The Fourth Political Theory Alexander Dugin T F P T HE OURTH OLITICAL HEORY ARKTOS L 2012 ONDON First English edition published in 2012 by Arktos Media Ltd. Copyright to the English edition © 2012 by Arktos Media Ltd. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or utilised in any form or by any means (whether electronic or mechanical), including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher. Printed in the United Kingdom. 978-1-907166-65-5 ISBN BIC classification: Social forecasting, future studies (JFFR) Social & political philosophy (HPS) Translation: Mark Sleboda & Michael Millerman Editor: John B. Morgan Proofreader: Michael J. Brooks Cover Design: Andreas Nilsson Layout: Daniel Friberg ARKTOS MEDIA LTD www.arktos.com T C ABLE OF ONTENTS A NOTE FROM THE EDITOR FOREWORD BY ALAIN SORAL: WHY WE SHOULD READ ALEXANDER DUGIN INTRODUCTION: TO BE OR NOT TO BE? 1. THE BIRTH OF THE CONCEPT 2. DASEIN AS AN ACTOR 3. THE CRITIQUE OF MONOTONIC PROCESSES 4. THE REVERSIBILITY OF TIME 5. GLOBAL TRANSITION AND ITS ENEMIES 6. CONSERVATISM AND POSTMODERNITY 7. ‘CIVILISATION’ AS AN IDEOLOGICAL CONCEPT 8. THE TRANSFORMATION OF THE LEFT IN THE TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY 9. LIBERALISM AND ITS METAMORPHOSES 10. THE ONTOLOGY OF THE FUTURE 11. THE NEW POLITICAL ANTHROPOLOGY: THE POLITICAL MAN AND HIS MUTATIONS 12. FOURTH POLITICAL PRACTICE 13. GENDER IN THE FOURTH POLITICAL THEORY 14. AGAINST THE POSTMODERN WORLD APPENDIX I APPENDIX II A N E OTE FROM THE DITOR The bulk of the text in this book was published as Chetvertaia politicheskaia teoriia, which was published in St. Petersburg in 2009 by Amphora. The text has been revised by the author, and additional chapters have been added to this edition from other writings by Professor Dugin which were published later, dealing with the same theme. Unless otherwise indicated, the footnotes to the text were included by the author himself. Additional footnotes which were added by me for reference are so marked. Where sources in other languages have been cited, I have attempted to replace them with existing English-language editions. Citations to works for which I could locate no translation are retained in their original language. Web site addresses for on-line sources were verified as accurate and available during the period of March through May, 2012. I would like to thank Alain Soral, who allowed us to use his Preface from the French edition of this book here, and also Sergio Knipe, who translated it into English. I would also like to extend my gratitude to Mark Sleboda, who spent many hours working on the translation and improving it; to Michael Millerman, who provided us with the translations for chapters 6 through 9; and to Michael J. Brooks, who proofread the manuscript. Others who volunteered their time in working on the translation were Natella Speranskaja, Zhirayr Ananyan, Nina Kouprianova, Fedor Smirnov, Valentin Cherednikov, Cyrill Lazareff, and Ivan Fedorov. I also extend my appreciation to Mark Dyal, who helped by tracking down the source of a very tricky Nietzsche quotation cited in the text. JOHN B. MORGAN IV Bangalore, India, May 2012 F A S : W W S OREWORD BY LAIN ORAL HY E HOULD R A D EAD LEXANDER UGIN W hen the notions of Right and Left have become politically meaningless, in the West as much as everywhere else in the world; when liberals and libertarians agree on the essentials; when the three grand political theories of the Twentieth century — capitalism, Communism and fascism — have ultimately proven incapable of governing peoples peaceably, what is left to do? According to Alexander Dugin, a teacher of sociology and geopolitics at the renowned Lermontov University of Moscow, and one of the most influential intellectuals in Russia, only one, radical solution remains: to devise a different approach, a Fourth Political Theory. Conceptualising and theorising it: such is the aim of the present book. The thought of this brilliant Moscow intellectual, which transcends our Western ideological divides and media-conditioned reactions, will not fail to surprise conformists: for it suggests that in order for us to face the future in a resolute and victorious way, we should revert to traditional forms of spirituality. According to Dugin, the primary target must be Western postmodernism: we must wage war upon this thalassocratic Empire — a morbid blend of the society of the spectacle[1] and consumer culture — and its plan for ultimate world domination. In Fourth Political Theory, Dugin shows that the only way to build a multipolar world, founded on authentic values, is to resolutely turn one’s back on the Atlanticist West and its false values. And how can this be achieved? Only by unconditionally preserving the geopolitical sovereignty of the powers of the Eurasian continent — Russia, China, Iran and India — which safeguard the freedom of all other peoples on the planet. A genuine manual for cultural guerrilla warfare, Fourth Political Theory is a book that can be seen as a complement to my own Comprendre l’empire[2] (which has been translated into Russian by friends of Alexander Dugin’s). Dugin in Moscow, I (and others) in Paris...while we only met for the first time in January 2011, and never consulted with one another, our ideas — no doubt formulated differently — agree on all the important points: from the need to unite the value-centred Right and the labour-centred Left to the imperative need for resistance against the Empire, from the appeal to Tradition as well as to many other concepts... Once again, this shows that the only worthwhile international is that of the spirit, led by good men! Alain Soral (Translated by Sergio Knipe) I : T B N B ? NTRODUCTION O E OR OT TO E I n today’s world, politics appears to be a thing of the past, at least as we used to know it. Liberalism persistently fought against those of its political enemies which had offered alternative systems; that is, conservatism, monarchism, traditionalism, fascism, socialism, and Communism, and finally, by the end of the Twentieth century, had defeated them all. It would be logical to assume that politics would become liberal, while all of its marginalised opponents, surviving in the peripheral fringes of global society, would reconsider their strategies and formulate a new united front according to Alain de Benoist’s[3] periphery against the centre.[4] Instead, at the beginning of the Twenty-first century, everything followed a different script. Liberalism, which had always insisted on de-emphasising the importance of politics, made the decision to abolish politics completely after its triumph. Maybe this was to prevent the rise of political alternatives and to ensure its eternal rule, or because its political agenda had simply expired with the absence of ideological rivals, the existence of which Carl Schmitt[5] had considered indispensable for the proper construction of a political position.[6] Regardless of the rationale, liberalism did everything possible to ensure the collapse of politics. At the same time, liberalism itself has changed, passing from the level of ideas, political programmes and declarations to the level of reality, penetrating the very flesh of the social fabric, which became suffused with liberalism and, in turn, it began to seem like the natural order of things. This was presented not as a political process, but as a natural and organic one. As a consequence of such a historical transformation, all other political ideologies, passionately feuding against each other during the last century, lost their currency. Conservatism, fascism and Communism, together with their many variations, lost the battle, and triumphant liberalism mutated into a lifestyle: consumerism, individualism, and a postmodern manifestation of the fragmented and sub-political being. Politics became biopolitical,[7] moving to the individual and sub-individual level. It turns out that it was not only the defeated political ideologies that left the stage, but politics itself, and even liberalism, in its ideological forms, exited. This is why it became nearly impossible to imagine an alternative form of politics. Those who do not agree with liberalism find themselves in a difficult situation — the triumphant enemy has dissolved and disappeared; now they are left struggling against the air. How can one engage in politics, if there is no politics? There is only one way out — to reject the classical political theories, both winners and losers, strain our imaginations, seize the reality of a new world, correctly decipher the challenges of postmodernity, and create something new — something beyond the political battles of the Nineteenth and Twentieth centuries. Such an approach is an invitation to the development of the Fourth Political Theory — beyond Communism, fascism and liberalism. To move forward towards the development of a Fourth Political Theory, it is necessary to: • reconsider the political history of recent centuries from new positions beyond the frameworks and clichés of the old ideologies; • realise and become aware of the profound structure of the global society emerging before our eyes; • correctly decipher the paradigm of postmodernity; • learn to oppose not the political idea, programme or strategy, but the ‘objective’ reality of the status quo, the most social aspect of the apolitical, fractured (post-) society; • and finally, construct an autonomous political model which offers a new way and a project for the world of deadlocks, blind alleys, and the endless recycling of the ‘same old things’ (post-history, according to Baudrillard). [8] This book is dedicated to this very problem — as the beginning of the development of a Fourth Political Theory, through an overview and re- examination of the first three political theories, and to the closely-related ideologies of National Bolshevism and Eurasianism that came very close indeed to the Fourth Political Theory. This is not dogma, nor a complete system, nor a finished project. This is an invitation to political creativity, a statement of intuitions and conjectures, an analysis of new conditions, and an attempt to reconsider the past. The Fourth Political Theory is not the work of a single author, but is rather a trend comprising a wide spectrum of ideas, researches, analyses, prognoses, and projects. Anyone thinking in this vein can contribute his own ideas. As such, more and more intellectuals, philosophers, historians, scientists, scholars, and thinkers will respond to this call. It is significant that the book, Against Liberalism,[9] by the renowned French intellectual Alain de Benoist, which has also been published in Russian by Amphora, has a subtitle: Towards the Fourth Political Theory. Undoubtedly, many things can be said on this theme by representatives of both the old Left and the old Right and, most likely, even by liberals themselves, who are