger of total relativism.

The Conquest of America and the Concept of a "Just War"

In the 20th century, the ideology of anti-colonialism was articulated most prominently by Woodrow Wilson and Vladimir Lenin, signaling the end of European domination in world history. Now, after the collapse of the Soviet Union and the end of communism, some American intellectuals have turned this anti-European propaganda against the US, seemingly unaware that their critique is possible only within the orbit of the European culture they otherwise castigate and dismiss. To attack European culture is tantamount to attacking American culture as well, since the latter is but a special case of the former, which is precisely why it has been able to accept and absorb peoples and influences not only from the Western hemisphere but from all over the world. American universalism is but an extension of that same Christian universalism which for centuries has defined European identity. As Schmitt emphasized, the European equilibrium of the ius publicum Europaeum presupposed a seemingly homogeneous Christian Europe, which lasted well into the 19th century. The American project has always been a fundamentally heterogeneous undertaking and Americans have always come from the most diverse ethnic, racial, religious and linguistic backgrounds. But if there had not been some homogeneous culture to unity this diversity, there would have been no distinct American culture which, unfortunately, today many educated Europeans and Americans no longer understand and therefore have come to despise.

A paradigmatic example of this general anti-European syndrome is Tzvetan Todorov's The Conquest of America. In an effort to vindicate the particularity of "the other," the author ends up castigating West European culture as a whole by deploying a secularized version of Christian universalism. Openly acknowledging the moralistic objectives and "mythological" character of his account,(n58) Todorov develops a "politically correct" postmodern interpretation of the Spanish conquista not to understand its historical significance but to show how it has shaped today's Western imperialist identity--one allegedly still unable to come to terms with "the other" and therefore inherently racist, ethnocentric, etc. The book closes with a discussion of "Las Casas' Prophesy" concerning the wrath that "God will vent" not only upon Spain but all of Western Europe because of its "impious, criminal and ignominious deeds perpetrated so unjustly, tyrannically and barbarously."(n59)

Todorov overlooks not only the generally religious framework of Las Casas' prophesy, but also the idiosyncratically Western concept of justice the Dominican bishop deployed. Having ontologized a humanism derived from the Western axiological patrimony, he does not realize the extent to which his postmodernism has already reduced "the other" to "the same," precisely in his effort to vindicate its particularity.(n60) Worse yet, inhibited by his "politically correct" moralism, he not only provides a ridiculous, if academically fashionable, explanation for the Spaniards' success,(n61) but he manages to subvert his own arguments with the very evidence he adduces to support them. He claims that the "present" is more important to him than the past, but in defining genocide he makes no reference whatsoever to either the Armenians or the Holocaust as reference points. Consequently, his claim that "the sixteenth century perpetuated the greatest genocide in human history"(n62) remains not only unsubstantiated but falsified. By his own account, most of the victims died of diseases and other indirect causes: "The Spaniards did not undertake a direct extermination of these millions of Indians, nor could they have done so." The main causes were three, and "the Spaniards responsibility is inversely proportional to the number of victims deriving from each of them: 1. By direct murder, during wars or outside them: a high number, nonetheless relatively small; direct responsibility. 2. By consequence of bad treatment: a high number; a (barely) less direct responsibility. 3. By diseases, by `microbe shock': the majority of the population; an indirect and diffused responsibility."(n63)

Todorov does acknowledge that Columbus was motivated by the "universal victory of Christianity" and that it was Columbus' medieval mentality that led him "to discover America and inaugurate the modern era."(n64) His greatest infraction, however, was that he conquered land rather than people, i.e., he was more interested in nature than in the Indians, which he is treated as "the other", "Columbus summary perception of the Indians [is] a mixture of authoritarianism and condescension . . . In Columus' hermeneutics human beings have no particular place."(n65) Had Todorov set aside his abstract moralizing, he may have realized that the conquest of the New World was primarily a land appropriation. It is not surprising, therefore, that the conquerors thought they were bringing "civilization" to those they conquered--something probably also true of the Mongols who invaded and colonized China, Russia and a few other which, by contrast, had higher than thier own.

The ideological slant of The Conquest of America is by no means unusual. Long before, Schmitt noted that non-European peoples who have undertaken conquest, land appropriations, etc. were not being tarred with the same brush as Europeans.(n66) Unlike Todorov's moralistic tirade, The Nomos of the Earth is dressed to historians and jurists. In no ways does Schmitt excuse the atrocities committed by the Spanish, but rather explains how they were possible in the given circumstances. "The Land Appropriation of a New World" begins with a discussion of the lines drawn by the European powers to divide the world. In this connection, Schmitt discusses the meaning of "beyond the line," which meant beyondn the reach of European law: " At this`line' Europe ended and `New World' began. At any rate, European law -- `European public law' -- ended. Consequently, so did the bracketing of war achieved by the former European international law, meaning the struggle for land appropriations knew no bounds. Beyond the line was an `overseas' zone in which, for want of any legal limits to war, only, the law of the stronger applied."n(67) For Todorov, it is a much simpler explanation: "Far from central government, far from royal law, all prohibitions give way, the social link, already loosened, snaps, revealing not a primitive nature, the beast sleeping in each of us, but a modern being? one with a great future in fact, restrained by no morality and inflicting death because and when he pleases."(n68) The Spaniards are simply racist, ethno-centric, ruthless exploiters, etc., i.e., modern -- they already exhibited traits Todorov claims are characteristic of Western identity.

Of particular interest here are Todorov's comments on Vitoria and the concept of a "just war," since most of Schmitt's chapter is devoted to these subjects. By his own admission, Todorov mixes (in fact, confuses) medieval and modern categories. This is particularly true in the case of Vitoria. Todorov observes that: "Vitoria demolishes the contemporary justifications of the wars waged in America, but nonetheless conceives that `just wars' are possible."(n69) More to the point: "We are accustomed to seeing Vitoria as a defender of the Indians; but if we question, not the subject's intentions, hut the impact of his discourses, it is clear that . . . under the cover of an international law based on reciprocity, he in reality supplies a legal basis to the wars of colonization which had hitherto had none (none which, in any case, might withstand serious consideration)."(n70) But there was no "international law based on reciprocity." Here Todorov is simply transposing modern categories to medieval matters for his own ideological purposes.

Unlike Todorov, Schmitt places the problem in perspective: "For 400 years, from the 16th to the 20th century, the structure of European international law was determined by a fundamental course of events the conquest of the New World. Then, as later, there were numerous positions taken with respect to the justice or injustice of the conquista. Nevertheless, the fundamental problem the justification of European land appropriations as a whole -- was seldom addressed in any systematic way outside moral and legal questions. In fact, only one monograph deals with this problem systematically and confronts it squarely in terms of international law.... It is the famous relectiones of Francisco de Vitoria."(n71) Vitoria rejected the contrary opinions of other theologians and treated Christians and non-Christians alike. He did not even accept discovery, which was the recognized basis of legal title from the 1 6th to the 1 8th century, as legitimate. More to the point, he considered global lines beyond which the distinction between justice and injustice was suspended not only a sin but an appalling crime. However: "Vitoria's view of the conquista was ultimately altogether positive. Most significant for him was the fait accompli of Christianization. . . . The positive conclusion is reached only by means of general concepts and with the aid of objective arguments in support of a just war.... If barbarians opposed the right of free passage and free missions, of liberum commercium and free propaganda, then they would violate the existing rights of the Spanish according to ius gentium; if the peaceful treaties of the Spanish were of no avail, then they had grounds for a just war."(n72)

The papal missionary mandate was the legal foundation of the conquista. This was not only the pope's position but also that of the Catholic rulers of Spain. Vitoria's arguments were entirely consistent with the spatial order and the international law of the respublica Christiana. One cannot apply modern categories to a medieval context without distorting both: "In the Middle Ages, a just war could he a just war of aggression. Clearly, the formal structure of the two concepts of justice are completely different. As far as the substance of medieval justice is concerned, however, it should be remembered that Vitoria's doctrine of a just war is argued on the basis of a missionary mandate issued by a potestas spiritualis that was not only institutionally stable but intellectually self-evident. The right of liberum commercium as well as the ius peregrinandi are to facilitate the work of Christian missions and the execution of the papal missionary mandate.... Here we are interested only in the justification of land appropriation--a question Vitoria reduced to the general problem of a just war. All significant questions of an order based on international law ultimately meet in the concept of a just war."(n73)

 

 

The Question of a New Nomos of the Earth

Following chapters on "The Land Appropriation of a New World" and "The Ius Publicum Europaeum," Schmitt concludes his book with a chapter titled "The Question of a New Nomos of the Earth, which is concerned primarily with the transformation of the concept of war. Clearly, this problem was uppermost in Schmitt's mind following Germany's total defeat in WWII and the final destruction of the European system of states. But he had already devoted a treatise to the development of a discriminatory concept of war following WWI,(n74) and in 1945 he wrote a legal opinion on the criminality of aggressive war.(n75) Despite whatever self-serving motives he may have had in writing these works,(n76) they are consistent with the historical and juridical structure of international law during the respublica Christiana, the ius publicum Europaeum, and what remains of international law today.

This progression can be put into perspective by following Schmitt's discussion of Vitoria's legacy: "Vitoria was in no sense one of the `forerunners of modern lawyers dealing with constitutional questions.'. . . Abstracted entirely from spatial viewpoints, Vitoria's ahistorical method generalizes many European historical concepts specific to the ius gentium of the Middle Ages (such as yolk prince and war) and thereby strips them of their historical particularity."(n77) In this context, Schmitt mentions the works of Ernest Nys, which paved the way for the popularization of Vitoria's ideas after WWI but who, because of his belief in humanitarian progress, also contributed to the criminalization of aggressive war. This was also true of James Brown Scott, the leading American expert on international law, who blatantly instrumentalized Vitoria's doctrines concerning free trade (liberum commercium, the freedom of propaganda, and a just war) to justify American economic imperialism. Schmitt sums up Sctott's argument as follows: "War should cease to be simply a legally recognized matter or only one of legal indifference; rather, it should again become a just war in which the aggressor as such is declared a felon in the full criminal sense of the word. The former right to neutrality, grounded in the international law of the ius publicum Europaeum and based on the equivalence of just and unjust war, should also and accordingly be eliminated."(n78)

Here then is the crux of the matter. Vitoria's thinking is based on the international law obtaining during the Christian Middle Ages rather than on the international law between states established with the ius publicum Europaeum. Moreover, as Schmitt points out, Vitoria was not a jurist but a theologian: "Based on relations between states, post-medieval international law from the 1 6th to the 20th century sought to repress the iusta causa. The formal reference point for the determination of a just war was no longer the authority of the Church in international law but rather the equal sovereignty of states. Instead of iusta causa, the order of international law between states was based on iustus hostis; any war between states, between equal sovereigns, was legitimate. On the basis of this juridical formalization, a rationalization and humanization--a bracketing--of war was achieved for 200 years." The turn to "the modern age in the history of international law was accomplished by a dual division of two lines of thought that were inseparable in the Middle Ages -- the definitive separation of moral-theological from juridical-political arguments and the equally important separation of the question of iusta causa, grounded in moral arguments and natural law," from the juridical question of iustus hostis, distinguished from the criminal, i.e., from object of punitive action."(n79)

With the end of the ius publicum Europaeum, the concept of war changed once again: moralistic (rather than theologically-based) arguments became confused with political arguments, and the iusta causa displaced the just enemy (iustus hostis). Accordingly, war became a crime and the aggressor a criminal, which means that the current distinction between just and unjust war lacks any relation to Vitoria and does not even attempt to determine the iusta causa.(n80) According to Schmitt: "If today some formulas of the doctrine of a just war rooted in the concrete order of the medieval respublica Christiana are utilized in modern and global formulas, this does not signify a return to, but rather a fundamental transformation of concepts of enemy, war, concrete order and justice presupposed in medieval doctrine."(n81) This transformation is crucial to any consideration of a new nomos of the earth because these concepts must be rooted in a concrete order. Lacking such an order or nomos, these free-floating concepts do not constitute institutional standards but have only the value of ideological slogans.

Unimpressed with the duration of the Cold War and its mixture of neither war nor peace, Schmitt speculated on the possibility of the eventual development of what he called GroBetaraume(n82) -- larger spatial entities, similar to but not synonymous with federations or blocs --displacing states and constituting a new nomos.(n83) Since his death in 1985 and the subsequent collapse of communism, the likelihood of his diagnosis and prognosis has increased. While the international situation remains confused and leading intellectuals such as Fukuyama and Huntington, unable to think behind predominant liberal democratic categories, can only recycle new versions of the old Wilsonianism, Schmitt's vision of a world of GroBetaraume as a new geopolitical configuration may well be in the process of being realized.

Im Labyrinth einer destruktiven Politik

Im Labyrinth einer destruktiven Politik

Helmut MÜLLER

ex: http://helmutmueller.wordpress.com/

 

 

 

Der  Weg des geringsten Widerstandes  soll, unter Umgehung heißer Eisen und Tabus bei gleichzeitigem Respekt vor Geßlerhüten, schnurstracks in eine Regierungsbeteiligung führen. So weit, so bekannt. Die Eliminierung störrischer, vorlauter Querdenker ist dabei nicht zu vermeiden. Was ab jetzt angesagt scheint, ist eine allgemeine Entrümpelungsaktion von „braunem Ruß“ (Strache), deren innere, weitreichende Dramatik sich schon einmal unter anderer Führung gezeigt hat. Die nationalen Gehege von blauäugigen Störenfrieds zu lichten, also da weiterzumachen, wo ein anderer begonnen hat, ist aber nur logische Konsequenz, wenn derselbe Verblichene und dessen Politikverständnis auch sonst als Originalvorlage dient.                                                            

Neben der vermeintlichen Intelligenz im Berater-„Look“ tragen nun auch altgediente Liberale  im Hintergrund, sobald vor die Kamera gebeten, zur Befeuerung der nun einmal angefachten Unruhe bei. Oder zur Verwirrung. Vor allem dann, wenn von deren Seite (in Absprache mit wem immer) diskriminierende Begriffe als beliebige Keule eingesetzt werden, ohne das Diskriminierende dem werten Publikum näher erläutert zu haben, womit der Sache der Deutschösterreicher in einem konkreten Fall ein Bärendienst erwiesen wird.                                                                                                                           

Jenen  unverzeihlichen Fehler hatte ja schon Haider begangen. Eben diesen wiederholte der angesehene nationalliberale Ex-Politiker Wilhelm Brauneder, als er, auf den Abgeordneten Königshofer angesprochen meinte, jetzt sei Schluß mit der Deutschtümelei.* Inwiefern hat das mit dem aktuellen Fall zu tun und was heißt das heutzutage?  Wer ist sonst noch gemeint?  Herr Professor, bitte  um Aufklärung!

Eine andere Art der schrecklichen Vereinfachung besteht darin, daß man bald jeden, dessen persönliche Meinung oder  politisches Verhalten nicht gefällt, als Hasser denunziert. So wurde derselbe von der Partei ausgeschlossene freiheitliche Abgeordnete Königshofer von einer Gratiszeitung als „Hass-Politiker“ bezeichnet. Weil er etwas  grob vereinfacht auf den wunden Punkt gebracht hat und sich ein gefälschtes politisches Bewußtsein nicht aufnötigen  lassen will?  Doch nicht jeder, der die eine oder andere Aussage dieses Tiroler Abgeordneten als wenig passend empfindet, muß  deshalb schon die schnelle Abservierung desselben begrüßen.                                                                                                                           

Die Meinungsfreiheit, die jetzt von vielen einem „Kameraden“   (als solcher galt Königshofer ja bis vor kurzem) verwehrt wird, nehmen dieselben als Nationalliberale oder Freiheitliche für sich selbst sehr wohl in Anspruch. Das gilt seit jeher ebenso für  den „geläuterten“  Parteiobmann, der,  unter Berufung auf Voltaire, die Meinungsfreiheit für sich reklamiert und  selbst schon Vereinfachungen à la Königshofer  von sich gegeben hat. Ohne derzeit vielleicht zu bedenken, daß  jetzt der Esel gemeint sein könnte, während man mit anderen auf einen unerwünscht gewordenen „Sack“ eindrischt.                                          

Könnte im Übrigen in der  besagten Causa, und da in einem ganz bestimmten Punkt,  nicht gelten, was ein Freund aus England so formuliert: „… bei ethisch begründeten Themen kann Parteidisziplin nicht eingefordert werden“?

Bei der ganzen Angelegenheit geht ja außerdem völlig unter, daß die größten und aktivsten Hasser ja als solche kaum Beachtung finden. Gemeint sind natürlich nicht die immer wieder zitierten und vorgeführten islamistischen „Haßprediger“. Weit gefehlt, denn jene. die  ich meine, gebärden sich eher  heuchlerisch, demokratisch maskiert oder umgeben sich mit einem gutmenschlichen Heiligenschein. Und sind somit die gefährlichsten.                     

In der Tat, wie müssen doch die quasi unantastbare politische Elite dieser Tage und die heuchelnden und hetzenden Medien wie auch die käuflichen  Intellektuellen ihr Volk, ihre Kultur, ihre Sprache und Tradition bloß hassen, daß sie alles was ihren Vorfahren einmal hoch und heilig war, bewußt, und wie es scheint manchmal mit Genuß,  dem Untergang preisgeben? Ja so hassen, daß sie selbst angesichts eines Geburtendefizits  die Tötung ungeborenen Lebens als Fortschritt begreifen und das zunehmende Multikulti-Chaos als Bereicherung empfinden.                                                                                                             

Und das eben bereits zwischen Sizilien und dem Nordkap, wobei es den Anschein hat, als ob die Millionen deshalb  frustrierten, verunsicherten und empörten noch leisen Stimmen von Zeit zu Zeit in einer einzigen Person, wie dieser „Verrückte“  in Oslo es sein könnte, sich zu einer einzigen unüberhörbaren zuspitzten.                                                       

Interessanterweise meint ausgerechnet der EU-Abgeordnete Mölzer, es wäre „schäbig“ wollte man den Förderern der Islamisierung und der multikulturellen Gesellschaft die Schuld an der Tragödie von Oslo zuschieben. Sehr vorausschauend allerdings, schließlich möchte  man selbst einmal einer Regierung angehören.                                                           

Man sollte Bilder nicht übermäßig strapazieren. Aber wenn Volkes Recht und Stimme weiter ignoriert werden, könnte einer populistischen Welle noch eine radikaldemokratische, wenn nicht gar mörderische Umwälzung oder Revolution folgen. Ob das undenkbar sei, ist nicht die Frage. Sondern: ob die Politik weiter darauf hin zusteuert und ob wir, als Volk,  es uns dann noch gefallen lassen.

*Der Deutschtümelei  bezichtigte man assimilierte Nichtdeutsche der Monarchie, die ihr angenommenes Deutschtum besonders oder  in fanatischer Art und Weise  hervorhoben.

Schluss mit kunterbunt!

Schluß mit kunterbunt!

Helmut MÜLLER

Ex: http://helmutmueller.wordpress.com/

„Farbige legen Tottenham in Schutt und Asche“  – so oder ähnlich hätten die Schlagzeilen unserer Medien lauten müssen.  Stattdessen  verschwiegen sie politisch korrekt die Herkunft der überwiegenden Mehrheit der Gewalttäter. Ein Polizist sprach, am ersten Tag laut „Telegraph“, von einem 80%igen Anteil  Schwarzer, der Rest sei  hauptsächlich mit Osteuropäern und anderen Ethnien durchmischt, so derselbe.  Doch was bringt eine österreichische Zeitung auf der Titelseite? Einen europäisch aussehenden Chaoten, wahrscheinlich Trittbrettfahrer. Bewußte Irreführung!

Was sich in London und in der Folge in weiteren Städten Englands abspielte und weiter zu eskalieren droht ,  ist in erster Linie die Frucht  einer  verantwortungslosen Einwanderungspolitik  (113 Volksgruppen allein in South-Tottenham!) und, in der Folge, eines Kopf-in-den-Sand-Verhaltens  wie es auch in Frankreich, den Benelux-Staaten  oder  auch in deutschen Landen üblich geworden  ist.                                                                         

Es ist aber nicht zuletzt  auch ein Ergebnis  jener  von Linken und Liberalen gepflogenen und  von unpolitischen Spießbürgern mitgetragenen politischen Korrektheit, die  geistig und politisch alles einzuebnen und Unterschiede zu ignorieren versucht.  Eine Denk- und Verhaltensweise die  wider die Realität, nicht zuletzt auch wider die Naturgesetze  bestehen will, am Ende aber  nur gefährliche gesellschaftliche Spannungen erzeugt und im Multikultichaos  (South Tottenham: 190 Sprachen!) endet. Was nicht allen Inländern gefällt. In England nicht, bei uns nicht.

Um die empörten und frustrierten Bürger nun niederzuhalten wird – von Seiten der linksliberalen, meist rot-grünen Gutmenschen  und Heuchler in Staat und Gesellschaft – permanenter  Gesinnungsterror (Wer gegen Überfremdung und Multikulti  ist, wird zum „Nazi“ gestempelt) gegen die Mehrheitsbevölkerung ausgeübt.  Typisch für diese politisch Korrekten ist  ja auch,  wie im jüngsten  Anlaßfall , der Versuch, alle möglichen Ausreden und Entschuldigungen für die Gewalttaten der überwiegend Farbigen zu konstruieren, wobei  natürlich die soziale  Lage oder die familiäre Situation in den Vordergrund geschoben werden.                                                                                                     

Alleinseligmachende Milieutheorie, eh klar. Nur hält diese halt nur zum Teil, was sie verspricht, da entgegen dem Wunschdenken vieler, Rasse und Glaube bei solchen Unruhen sehr wohl  hintergründig eine Rolle spielen.  Armut kann deshalb sowenig  alleinige Rechtfertigung für solche Gewalttaten sein wie ein anderer kultureller Hintergrund.  Bekannt ist ja auch , daß bei einigen Zuwanderergruppen das Aggressionspotential  nicht zu übersehen  ist.

Über importierte Brutalität und Skrupellosigkeit wissen aber auch wir im gemütlicheren Mitteleuropa bereits Bescheid. Und, ob  Messerstecherei  vor einer Disco in Wien oder  brutale Attacken durch ausländische  Jugendliche in Villach,  meistens wird auch  hierzulande die Herkunft der Täter verschwiegen. Wenn einmal nicht, dann  eben  u. a. – wie in England oder Deutschland auch –  mit deren anderen kulturellen Tradition oder  sozialen Lage und ähnlichen von den Erst-Ursachen ablenkenden Argumenten  quasi  gerechtfertigt. Was  bestenfalls nur zur  zeitlichen Verlagerung des Problems beiträgt, nicht zu dessen Lösung.

Das englische Beispiel steht für eine Reihe weiterer, die allesamt das Scheitern einer  gefährlichen Illusion  oder auch schon politischen Strategie in allzu realistischer Weise  symbolisieren. Multikulti, das beliebige Spielchen mit Menschen,  ist gescheitert, meinte sogar eine nach Wählern schielende Frau Merkel.                                                                       

Es genügt jetzt aber nicht mehr, es nur  einzusehen, es gilt  jetzt zu handeln, ehe im Zuge auch einer sich verschlechternden wirtschaftlichen Lage halb Europa in Brand gesetzt wird.  Der Funke kann jederzeit auch auf Deutschland oder Österreich überspringen. An gewaltbereiten frustrierten Ausländern wird es da wie dort so wenig mangeln wie an einheimischen Chaoten-Hilfstruppen.

Angesichts der uns unter Umständen drohenden Gefahren sollte, wie bei  jeder Zweierbeziehung, auch bei  zerrüttetem von Mißtrauen und  Abneigung geprägtem Zusammenleben unterschiedlicher  Ethnien und Kulturen,  eine Scheidung möglich sein. Eine „Entkolonialisierung“ Europas und dessen Wiedereroberung wäre  eine nationalrevolutionäre europäische Aufgabe.

Schopenhauer: el primer golpe a la Ilustracion

 

 

Schopenhauer: el primer golpe a la Ilustración

 

Alberto Buela (*)

 

En Arturo Schopenhauer (1788-1860) toda su filosofía se apoya en Kant y forma parte del idealismo alemán pero lo novedoso es que sostiene dos rasgos existenciales antitéticos con ellos: es un pesimista  y no es un profesor a sueldo del Estado. Esto último deslumbró a Nietzsche.

Hijo de un gran comerciante de Danzig, su posición acomodada lo liberó de las dos servidumbres de su época para los filósofos: la teología protestante o la docencia privada. Se educó a través de sus largas estadías en Inglaterra, Francia e Italia (Venecia). Su apetito sensual, grado sumo, luchó siempre la serena  reflexión filosófica. Su soltería y misoginia nos recuerda el tango: en mi vida tuve muchas minas pero nunca una mujer. En una palabra, conoció la hembra pero no a la mujer.

Ingresa en la Universidad de Gotinga donde estudia medicina, luego frecuenta a Goethe, sigue cursos en Berlín con Fichte y se doctora en Jena con una tesis sobre La cuádruple raíz del principio de razón suficiente en 1813.

En 1819 publica su principal obra El mundo como voluntad y representación y toda su producción posterior no va ha ser sino un comentario aumentado y corregido de ella. Nunca se retractó de nada ni nunca cambió. Obras como La voluntad en la naturaleza (1836),  Libertad de la voluntad (1838), Los dos problemas fundamentales de la ética (1841) son simples escolios a su única obra principal.

Sobre él ha afirmado el genial Castellani: “Schopen es malo, pero simpático. No fue católico por mera casualidad. Y fue lástima porque tenía ala calderoniana y graciana, a quienes tradujo. Pero fue  “antiprotestante” al máximo, como Nietzsche, lo cual en nuestra opinión no es poco…Tuvo dos fallas: fue el primer filósofo existencial sin ser teólogo y quiso reducir a la filosofía aquello que pertenece a la teología” [1]

En 1844 reedita su trabajo cumbre, aunque no se habían vendido aun los ejemplares de su primera edición, llevando los agregados al doble la edición original.

Nueve años antes de su muerte publica dos tomos pequeños Parerga y Parilepómena, ensayos de acceso popular donde trata de los más diversos temas, que tienen muy poco que ver con su obra principal, pero que le dan una cierta popularidad al ser los más leídos de sus libros. Al final de sus días Schopenhauer gozó del reconocimiento que tanto buscó y que le fue esquivo.

Schopenhauer siguió los cursos de Fichte en Berlín varios años y como “el fanfarrón”, así lo llama, parte y depende también de Kant.

Así, ambos reconocen que el mérito inmortal de la crítica kantiana de la razón es haber establecido, de una vez y para siempre, que los entes, el mundo de las cosas que percibimos por los sentidos y reproducimos en el espíritu, no es el mundo en sí sino nuestro mundo, un producto de nuestra organización psicofísica.

La clara distinción en Kant entre sensibilidad y entendimiento pero donde el entendimiento no puede separarse realmente de los sentidos y refiere a una causa exterior la sensación que aparece bajo las formas de espacio y tiempo, viene a explicar a los entes, las cosas como fenómenos pero no como “cosas en sí”.

Muy acertadamente observa Silvio Maresca que: “Ante sus ojos- los de Schopenhauer- el romanticismo filosófico y el idealismo (Fichte-Hegel) que sucedieron casi enseguida a la filosofía kantiana, constituían una tergiversación de ésta. ¿Por qué? Porque abolían lo que según él era el principio fundamental: la distinción entre los fenómenos y la cosa en sí”.[2]

Fichte a través de su Teoría de la ciencia va a sostener que el no-yo (los entes exteriores) surgen en el yo legalmente pero sin fundamento. No existe una tal cosa en sí. El mundo sensible es una realidad empírica que está de pie ahí. La ciencia de la naturaleza es necesariamente materialista. Schopenhauer es materialista, pero va a afirmar: Toda la imagen materialista del mundo, es solo representación, no “cosa en sí”. Rechaza la tesis que todo el mundo fenoménico sea calificado como un producto de la actividad inconciente del yo. ¿Que es este mundo además de mi representación?, se pregunta. Y responde que se debe partir del hombre que es lo dado y de lo más íntimo de él, y eso debe ser a su vez lo más íntimo del mundo y esto es la voluntad. Se produce así en Schopenhauer un primado de lo práctico sobre lo teórico.

La voluntad es, hablando en kantiano “la cosa en sí” ese afán infinito que nunca termina de satisfacerse, es “el vivir” que va siempre al encuentro de nuevos problemas. Es infatigable e inextinguible.

La voluntad no es para el pesimista de Danzig la facultad de decidir regida por la razón como se la entiende regularmente sino sólo el afán, el impulso irracional que comparten hombre y mundo. “Toda fuerza natural es concebida per analogiam con aquello que en nosotros mismos conocemos como voluntad”.

Esa voluntad irracional para la que el mundo y las cosas son solo un fenómeno no tiene ningún objetivo perdurable sino sólo aparente (por trabajar sobre fenómenos) y entonces todo objetivo logrado despierta nuevas necesidades (toda satisfacción tiene como presupuesto el disgusto de una insatisfacción) donde el no tener ya nada que desear preanuncia la muerte o la liberación.

Porque el más sabio es el que se percata que la existencia es una sucesión de sin sabores que no conduce a nada y se desprende del mundo. No espera la redención del progreso y solo practica la no-voluntad.

El pesimista de Danzig al identificar la voluntad irracional con la “cosa en sí” puede afirmar sin temor que “lo real es irracional y lo irracional es lo real” con lo que termina invirtiendo la máxima hegeliana “todo lo racional es real y todo lo real es racional”. Es el primero del los golpes mortales que se le aplicará  al racionalismo iluminista, luego vendrá Nietzsche y más tarde Scheler y Heidegger. Pero eso ya es historia conocida. Salute.

 

Post Scriptum: 

Schopenhauer en sus últimos años- que además de hablar correctamente en italiano, francés e inglés, hablaba, aunque con alguna dificultad, en castellano. La hispanofilia de Schopenhauer se reconoce en toda su obra pues cada vez que cita, sobre todo a Baltasar Gracián (1601-1658), lo hace en castellano. Aprendió el español para traducir el opúsculo Oráculo manual (1647). También cita a menudo El Criticón a la que considera “incomparable”. Existe actualmente en Alemania y desde hace unos quince años una revista de pensamiento no conformista denominada “Criticón”. También cita y traduce a Calderón de la Barca.

Miguel de Unamuno fue el primero que realizó algunas traducciones parciales del filósofo de Danzig, como corto pago para una deuda hispánica con él. En Argentina ejerció influencia sobre Macedonio Fernández y sobre su discípulo Jorge Luis Borges. Tengo conocimiento de dos buenos artículos sobre Schopenhauer en nuestro país: el del cura Castellani (Revista de la Universidad de Buenos Aires, cuarta época, Nº 16, 1950) y el mencionado de Maresca.

 

(*) [e-mail]   www.disenso.org

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[1] Castellani, Leonardo: Schopenhaue, en Revista de la Universidad de Buenos Aires, cuarta época, Nº 16, 1950, pp.389-426

[2] Maresca, Silvio: En la senda de Nietzsche, Catálogos, Buenos Aires, 1991, p. 20

Ce qu'il nous faut pour sortir de la crise...

 

Ce qu’il nous faut pour sortir de la crise, un Jacques Rueff et un De Gaulle !

Par Marc Rousset

 

Ex: http://synthesenationale.hautetfort.com/

 

La crise actuelle et les chutes des bourses  mondiales sont dues à la conjonction de l’insuffisance du plan européen de sauvetage grec et à la bombe à retardement de l’Oncle Sam.

 

L’architecture  du deuxième plan de sauvetage grec  reste bancale. L’Europe présente un programme excessivement complexe, là où les investisseurs attendaient une feuille de route simple. Sa portée demeure réduite au seul cas grec ; or c’est du traitement réservé à Lisbonne, Madrid et Rome que dépend l’avenir de la zone euro ! Le deuxième plan de sauvetage grec est avant tout un succès diplomatique  de Nicolas Sarkozy à la Pyrrhus ; il offre un répit à l’union monétaire, mais n’apporte pas de fond à la crise des endettements souverains.

 

Par ailleurs la dette actuelle supportée par les Etats-Unis, les ménages et les entreprises américaines atteint le niveau record de 375% du PIB américain, ce qui place les Etats-Unis dans le même état de « banqueroute » virtuelle que l’Espagne ou le Portugal. A titre de comparaison, à la veille de la grande crise de 1929, ce ratio ne s’élevait qu’à 270% ! Là est la principale bombe à retardement du système financier outre-Atlantique, comme le remarque très justement Yves de Kerdrel (1).

 

De plus, suite à la folie du libre échangisme mondialiste, le salaire médian des ménages américains s’établit désormais outre-Atlantique à 1 530 euros par mois, ce qui représente un salaire inférieur à celui des principaux pays européens, France incluse. Et  chaque ménage américain, suite à son appauvrissement salarial, supporte  une dette personnelle moyenne de 75600 dollars ! En fait l’Amérique entière est endettée, de l’Etat fédéral aux comtés, en passant par les ménages. Et comme écrivait Jacques Rueff : « Ce qui doit arriver, arrive ! »

 

Le résultat, c’est que les investisseurs (vous et moi) ont perdu toute confiance, tant dans les banquiers centraux manipulateurs des monnaies de papier que dans les dirigeants politiques intervenant dans les mécanismes économiques. Rien n’est en fait solutionné à ce jour tant en Europe qu’aux Etats-Unis ! Tout indique que les Etats-Unis vont retomber dans une récession, pour autant qu’ils en soient sortis grâce aux  miracles et aux mensonges du politiquement correct ! Après l’escroquerie de la titrisation des « subprime », les mauvaises recettes des 600 milliards de dollars du Quantitative Easing par l’Etat américain auprès de la Réserve Fédérale  et le laxisme monétaire avec des taux d’intérêt ridiculement bas , les pouvoirs publics , après avoir tout vainement utilisé ,sont maintenant impuissants aux Etats-Unis.

 

En Europe, in fine, tout va dépendre de l’Allemagne ! Ou bien l’Allemagne prend peur pour ses banques engagées en Italie et en Espagne  et pense qu’économiquement , dans son propre intérêt, la zone euro doit survivre, ou bien elle se résigne à l’éclatement de la zone euro fin 2011, ce qui est le plus probable pour des raisons politiques intérieures et constitutionnelles, les Allemands se refusant à payer pour les autres ! Et nous Français ,suite au laxisme irresponsable  de nos gouvernants , de nos syndicats  qui ont rendu la France pas compétitive par rapport à l’Allemagne (politique sociale trop généreuse en comparaison avec  le Hartz IV allemand d’un homme politique  allemand intelligent  et courageux prénommé Gerhard Schroeder, la folie des 35H, la civilisation des loisirs,  trop  grand nombre de fonctionnaires qui représentent une charge de 13,2% du PIB  en France contre  seulement 7% en Allemagne, c'est-à-dire les frais généraux  démesurés de l’entreprise France  ..) nous risquons aujourd’hui de ne plus pouvoir suivre l’Allemagne. Il convient de noter que, lors de la création de l’euro, la France était  compétitive par rapport à l’Allemagne. La fin de l’euro  serait regrettable  pour le noyau dur politique  de la seule vraie Europe européenne ! La zone euro pourrait alors éclater en deux (France et pays latins d’un côté, Allemagne, Hollande, Autriche, certains pays de l’Europe du nord de l’autre) ou  plus probablement  s’orienter vers le rétablissement des monnaies nationales avec les dérives des dévaluations compétitives et les fuites en avant inflationnistes pour  permettre aux Etats européens de se libérer du poids  insurmontable des dettes publiques souveraines.

 

Cette crise financière est  donc avant tout en Europe la crise du laxisme et de l’irresponsabilité de l’Etat Providence, symbolisée par les rêveries socialistes françaises de Madame Aubry, mais aggravée par l’escroquerie anglo-saxonne du « subprime ». Les gouvernements européens, tout comme les Etats-Unis, sont maintenant  le dos au mur !

 

Note

 

(1) Yves de Kerdrel, Le Figaro du 2 août 2011, « La bombe à retardement de l’Oncle Sam ».

Carl Schmitt's Decisionism

Carl Schmitt's Decisionism

Paul Hirst

Ex: http://freespeechproject.com/

 

Since 1945 Western nations have witnessed a dramatic reduction in the variety of positions in political theory and jurisprudence. Political argument has been virtually reduced to contests within liberal-democratic theory. Even radicals now take representative democracy as their unquestioned point of departure. There are, of course, some benefits following from this restriction of political debate. Fascist, Nazi and Stalinist political ideologies are now beyond the pale. But the hegemony of liberal-democratic political agreement tends to obscure the fact that we are thinking in terms which were already obsolete at the end of the nineteenth century.

Nazism and Stalinism frightened Western politicians into a strict adherence to liberal democracy. Political discussion remains excessively rigid, even though the liberal-democratic view of politics is grossly at odds with our political condition. Conservative theorists like Hayek try to re-create idealized political conditions of the mid nineteenth century. In so doing, they lend themselves to some of the most unsavoury interests of the late twentieth century - those determined to exploit the present undemocratic political condition. Social-democratic theorists also avoid the central question of how to ensure public accountability of big government. Many radicals see liberal democracy as a means to reform, rather than as what needs to be reformed. They attempt to extend governmental action, without devising new means of controlling governmental agencies. New Right thinkers have reinforced the situation by pitting classical liberalism against democracy, individual rights against an interventionist state. There are no challenges to representative democracy, only attempts to restrict its functions. The democratic state continues to be seen as a sovereign public power able to assure public peace.

The terms of debate have not always been so restricted. In the first three decades of this century, liberal-democratic theory and the notion of popular sovereignty through representative government were widely challenged by many groups. Much of this challenge, of course, was demagogic rhetoric presented on behalf of absurd doctrines of social reorganization. The anti-liberal criticism of Sorel, Maurras or Mussolini may be occassionally intriguing, but their alternatives are poisonous and fortunately, no longer have a place in contemporary political discussion. The same can be said of much of the ultra-leftist and communist political theory of this period.

Other arguments are dismissed only at a cost. The one I will consider here - Carl Schmitt's 'decisionism' - challenges the liberal-democratic theory of sovereignty in a way that throws considerable light on contemporary political conditions. His political theory before the Nazi seizure of power shared some assumptions with fascist political doctrine and he did attempt to become the 'crown jurist' of the new Nazi state. Nevertheless, Schmitt's work asks hard questions and points to aspects of political life too uncomfortable to ignore. Because his thinking about concrete political situations is not governed by any dogmatic political alternative, it exhibits a peculiar objectivity.

Schmitt's situational judgement stems from his view of politics or, more correctly, from his view of the political as 'friend-enemy' relations, which explains how he could change suddenly from contempt for Hitler to endorsing Nazism. If it is nihilistic to lack substantial ethical standards beyond politics, then Schmitt is a nihilist. In this, however, he is in the company of many modern political thinkers. What led him to collaborate with the Nazis from March 1933 to December 1936 was not, however, ethical nihilism, but above all concern with order. Along with many German conservatives, Schmitt saw the choice as either Hitler or chaos. As it turned out, he saved his life but lost his reputation. He lived in disrepute in the later years of the Third Reich, and died in ignominy in the Federal Republic. But political thought should not be evaluated on the basis of the authors' personal political judgements. Thus the value of Schmitt's work is not diminished by the choices he made.

Schmitt's main targets are the liberal-constitutional theory of the state and the parliamentarist conception of politics. In the former, the state is subordinated to law; it becomes the executor of purposes determined by a representative legislative assembly. In the latter, politics is dominated by 'discussion,' by the free deliberation of representatives in the assembly. Schmitt considers nineteenth-century liberal democracy anti-political and rendered impotent by a rule-bound legalism, a rationalistic concept of political debate, and the desire that individual citizens enjoy a legally guaranteed 'private' sphere protected from the state. The political is none of these things. Its essence is struggle.

In The Concept of the Political Schmitt argues that the differentia specifica of the political, which separates it from other spheres of life, such as religion or economics, is friend-enemy relations. The political comes into being when groups are placed in a relation of emnity, where each comes to perceive the other as an irreconcilable adversary to be fought and, if possible, defeated. Such relations exhibit an existential logic which overrides the motives which may have brought groups to this point. Each group now faces an opponent, and must take account of that fact: 'Every religious, moral, economic, ethical, or other antithesis transforms itself into a political one if it is sufficiently strong to group human beings effectively according to friends and enemy.' The political consists not in war or armed conflict as such, but precisely in the relation of emnity: not competition but confrontation. It is bound by no law: it is prior to no law.

For Schmitt: 'The concept of the state presupposes the concept of the political.' States arise as a means of continuing, organizing and channeling political struggle. It is political struggle which gives rise to political order. Any entity involved in friend-enemy relations is by definition political, whatever its origin or the origin of the differences leading to emnity: 'A religious community which wages wars against members of others religious communities or engages in other wars is already more than a religious community; it is a political entity.' The political condition arises from the struggle of groups; internal order is imposed to pursue external conflict. To view the state as the settled and orderly administration of a territory, concerned with the organization of its affairs according to law, is to see only the stabilized results of conflict. It is also to ignore the fact that the state stands in a relation of emnity to other states, that it holds its territory by means of armed force and that, on this basis of a monopoly of force, it can make claims to be the lawful government of that territory. The peaceful, legalistic, liberal bourgeoisie is sitting on a volcano and ignoring the fact. Their world depends on a relative stabilization of conflict within the state, and on the state's ability to keep at bay other potentially hostile states.

For Hobbes, the political state arises from a contract to submit to a sovereign who will put an end to the war of all against all which must otherwise prevail in a state of nature - an exchange of obediance for protection. Schmitt starts where Hobbes leaves off - with the natural condition between organized and competing groups or states. No amount of discussion, compromise or exhortation can settle issues between enemies. There can be no genuine agreement, because in the end there is nothing to agree about. Dominated as it is by the friend-enemy alternative, the political requires not discussion but decision. No amount of reflection can change an issue which is so existentially primitive that it precludes it. Speeches and motions in assemblies should not be contraposed to blood and iron but with the moral force of the decision, because vacillating parliamentarians can also cause considerable bloodshed.

In Schmitt's view, parliamentarism and liberalism existed in a particular historical epoch between the 'absolute' state of the seventeenth century and the 'total state' of the twentieth century. Parliamentary discussion and a liberal 'private sphere' presupposed the depoliticization of a large area of social, economic and cultural life. The state provided a legally codified order within which social customs, economic competition, religious beliefs, and so on, could be pursued without becoming 'political.' 'Politics' as such ceases to be exclusively the atter of the state when 'state and society penetrate each other.' The modern 'total state' breaks down the depoliticization on which such a narrow view of politics could rest:

 

Heretofore ostensibly neutral domains - religion, culture, education, the economy - then cease to be neutral. . . Against such neutralizations and depoliticizations of important domains appears the total state, which potentially embraces every domain. This results in the identity of the state and society. In such a state. . . everything is at least potentially political, and in referring to the state it is no longer possible to assert for it a specifically political characteristic.

 

Democracy and liberalism are fundamentally antagonistic. Democracy does away with the depoliticizations characteristic of rule by a narrow bourgeois stratum insulated from popular demands. Mass politics means a broadening of the agenda to include the affairs of all society - everything is potentially political. Mass politics also threatens existing forms of legal order. The politicization of all domains increases pressure on the state by multiplying the competing interests demanding action; at the same time, the function of the liberal legal framework - the regulating of the 'private sphere' - become inadequate. Once all social affairs become political, the existing constitutional framework threatens the social order: politics becomes a contest of organized parties seeking to prevail rather than to acheive reconciliation. The result is a state bound by law to allow every party an 'equal chance' for power: a weak state threatened with dissolution.

Schmitt may be an authoritarian conservative. But his diagnosis of the defects of parliamentarism and liberalism is an objective analysis rather than a mere restatement of value preferences. His concept of 'sovereignty' is challenging because it forces us to think very carefully about the conjuring trick which is 'law.' Liberalism tries to make the state subject to law. Laws are lawful if properly enacted according to set procedures; hence the 'rule of law.' In much liberal-democratic constitutional doctrine the legislature is held to be 'sovereign': it derives its law-making power from the will of the people expressed through their 'representatives.' Liberalism relies on a constituting political moment in order that the 'sovereignty' implied in democratic legislatures be unable to modify at will not only specific laws but also law-making processes. It is therefore threatened by a condition of politics which converts the 'rule of law' into a merely formal doctrine. If this 'rule of law' is simply the people's will expressed through their representatives, then it has no determinate content and the state is no longer substantially bound by law in its actions.

Classical liberalism implies a highly conservative version of the rule of law and a sovereignty limited by a constitutive political act beyond the reach of normal politics. Democracy threatens the parliamentary-constitutional regime with a boundless sovereign power claimed in the name of the 'people.' This reveals that all legal orders have an 'outside'; they rest on a political condition which is prior to and not bound by the law. A constitution can survive only if the constituting political act is upheld by some political power. The 'people' exist only in the claims of that tiny minority (their 'representatives') which functions as a 'majority' in the legislative assembly. 'Sovereignty' is thus not a matter of formal constitutional doctrine or essentially hypocritical references to the 'people'; it is a matter of determining which particular agency has the capacity - outside of law - to impose an order which, because it is political, can become legal.

Schmitt's analysis cuts through three hundred years of political theory and public law doctrine to define sovereignty in a way that renders irrelevant the endless debates about principles of political organization or the formal constitutional powers of different bodies.

 

From a practical or theoretical perspective, it really does not matter whether an abstract scheme advanced to define sovereignty (namely, that sovereignty is the highest power, not a derived power) is acceptable. About an abstract concept there will be no argument. . . What is argued about is the concrete application, and that means who decides in a situation of conflict what constitutes the public interest or interest of the state, public safety and order, le salut public, and so on. The exception, which is not codified in the existing legal order, can at best be characterized as a case of extreme peril, a danger to the existence of the state, or the like, but it cannot be circumscribed factually and made to conform to a preformed law.

 

Brutally put: ' Sovereign is he who decides on the exception.' The sovereign is a definite agency capable of making a decision, not a legitimating category (the 'people') or a purely formal definition (plentitude of power, etc.). Sovereignty is outside the law, since the actions of the sovereign in the state of exception cannot be bound by laws since laws presuppose a normal situation. To claim that this is anti-legal is to ignore the fact that all laws have an outside, that they exist because of a substantiated claim on the part of some agency to be the dominant source of binding rules within a territory. The sovereign determines the possibility of the 'rule of law' by deciding on the exception: 'For a legal order to make sense, a normal situation must exist, and he is sovereign who definitely decides whether this normal situation actually exists.'

Schmitt's concept of the exception is neither nihilistic nor anarchistic, it is concerned with the preservation of the state and the defence of legitimately constituted government and the stable institutions of society. He argues that ' the exception is different from anarchy and chaos.' It is an attempt to restore order in a political sense. While the state of exception can know no norms, the actions of the sovereign within the state must be governed by what is prudent to restore order. Barbaric excess and pure arbitrary power are not Schmitt's objecty. power is limited by a prudent concern for the social order; in the exception, 'order in the juristic sense still prevails, even if it is not of the ordinary kind.' Schmitt may be a relativist with regard to ultimate values in politics. But he is certainly a conservative concerned with defending a political framework in which the 'concrete orders' of society can be preserved, which distinguishes his thinking from both fascism and Nazism in their subordination of all social institutions to such idealized entities as the Leader and the People. For Schmitt, the exception is never the rule, as it is with fascism and Nazism. If he persists in demonstrating how law depends on politics, the norm on the exception, stability on struggle, he points up the contrary illusions of fascism and Nazism. In fact, Schmitt's work can be used as a critique of both. The ruthless logic in his analsysis of the political, the nature of soveriegnty, and the exception demonstrates the irrationality of fascism and Nazism. The exception cannot be made the rule in the 'total state' without reducing society to such a disorder through the political actions of the mass party that the very survival of the state is threatened. The Nazi state sought war as the highest goal in politics, but conducted its affairs in such a chaotic way that its war-making capacity was undermined and its war aims became fatally overextended. Schmitt's friend-enemy thesis is concerned with avoiding the danger that the logic of the political will reach its conclusion in unlimited war.

Schmitt modernizes the absolutist doctrines of Bodin and Hobbes. His jurisprudence restores - in the exception rather than the norm - the sovereign as uncommanded commander. For Hobbes, lawas are orders given by those with authority - authoritas non veritas facit legem. Confronted with complex systems of procedural limitation in public law and with the formalization of law into a system, laws become far more complex than orders. Modern legal positivism could point to a normal liberal-parliamentary legal order which did and still does appear to contradict Hobbes. Even in the somewhat modernized form of John Austin, the Hobbesian view of sovereignty is rejected on all sides. Schmitt shared neither the simplistic view of Hobbes that this implies, nor the indifference of modern legal positivism to the political foundation of law. He founded his jurisprudence neither on the normal workings of the legal order nor on the formal niceties of constitutional doctrine, but on a condition quite alien to them. 'Normalcy' rests not on legal or constitutional conditions but on a certain balance of political forces, a certain capacity of the state to impose order by force should the need arise. This is especially true of liberal-parliamentary regimes, whose public law requires stablization of political conflicts and considerable police and war powers even to begin to have the slightest chance of functioning at all. Law cannot itself form a completely rational and lawful system; the analysis of the state must make reference to those agencies which have the capacity to decide on the state of exception and not merely a formal plentitude of power.

In Political Theology Schmitt claims that the concepts of the modern theory of the state are secularized theological concepts. This is obvious in the case of the concept of sovereignty, wherein the omnipotent lawgiver is a mundane version of an all-powerful God. He argues that liberalism and parliamentarism correspond to deist views of God's action through constant and general natural laws. His own view is a form of fundamentalism in which the exception plays the same role in relation to the state as the miracles of Jesus do in confirming the Gospel. The exception reveals the legally unlimited capacity of whoever is sovereign within the state. In conventional, liberal-democratic doctrine the people are sovereign; their will is expressed through representatives. Schmitt argues that modern democracy is a form of populism in that the people are mobilized by propaganda and organized interests. Such a democracy bases legitimacy on the people's will. Thus parliament exists on the sufferance of political parties, propaganda agencies and organized interest which compete for popular 'consent.' When parliamentary forms and the rule of 'law' become inadequate to the political situation, they will be dispensed with in the name of the people: 'No other constitutional institution can withstand the sole criterion of the people's will, however it is expressed.'

Schmitt thus accepts the logic of Weber's view of plebiscitarian democracy and the rise of bureaucratic mass parties, which utterly destroy the old parliamentary notables. He uses the nineteenth-century conservatives Juan Donoso Cortes to set the essential dilemma in Political Theology: either a boundless democracy of plebiscitarian populism which will carry us wherever it will (i.e. to Marxist or fascist domination) or a dictatorship. Schmitt advocates a very specific form of dictatorship in a state of exception - a "commissarial' dictatorship, which acts to restore social stability, to preserve the concrete orders of society and restore the constitution. The dictator has a constitutional office. He acts in the name of the constitution, but takes such measures as are necessary to preserve order. these measures are not bound by law; they are extralegal.

Schmitt's doctrine thus involves a paradox. For all its stress on friend-enemy relations, on decisive political action, its core, its aim, is the maintenance of stability and order. It is founded on a political non-law, but not in the interest of lawlessness. Schmitt insists that the constitution must be capable of meeting the challenge of the exception, and of allowing those measures necessary to preserve order. He is anti-liberal because he claims that liberalism cannot cope with the reality of the political; it can only insist on a legal formalism which is useless in the exceptional case. He argues that only those parties which are bound to uphold the constitution should be allowed an 'equal chance' to struggle for power. Parties which threaten the existing order and use constitutional means to challenge the constitution should be subject to rigorous control.

Schmitt's relentless attack on 'discussion' makes most democrats and radicals extremely hostile to his views. He is a determined critic of the Enlightenment. Habermas's 'ideal speech situation', in which we communicate without distortion to discover a common 'emancipatory interest', would appear to Schmitt as a trivial philosophical restatement of Guizot's view that in representative government, ' through discussion the powers-that-be are obliged to seek truth in common." Schmitt is probably right. Enemies have nothing to discuss and we can never attain a situation in which the friend-enemy distinction is abolished. Liberalism does tend to ignore the exception and the more resolute forms of political struggle.

Inacceptable ingérence turque et menace conttre nos libertés!

 

Inacceptable ingérence turque et menace contre nos libertés!

PARIS (NOVOpress) — Les crises violentes, les attentats terroristes les plus graves, fragilisent les opinions publiques et offrent une fenêtre d’opportunité à des lobbies influents ou à des minorités agissantes pour faire avancer leurs intérêts. Les musulmans les plus radicaux et les plus politisés veulent tirer profit du drame norvégien pour attenter à la liberté d’expression des adversaires de l’expansion de l’islam en Europe.

Ibrahim Kalin, l’un des conseillers séniors du Premier ministre turc Recep Tayyip Erdogan, exige dans un commentaire paru il y a quelques jours dans le journal panarabiste Asharq Al-Awsat la criminalisation de l’« islamophobie » au titre de crime contre l’humanité. Kalin émet une violente critique vis-à-vis des chefs de gouvernement européens, qui selon lui n’ont rien fait jusqu’ici pour faire cesser la critique de l’islam.

« Le massacre norvégien a récusé les affirmations selon lesquelles l’islamophobie serait non violente et donc, contrairement à l’antisémitisme, relèverait de la liberté d’opinion et du droit à la critique. Après l’acte meurtrier d’Anders Behring Breivik, on ne peut plus traiter à la légère l’idéologie qui sous-tend cet acte, l’islamophobie », affirme Kalin, qui déplore – tout comme la gauche – le renforcement des partis de droite en Europe : « La montée de partis conservateurs hostiles à l’immigration et situés à d’extrême droite est devenue la principale tendance de la politique européenne depuis quelques années et a trouvé une base particulièrement forte en France, en Allemagne, aux Pays-Bas, en Autriche et en Suisse. »

Kalin reproche aux chefs d’État et de gouvernement des plus grands États de l’Union européenne de céder à l’état d’esprit de la population, en déclarant (Angela Merkel, comme Nicolas Sarkozy et David Cameron), que le multiculturalisme était terminé. Kalil attribue le phénomène de l’islamophobie essentiellement à des préjugés et des stéréotypes par rapport à l’islam et aux musulmans… qu’il ne prend pas la peine de réfuter.

Source: http://fr.novopress.info/93855/attentats-de-norvege-la-liberte-dexpression-en-danger/

London: Die britische Regierung hilflos!

London: Die britische Regierung reagiert auf die Unruhen hilflos wie der gestürzte Diktator Mubarak

Udo Ulfkotte

 

Zwanzigtausend Londoner (20.000!) haben in der vergangenen Nacht den Notruf gewählt und die Polizei um Hilfe vor Gewalttätern gebeten. In den wenigsten Fällen konnte die Polizei helfen. Viele Briten rannten vor den Migrantengangs um ihr Leben. Die Gefängnisse in London sind jetzt bis auf den letzten Platz gefüllt. Und die britische Regierung reagiert jetzt hilflos wie der gestürzte ägyptische Diktator Mubarak: Sie will die Massenproteste niederschlagen und die sozialen Netzwerke und Massenkommunikationsmittel vorübergehend abschalten lassen. Und 16.000 Polizisten sollen die Gewaltorgie junger Migranten beenden. Der EU-Politiker Gerard Batten fordert die Londoner Regierung auf, die Gewaltorgie durch Truppen niederschlagen zu lassen.

 

 

Die jüngsten Ereignisse in Norwegen und in Großbritannien läuten das Ende unserer Freiheiten ein. Denn die Politik wird nun alles dransetzen, um unter dem Mantel des Schutzes der Bevölkerung den totalen EU-Überwachungsstaat auszubauen. Die Chinesen erwarten das von uns vor den Olympischen Spielen 2012.

Die Migrantenunruhen in Großbritannien tragen bizarre Züge: Da stehen bewaffnete Afrikaner bewaffneten Türken gegenüber, die ihre Geschäfte vor dem plündernden Mob verteidigen und den Afrikanern zubrüllen: »Dies ist unser Stadtviertel«. Wo die Polizei keine Chance mehr hat, da ziehen nun Bürgerwehren auf. London erlebt auf einen Schlag die multikulturelle Realität. Besonders schlimm muss es für jene Journalisten sein, die nach den Attentaten von Norwegen vor der großen neuen potenziellen Gefahr von rechts warnten: Europäer, die mit der wachsenden Zuwanderung nicht einverstanden sind.

MEHR: http://info.kopp-verlag.de/hintergruende/europa/udo-ulfkotte/london-die-britische-regierung-reagiert-auf-die-unruhen-hilflos-wie-der-gestuerzte-diktator-mubarak.html

Fin de partie pour les dettes du système mondialiste

Fin de partie pour les dettes du Système mondialiste

 

C’est l’accroissement permanent du volume des dettes privées et des dettes publiques qui a permis le développement du Système mondialiste. Mais l’heure de payer la facture est arrivée.

Polémia (ex: http://www.polemia.com/ ).

1- Le libréchangisme mondial et la dérégulation financière ont conduit à une concurrence fiscale entre les Etats. La délocalisation des profits et des patrimoines a débouché sur l’évaporation d’une partie des recettes fiscales des Etats : ainsi, en France, l’impôt sur les bénéfices s’élève à 3% de leur chiffre d’affaires pour les PME mais à seulement 0,3% pour les multinationales du CAC 40. La même logique s’est appliquée aux particuliers : les riches Grecs ont placé leurs avoirs en Suisse et beaucoup de Français aisés sont devenus exilés fiscaux en Belgique ou en Grande-Bretagne.

2- Le libréchangisme mondial a mis en concurrence la main-d’œuvre des pays développés avec celle des pays du tiers-monde : ce qui provoqué la baisse des salaires et la montée du chômage lié aux délocalisations, aux Etats-Unis et en Europe. Avec trois conséquences financières :

• -la baisse de la base des recettes fiscales (ou des contributions sociales) ;
• -la montée des dépenses d’assistance devenue nécessaire pour rendre acceptables les conséquences sociales des délocalisations ; l’Etat-providence a ici été mobilisé au service de la mondialisation et des intérêts du grand capital (privatiser les bénéfices, socialiser les pertes) ;
• -la montée de l’endettement privé (en particulier aux Etats-Unis et en Grande-Bretagne) pour maintenir artificiellement le niveau de vie des salariés et des chômeurs.

3- L’immigration – sorte de délocalisation à domicile – a eu les mêmes conséquences pour les secteurs du bâtiment de l’hôtellerie et des services que les délocalisations pour le secteur industriel. Quand Nafissatou Diallo, fausse réfugiée guinéenne, occupe un emploi précaire au Sofitel de New York, c’est une Afro-Américaine de plus qui pointe au chômage.

L’immigration de masse emporte donc les mêmes conséquences financières que les délocalisations mais aussi une conséquence supplémentaire – surtout en Europe et a fortiori en France : la prise en charge de la couverture sociale d’une personne et souvent d’une famille supplémentaire. Car au lieu de prendre en charge socialement le travailleur et sa famille, on prend en charge le chômeur et sa famille plus l’immigré (et sa famille) qui le remplace au travail.

4- Tout ceci creuse les déficits, d’autant que le redressement financier est difficile car chaque campagne électorale s’y oppose :

• -les candidats ont besoin d’argent pour financer leurs coûteuses campagnes de communication : ils doivent donc ménager les grands lobbys, les grandes entreprises et les hyper-riches ; pas possible donc d’augmenter les recettes fiscales ;
• -les candidats ont aussi besoin de ménager leurs « clientèles » électorales vivant de subsides publics ; guère possible dans ces conditions de diminuer les dépenses…

Il ne faut pas chercher ailleurs la cause du blocage de la situation budgétaire américaine. Notons d’ailleurs que lors de la dernière présidentielle française les deux finalistes avaient chacun promis de creuser le déficit de 40 milliards d’euros supplémentaires : principalement en dépenses sociales pour Ségolène Royal, principalement en déductions fiscales pour les plus riches pour Nicolas Sarkozy qui a d’ailleurs tenu les engagements pris envers ses mandants.

5- Dans ces conditions le seul recours fiscal possible est de taxer un peu plus les classes moyennes en faisant appel à leur sens des responsabilités. Mais leur sens civique et leur dévouement ne peuvent être que profondément découragés par l’arrogance de l’oligarchie financière qui s’est enrichie durant les années de crise.

Il n’y a donc pas d’autres évolutions possibles que la poursuite de la course vers l’abîme.

Et après ?

6- Polémia (*) a largement annoncé depuis 2006, et singulièrement depuis 2008, l’évolution actuelle, d’autant que la « solution » retenue par l’oligarchie mondiale après la faillite de Lehman Brothers, en 2008, a consisté à étatiser les dettes privées et à ajouter de la dette à la dette. L’économie mondiale a été traitée comme l’ivrogne à qui on recommande une bonne cuite pour sortir de sa gueule de bois…

7- La chute du Système mondialiste va donc se poursuivre avec deux conséquences probables : -l’éclatement de la zone euro et le retour du Deutschmark ; -la fragilisation de la puissance américaine. Bref, ce que le GEAB avait diagnostiqué comme une dislocation géopolitique majeure.

8- Aller au-delà de ce diagnostic est difficile. « L’histoire est le fruit de l’inattendu » (Dominique Venner). Dire ce qui sortira de l’effondrement du Système mondialiste est aussi délicat que l’était de prévoir le futur de la Russie lors de la chute du communisme. L’avenir n’est pas toujours pavé de roses…

9- On voit mal néanmoins comment la reconstruction pourrait se faire autrement que par un recours aux fondamentaux : frontières, protectionnisme, relocalisations, souveraineté des peuples. Le politiquement correct est mort mais il ne le sait pas encore…

Polémia
8/08/2011

(*) Voir aussi (entre autres très nombreux articles aux rubriques « dette » ou « crise ») :

« Le Capitalisme à l'agonie » de Paul Jorion
La balance des paiements des Etats-Unis et les crises financières - un demi-siècle d'histoire (Première partie)
Après moi le déluge ? les dérèglements du système politique
Les banques internationales exploitent la crise pour engranger des profits massifs
Essor de la « superclasse globale » (ou hyperclasse) et crise des classes moyennes.
Dette française : les gouvernants achètent des clientèles électorales et du temps d'antenne en hypothéquant l'avenir (édito 07/2009)
Crise systémique globale : Le choc cumulé des trois « vagues scélérates » de l'été 2009
Nouvelles de la « très grande dépression »
La fin de la « mondialisation heureuse » : un retour vers des économies plus autocentrées ? (édito 04/2008)
Le retour en grâce de Maurice Allais
La crise financière (Polémia 01/2009)
Rapport de la Commission sur la dette publique
« L'Empire des dettes : A l'aube d'une crise économique épique » par William Bonner et Addison Wiggin traduit par Marianne Véron
Finances publiques françaises : le péril argentin
Déclin français et « argentinisation » : et si l'on parlait de la responsabilité des institutions de la Ve République !

Krantenkoppen - Augustus 2011 (2)

Krantenkoppen

Augustus 2011 (2)

THE NORWEGIAN MASSACRE, THE STATE, THE MEDIA AND ISRAEL:

Professor James Petras: "The Oslo attacks raise fundamental questions about the growing links between the legal Far-Right, the ‘mainstream media’, the Norwegian police, Israel and rightwing terrorism":
http://www.voltairenet.org/The ​-Norwegian-Massacre-the-State

 

 

SYRIE: SOMMES-NOUS VICTIMES DE LA DESINFORMATION?

"Cette image d’une Syrie en pleine révolution et d’un parti Baath au bord du gouffre ne correspond en aucun cas à la réalité du terrain, où le pouvoir contrôle la situation et où la contestation s’est considérablement réduite."

http://belgicatho.hautetfort.c ​om/archive/2011/08/05/syrie-so ​mmes-nous-victimes-de-la-desin ​formation.html

 

 

WIJS DE STAAT ISRAEL TERECHT:

"Laat het voldoende zijn te verwijzen naar het Kairos-document, in 2009 uitgebracht door de gezamenlijke Palestijnse christenen en door de katholieke patriarch van Jeruzalem mede ondertekend. Dat document benoemt de voortdurende bezetting door Israël tot het grootste kwaad voor allen, christen of niet. Het doet een beroep op alle christenen in de wereld om door desinvestering en economische boycot de Israëlische regering te noodzaken aan de bezetting een eind te maken."

http://www.katholieknieuwsblad ​.nl/opinie/item/877-wijs-de-st ​aat-israël-terecht.html

 

 

ERKENNING VAN PALESTINA OF OORLOG MET IRAN?

"De mogelijke erkenning van Palestina als staat door de VN brengt het koloniale project van Israël op de westelijke Jordaanoever in gevaar en zal bovendien de apartheidswetgeving binnen de staat Israël zelf meer op de voorgrond brengen":
http://www.dewereldmorgen.be/a ​rtikels/2011/07/17/erkenning-v ​an-palestina-oorlog-met-iran

 

 

DUITSE OORLOGSSCHEPEN VOOR ANGOLA:

""De bedoeling daarvan is Angola op interventies in Afrika voor te bereiden, verklaarde kanselier Angela Merkel. (...) Dat plan ligt in de lijn van de sinds jaren toegepaste strategie van de Duitse regering om militaire structuren in Afrika op te bouwen. Die moeten oorlogsoperaties mogelijk maken, uitgevoerd door lokale strijdkrachten, met de bedoelding een pro-westerse orde op het continent te handhaven zonder dat Europese troepen moeten worden ingezet":

http://www.dewereldmorgen.be/a ​rtikels/2011/07/19/duitse-oorl ​ogsschepen-voor-angola

 

ILAN PAPPE: DE KNORRIGE DIPLOMATEN VAN DE SCHURKENSTAAT ISRAËL:

"De strijd voor ondersteuning van de Palestijnse rechten in cruciale Europese landen is succesvol geweest. Met nauwelijks werkingsmiddelen, soms afhankelijk van kleine groepen geëngageerde enkelingen heeft deze campagne het leven voor elke diplomaat van Israël waar ook ter wereld tot een hel gemaakt":
http://www.dewereldmorgen.be/a ​rtikels/2011/07/25/ilan-papp-d ​e-knorrige-diplomaten-van-de-s ​churkenstaat-isra-l

 

 

OSLO: VRAIE TUERIE SOUS FAUSSE BANIERE?

"Il semble en tous les cas tout à fait possible qu’on soit en face d’une opération complexe de type «false flag» (fausse bannière)":
http://www.nation.be/web/oslo- ​vraie-tuerie-sous-fausse-banni ​ere/

 

 

UN PAYSAN SE SUICIDE CHAQUE JOUR:

"Les agri­culteurs se suicident plus que les autres professions. Le taux de suicide des agriculteurs exploitants est le plus élevé des catégories socio­professionnelles".

http://www.lefigaro.fr/actuali ​te-france/2010/04/26/01016-201 ​00426ARTFIG00654-un-paysan-fra ​ncais-se-suicide-chaque-jour-. ​php

 

 

POETIN WIL WIT-RUSLAND ERBIJ:

"De Russische premier Vladimir Poetin ziet het wel zitten om Rusland en Wit-Rusland om te vormen tot één land":
http://www.powned.tv/nieuws/bu ​itenland/2011/08/poetin_wil_wi ​trusland_erbij.html

 

 

SERBIA AND THE NEW WORLD ORDER:

"The Serbian people are being sold out by their own politicians":
http://english.pravda.ru/world ​/europe/31-07-2011/118623-serb ​ia_world_order-0/

 

 

BRAZILIAANSE MUNT OP HOOGSTE NIVEAU OOIT:

"In Brazilië voltrekt zich een economisch mirakel. Zuid-Amerika's grootste economie liet vorig jaar een groei van 7% noteren en mag nu de Mundial van 2014 en de Olympische Spelen van 2016 organiseren. Tijdens het presidentschap van Lula da Silva ontsnapte 10,4% van de Braziliaanse bevolking uit de armoede":
http://www.express.be/business ​/nl/economy/brazilaanse-munt-o ​p-hoogste-niveau-ooit/149882.h ​tm

 

 

WAT DOET DE DOLLAR ALS AMERIKA STRAKS FAILLIET GAAT?

"Wat weinigen weten is dat de VS al 2 maal failliet gingen: ze slaagden er niet in hun schulden terug te betalen aan de Fransen na de Amerikaanse Onafhankelijkheidsoorlog (1775–1783) en ook in 1979 verzaakten ze aan de tijdige terugbetaling van hun schuldeisers":
http://www.express.be/business ​/nl/economy/wat-doet-de-dollar ​-als-amerika-straks-failliet-g ​aat/149912.htm

 

 

PEROU: OU LE CARDINAL DE LIMA PARLE DE PATRIE, D'IDEOLOGIE DU GENRE ET DE CIVILISATION CHRETIENNE!

"L’homélie prononcée par le cardinal Juan Luis Cipriani en sa cathédrale de Lima, à l’occasion du 190e anniversaire de l’indépendance du Pérou et en présence de toutes les autorités de l’Etat, du pouvoir judiciaire, des élus politiques, de Mme le Maire, des autorités militaires et du Corps diplomatique. Elle est remarquable, insolite. Où l’on reparle de « patrie »…"
http://leblogdejeannesmits.blo ​gspot.com/2011/07/ou-le-cardin ​al-de-lima-parle-de-patrie.htm ​l

 

BREIVIK: EIN LEIDENSCHAFTLICHER VERTEIDIGER DES STAATES ISRAEL:

"Breiviks Aussagen über das Judentum erinnern an die anglo-israelitische Ideologie, die im 19. Jahrhundert in Großbritannien entstand. Sie ist in Skandinavien – vor allem in Freimaurerkreisen – verbreitet."
http://www.kreuz.net/article.1 ​3616.html

 

La musique du Doudou (Mons, Hainaut)

 

La musique du Doudou (Mons, Hainaut)

Doudou 2010 - Le combat

 

Combat du lumeçon

 

Keith Preston: Understanding Carl Schmitt

 

Keith Preston: Understanding Carl Schmitt

Carl Schmitt: The Conservative Revolutionary Habitus and the Aesthetics of Horror

Carl Schmitt: The Conservative Revolutionary Habitus and the Aesthetics of Horror

Richard Wolin

Ex: http://freespeechproject.com/

 

"Carl Schmitt's polemical discussion of political Romanticism conceals the aestheticizing oscillations of his own political thought. In this respect, too, a kinship of spirit with the fascist intelligentsia reveals itself."
—Jürgen Habermas, "The Horrors of Autonomy: Carl Schmitt in English"

"The pinnacle of great politics is the moment in which the enemy comes into view in concrete clarity as the enemy."
—Carl Schmitt, The Concept of the Political (1927)

Only months after Hitler's accession to power, the eminently citable political philosopher and jurist Carl Schmitt, in the ominously titled work, Staat, Bewegung, Volk, delivered one of his better known dicta. On January 30, 1933, observes Schmitt, "one can say that 'Hegel died.'" In the vast literature on Schmitt's role in the National Socialist conquest of power, one can find many glosses on this one remark, which indeed speaks volumes. But let us at the outset be sure to catch Schmitt's meaning, for Schmitt quickly reminds us what he does not intend by this pronouncement: he does not mean to impugn the hallowed tradition of German étatistme, that is, of German "philosophies of state," among which Schmitt would like to number his own contributions to the annals of political thought. Instead, it is Hegel qua philosopher of the "bureaucratic class" or Beamtenstaat that has been definitely surpassed with Hitler's triumph. For "bureaucracy" (cf. Max Weber's characterization of "legal-bureaucratic domination") is, according to its essence, a bourgeois form of rule. As such, this class of civil servants—which Hegel in the Rechtsphilosophie deems the "universal class"—represents an impermissable drag on the sovereignty of executive authority. For Schmitt, its characteristic mode of functioning, which is based on rules and procedures that are fixed, preestablished, calculable, qualifies it as the very embodiment of bourgeois normalcy—a form of life that Schmitt strove to destroy and transcend in virtually everything he thought and wrote during the 1920s, for the very essence of the bureaucratic conduct of business is reverence for the norm, a standpoint that could not exist in great tension with the doctrines of Carl Schmitt himself, whom we know to be a philosopher of the state of emergency—of the Auhsnamhezustand (literally, the "state of exception"). Thus, in the eyes of Schmitt, Hegel had set an ignominious precedent by according this putative universal class a position of preeminence in his political thought, insofar as the primacy of the bureaucracy tends to diminish or supplant the perogative of sovereign authority.

But behind the critique of Hegel and the provocative claim that Hitler's rise coincides with Hegel's metaphorical death (a claim, that while true, should have offered, pace Schmitt, little cause for celebration) lies a further indictment, for in the remarks cited, Hegel is simultaneously perceived as an advocate of the Rechtsstaat, of "constitutionalism" and "rule of law." Therefore, in the history of German political thought, the doctrines of this very German philosopher prove to be something of a Trojan horse: they represent a primary avenue via which alien bourgeois forms of political life have infiltrated healthy and autochthonous German traditions, one of whose distinguishing features is an rejection of "constitutionalism" and all it implies. The political thought of Hegel thus represents a threat—and now we encounter another one of Schmitt's key terms from the 1920s—to German homogeneity.

Schmitt's poignant observations concerning the relationship between Hegel and Hitler expresses the idea that one tradition in German cultural life—the tradition of German idealism—has come to an end and a new set of principles—based in effect on the category of völkish homogeneity (and all it implies for Germany's political future)—has arisen to take its place. Or, to express the same thought in other terms: a tradition based on the concept of Vernuft or "reason" has given way to a political system whose new raison d'être was the principle of authoritarian decision—whose consummate embodiment was the Führerprinzep, one of the ideological cornerstones of the post-Hegelian state. To be sure, Schmitt's insight remains a source of fascination owing to its uncanny prescience: in a statement of a few words, he manages to express the quintessence of some 100 years of German historical development. At the same time, this remark also remains worthy insofar as it serves as a prism through which the vagaries of Schmitt's own intellectual biography come into unique focues: it represents an unambiguous declaration of his satiety of Germany's prior experiments with constitutional government and of his longing for a total- or Führerstaat in which the ambivalences of the parliamentary system would be abolished once and for all. Above all, however, it suggest how readily Schmitt personally made the transition from intellectual antagonist of Weimar democracy to whole-hearted supporter of National Socialist revolution. Herein lies what one may refer to as the paradox of Carl Schmitt: a man who, in the words of Hannah Arendt, was a "convinced Nazi," yet "whose very ingenious theories about the end of democracy and legal government still make arresting reading."

The focal point of our inquiry will be the distinctive intellectual "habitus" (Bourdieu) that facilitated Schmitt's alacritous transformation from respected Weimar jurist and academician to "crown jurist of the Third Reich." To understand the intellectual basis of Schmitt's political views, one must appreciate his elective affinities with that generation of so-called conservative revolutionary thinkers whose worldview was so decisive in turning the tide of public opinion against the fledgling Weimar republic. As the political theorist Kurt Sontheimer has noted: "It is hardly a matter of controversy today that certain ideological predispositions in German thought generally, but particularly in the intellectual climate of the Weimar Republic, induced a large number of German electors under the Weimar Republic to consider the National Socialist movement as less problematic than it turned out to be." And even though the nationalsocialists and the conservative revolutionaries failed to see eye to eye on many points, their respective plans for a new Germany were sufficiently close that a comparison between them is able to "throw light on the intellectual atmosphere in which, when National Socialism arose, it could seem to be a more or less presentable doctrine." Hence "National Socialism . . . derived considerable profit from thinkers like Oswald Spengler, Arthur Moeller van den Bruck, and Ernst Jünger," despite their later parting of the ways. One could without much exaggeration label this intellectual movement protofascistic, insofar as its general ideological effect consisted in providing a type of ideological-spiritual preparation for the National Socialist triumph.

 

Schmitt himself was never an active member of the conservative revolutionary movement, whose best known representatives—Spengler, Jünger, and van den Bruck—have been named by Sontheimer (though one might add Hans Zehrer and Othmar Spann). It would be fair to say that the major differences between Schmitt and his like-minded, influential group of right-wing intellectuals concerned a matter of form rather than substance: unlike Schmitt, most of whose writings appeared in scholarly and professional journals, the conservative revolutionaries were, to a man, nonacademics who made names for themselves as Publizisten—that is, as political writers in that same kaleidoscope and febrile world of Weimar Offentlichkeit that was the object of so much scorn in their work. But Schmitt's status as a fellow traveler in relation to the movement's main journals (such as Zehrer's influential Die Tat, activities, and circles notwithstanding, his profound intellectual affinities with this group of convinced antirepublicans are impossible to deny. In fact, in the secondary literature, it has become more common than not simply to include him as a bona fide member of the group.

The intellectual habitus shared by Schmitt and the conservative revolutionaries is in no small measure of Nietzschean derivation. Both subscribed to the immoderate verdict registered by Nietzsche on the totality of inherited Western values: those values were essentially nihilistic. Liberalism, democracy, utlitarianism, individualism, and Enlightenment rationalism were the characteristic belief structures of the decadent capitalist West; they were manifestations of a superficial Zivilisation, which failed to measure up to the sublimity of German Kultur. In opposition to a bourgeois society viewed as being in an advanced state of decomposition, Schmitt and the conservative revolutionaries counterposed the Nietzschean rites of "active nihilism." In Nietzsche's view, whatever is falling should be given a final push. Thus one of the patented conceptual oppositions proper to the conservative revolutionary habitus was that between the "hero" (or "soldier") and the "bourgeois." Whereas the hero thrives on risk, danger, and uncertainity, the life of bourgeois is devoted to petty calculations of utility and security. This conceptual opposition would occupy center stage in what was perhaps the most influential conservative revolutionary publication of the entire Weimar period, Ernst Jünger's 1932 work, Der Arbeiter (the worker), where it assumes the form of a contrast between "the worker-soldier" and "the bourgeois." If one turns, for example, to what is arguably Schmitt's major work of the 1920s, The Concept of the Political (1927), where the famous "friend-enemy" distinction is codified as the raison d'être of politics, it is difficult to ignore the profound conservative revolutionary resonances of Schmitt's argument. Indeed, it would seem that such resonances permeate, Schmitt's attempt to justify politics primarily in martial terms; that is, in light of the ultimate instance of (or to use Schmitt's own terminology) Ernstfall of battle (Kampf) or war.

Once the conservative revolutionary dimension of Schmitt's thought is brought to light, it will become clear that the continuities in his pre- and post-1933 political philosophy and stronger than the discontinuities. Yet Schmitt's own path of development from arch foe of Weimar democracy to "convinced Nazi" (Arendt) is mediated by a successive series of intellectual transformations that attest to his growing political radicalisation during the 1920s and early 1930s. He follows a route that is both predictable and sui generis: predictable insomuch as it was a route traveled by an entire generation of like-minded German conservative and nationalist intellectuals during the interwar period; sui generis, insofar as there remains an irreducible originality and perspicacity to the various Zeitdiagnosen proffered by Schmitt during the 1920s, in comparison with the at times hackneyed and familar formulations of his conservative revolutionary contemporaries.

The oxymoronic designation "conservative revolutionary" is meant to distinguish the radical turn taken during the interwar period by right-of-center German intellectuals from the stance of their "traditional conservative" counterparts, who longed for a restoration of the imagined glories of earlier German Reichs and generally stressed the desirability of a return to premodern forms of social order (e.g., Tönnies Gemeinschaft) based on aristocratic considerations of rank and privilege. As opposed to the traditional conservatives, the conservative revolutionaries (and this is true of Jünger, van den Bruck, and Schmitt), in their reflections of the German defeat in the Great War, concluded that if Germany were to be successful in the next major European conflagaration, premodern or traditional solutions would not suffice. Instead, what was necessary was "modernization," yet a form of modernization that was at the same time compatible with the (albeit mythologized) traditional German values of heroism, "will" (as opposed to "reason"), Kultur, and hierarchy. In sum, what was desired was a modern community. As Jeffrey Herf has stressed in his informative book on the subject, when one searches for the ideological origins of National Socialism, it is not so much Germany's rejection of modernity that is at issue as its selective embrace of modernity. Thus National Socialist's triumph, far from being characterized by a disdain of modernity simpliciter, was marked simultaneously by an assimilation of technical modernity and a repudiation of Western political modernity: of the values of political liberalism as they emerge from the democratic revolutions of the eighteenth century. This describes the essence of the German "third way" or Sonderweg: Germany's special path to modernity that is neither Western in the sense of England and France nor Eastern in the sense of Russia or pan-slavism.

Schmitt began his in the 1910s as a traditonal conservative, namely, as a Catholic philosopher of state. As such, his early writings revolved around a version of political authoritarianism in which the idea of a strong state was defended at all costs against the threat of liberal encroachments. In his most significant work of the decade, The Value of the State and the Significance of the Individual (1914), the balance between the two central concepts, state and individual, is struck one-sidely in favour of the former term. For Schmitt, the state, in executing its law-promulgating perogatives, cannot countenance any opposition. The uncompromising, antiliberal conclusion he draws from this observation is that "no individual can have full autonomy within the state." Or, as Schmitt unambiguously expresses a similar thought elsewhere in the same work: "the individual" is merely "a means to the essence, the state is what is important." Thus, although Schmitt displayed little inclination for the brand of jingoistic nationalism so prevalent among his German academic mandarin brethern during the war years, as Joseph Bendersky has observed, "it was precisely on the point of authoritarianism vs. liberal individualism that the views of many Catholics [such as Schmitt] and those of non-Catholic conservatives coincided."

But like other German conservatives, it was Schmitt's antipathy to liberal democratic forms of government, coupled with the political turmoil of the Weimar republic, that facilitated his transformation from a traditional conservative to a conservative revolutionary. To be sure, a full account of the intricacies of Schmitt's conservative revolutionary "conversion" would necessitate a year by year account of his political thought during the Weimar period, during which Schmitt's intellectual output was nothing if prolific, (he published virtually a book a year). Instead, for the sake of concision and the sake of fidelity to the leitmotif of the "conservative revolutionary habitus," I have elected to concentrate on three key aspects of Schmitt's intellectual transformation during this period: first, his sympathies with the vitalist (lebensphilosophisch) critique of modern rationalism; second, his philosophy of history during these years; and third, his protofascistic of the conservative revolutionary doctrine of the "total state." All three aspects, moreover, are integrally interrelated.

II.

The vitalist critique of Enlightenment rationalism is of Nietzschean provenance. In opposition to the traditional philosophical image of "man" qua animal rationalis, Nietzsche counterposes his vision of "life [as] will to power." In the course of this "transvaluation of all values," the heretofore marginalized forces of life, will, affect, and passion should reclaim the position of primacy they once enjoyed before the triumph of "Socratism." It is in precisely this spirit that Nietzsche recommends that in the future, we philosophize with our affects instead of with concepts, for in the culture of European nihilism that has triumphed with the Enlightenment, "the essence of life, its will to power, is ignored," argues Nietzsche; "one overlooks the essential priority of the spontaneous, aggressive, expansive, form-giving forces that give new interpretations and directions."

It would be difficult to overestimate the power and influence this Nietzschean critique exerted over an entire generation of antidemocratic German intellectuals during the 1920s. The anticivilizational ethos that pervades Spengler's Decline of the West—the defence of "blood and tradition" against the much lamented forces of societal rationalisation—would be unthinkable without that dimension of vitalistic Kulturkritik to which Nietzsche's work gave consummate expression. Nor would it seem that the doctrines of Klages, Geist als Widersacher der Seele (Intellect as the Antagonist of the Soul; 1929-31), would have captured the mood of the times as well as they did had it not been for the irrevocable precedent set by Nietzsche's work, for the central opposition between "life" and "intellect," as articulated by Klages and so many other German "anti-intellectual intellectuals" during the interwar period, represents an unmistakably Nietzschean inheritance.

While the conservative revolutionary components of Schmitt's worldview have been frequently noted, the paramount role played by the "philosophy of life"—above all, by the concept of cultural criticism proper to Lebensphilosophie—on his political thought has escaped the attention of most critics. However, a full understanding of Schmitt's status as a radical conservative intellectual is inseparable from an appreciation of an hitherto neglected aspect of his work.

In point of fact, determinate influences of "philosophy of life"—a movement that would feed directly into the Existenzphilosophie craze of the 1920s (Heidegger, Jaspers, and others)—are really discernable in Schmitt's pre-Weimar writings. Thus, in one of his first published works, Law and Judgment (1912), Schmitt is concerned with demonstrating the impossibility of understanding the legal order in exclusively rationalist terms, that is, as a self-sufficient, complete system of legal norms after the fashion of legal positivism. It is on this basis that Schmitt argues in a particular case, a correct decision cannot be reached solely via a process of deducation or generalisation from existing legal precedents or norms. Instead, he contends, there is always a moment of irreducible particularity to each case that defies subsumption under general principles. It is precisely this aspect of legal judgment that Schmitt finds most interesting and significant. He goes on to coin a phrase for this "extralegal" dimension that proves an inescapable aspect of all legal decision making proper: the moment of "concrete indifference," the dimension of adjudication that transcends the previously established legal norm. In essence, the moment of "concrete indifference" represents for Schmitt a type of vital substrate, an element of "pure life," that forever stands opposed to the formalism of laws as such. Thus at the heart of bourgeois society—its legal system—one finds an element of existential particularity that defies the coherence of rationalist syllogizing or formal reason.

The foregoing account of concrete indifference is a matter of more than passing or academic interest insofar as it proves a crucial harbinger of Schmitt's later decisionistic theory of sovereignty, for its its devaluation of existing legal norms as a basis for judicial decision making, the category of concrete indifference points towards the imperative nature of judicial decision itself as a self-sufficient and irreducible basis of adjudication. The vitalist dimension of Schmitt's early philosophy of law betrays itself in his thoroughgoing denigration of legal normativism—for norms are a product of arid intellectualism (Intelligenz) and, as such, hostile to life (lebensfeindlick)—and the concomitant belief that the decision alone is capable of bridging the gap between the abstractness of law and the fullness of life.

The inchoate vitalist sympathies of Schmitt's early work become full blown in his writings of the 1920s. Here, the key text is Political Theology (1922), in which Schmitt formulates his decisionist theory of politics, or, as he remarks in the work's often cited first sentance: "Sovereign is he who decides the state of exception [Ausnahmezustand]."

It would be tempting to claim from this initial, terse yet lapidry definition of sovereignty, one may deduce the totality of Schmitt's mature political thought, for it contains what we know to the be the two keywords of his political philosophy during these years: decision and the exception. Both in Schmitt's lexicon are far from value-neutral or merely descriptive concepts. Instead, they are both accorded unambiguously positive value in the economy of his thought. Thus one of the hallmarks of Schmitt's political philosophy during the Weimar years will be a privileging of Ausnahmezustand, or state of exception, vis-à-vis political normalcy.

It is my claim that Schmitt's celebration of the state of exception over conditions of political normalcy—which he essentially equates with legal positivism and "parliamentarianism"—has its basis in the vitalist critique of Enlightenment rationalism. In his initial justification of the Ausnahmezustand in Political Theology, Schmitt leaves no doubt concerning the historical pedigree of such concepts. Thus following the well-known definition of sovereignty cited earlier, he immediantly underscores its status as a "borderline concept"—a Grenzbegriff, a concept "pertaining to the outermost sphere." It is precisely this fascination with extreme or "boundry situations" (Grenzsituationen—K. Jaspers—those unique moments of existential peril that become a proving ground of individual "authenticity"—that characterizes Lebensphilosophie's sweeping critique of bourgeois "everydayness." Hence in the Grenzsituationen, Dasein glimpses transcendence and is thereby transformed from possible to real Existenz." In parallel fashion, Schmitt, by according primacy to the "state of exception" as opposed to political normalcy, tries to invest the emergency situation with a higher, existential significance and meaning.

According to the inner logic of this conceptual scheme, the "state of exception" becomes the basis for a politics of authenticity. In contrast to conditions of political normalcy, which represent the unexalted reign of the "average, the "medicore," and the "everyday," the state of exception proves capable of reincorporating a dimension of heroism and greatness that is sorely lacking in routinized, bourgeois conduct of political life.

Consequently, the superiority of the state as the ultimate, decisionistic arbiter over the emergency situation is a matter that, in Schmitt's eyes, need not be argued for, for according to Schmitt, "every rationalist interpretation falsifies the immediacy of life." Instead, in his view, the state represents a fundamental, irrefragable, existential verity, as does the category of "life" in Nietzsche's philosophy, or, as Schmitt remarks with a characteristic pith in Political Theology, "The existence of the state is undoubted proof of its superiority over the validity of the legal norm." Thus "the decision [on the state of exception] becomes instantly independent of argumentative substantiation and receives autonomous value."

But as Franz Neumann observes in Behemoth, given the lack of coherence of National Socialist ideology, the rationales provided for totalitarian practice were often couched specifically in vitalist or existential terms. In Neumann's words,

 

[Given the incoherence of National Socialist ideology], what is left as justification for the [Grossdeutsche] Reich? Not racism, not the idea of the Holy Roman Empire, and certainly not some democratic nonsense like popular sovereignty or self-determination. Only the Reich itself remains. It is its own justification. The philosophical roots of the argument are to be found in the existential philosophy of Heidegger. Transferred to the realm of politics, exisentialism argues that power and might are true: power is a sufficient theoretical basis for more power.

 

[Excerpts from The Seduction of Unreason: The Intellectual Romance with Fascism from Nietzsche to Postmodernism (2004).]

Britische Geheimdienste: Viele der Randalierer gehören zu kriminellen Familien

Udo Ulfkotte

 

Der technische britische Geheimdienst GCHQ mit Sitz in Cheltenham hat im Auftrag des Premierministers und in Zusammenarbeit mit Scotland Yard einen ersten Teil jener BBM (BlackBerry Messenger) Nachrichten ausgewertet, mit denen die Plünderungen und Brandschatzungen in London im Hintergrund koordiniert wurden. Nach offiziellen Angaben handelt es sich bei den Hintermännern der Unruhen in der ersten Nacht demnach keinesfalls um »sozial unzufriedene Jugendliche«, sondern um den Sicherheitsbehörden bestens bekannte Mitglieder krimineller Familien.

 

BBM (BlackBerry Messenger) Nachrichten sind verschlüsselt und lassen sich für die »normalen« Strafverfolgungsbehörden nicht zur Telefonnummer des Absenders zurückverfolgen. Doch der GCHQ hat den erforderlichen Krypto-Schlüssel. Mehrere Hundert Mitglieder krimineller Gangs, die sich an den ersten Plünderungen beteiligt haben und entsprechende BBM an Bandenmitglieder gesendet hatten, wurden mittlerweise vom GCHQ identifiziert.

Mehr: http://info.kopp-verlag.de/hintergruende/europa/udo-ulfkotte/britische-geheimdienste-viele-der-randalierer-gehoeren-zu-kriminellen-familien.html

Der mysteriöse Tod Osama bin Ladens

Der mysteriöse Tod Osama bin Ladens: manipulierte Beweise, wo es eigentlich keine gibt

Paul Craig Roberts

 

Das Magazin The New Yorker veröffentlichte am 8. August einen Artikel von Nicholas Schmidle, der auf den Informationen einer nicht identifizierten Quelle beruht, die behauptet, mit der angeblichen amerikanischen Operation zur Ermordung Osama bin Ladens bestens vertraut zu sein. Eigentlich enthält der Artikel keine nützlichen Informationen. Sein Sinn scheint darin zu bestehen, Lücken in der ursprünglichen Darstellung wegzuerklären oder zu vertuschen. Im Kern geht es um die Frage, warum die Spezialeinheit SEALS einen unbewaffneten, keinen Widerstand leistenden Osama bin Laden töteten, dessen Gefangennahme sich doch als Goldmine an Informationen über Terrorismus hätte erweisen und dessen Schauprozess die in sich zusammenbrechende regierungsamtliche Darstellung der Ereignisse vom 11. September 2001 hätte retten können?

 

Dazu teilt uns der leichtgläubige Schmidle mit: »Es war niemals geplant, ihn einzusperren oder festzunehmen – diese Entscheidung wurde nicht in Sekundenbruchteilen vor Ort getroffen. ›Niemand wollte, dass Gefangene gemacht werden‹, erklärte der Offizier für Spezialeinsätze mir gegenüber.«

Und warum warfen die SEAL-Soldaten bin Ladens Körper in das Meer, anstatt der skeptischen Weltöffentlichkeit diesen Beweis vorzulegen?

MEHR: http://info.kopp-verlag.de/hintergruende/geostrategie/paul-craig-roberts/der-mysterioese-tod-osama-bin-ladens-manipulierte-beweise-wo-es-eigentlich-keine-gibt.html

Jonathan Bowden on Thomas Carlyle

 

Jonathan Bowden on Thomas Carlyle