Abstract
Political theory plays a subordinate role in contemporary literary and cultural studies. This is in error, because it can contribute to a differentiated understanding of the correlation of literary and political order, particularly when it comes to empire. This chapter unfolds this thesis on the basis of the political theory of Herfried Münkler and its application to the Habsburg Empire. Münkler’s theory of empire, seen as a major contribution to the developing field of critical imperial studies, as well as his writings on the subject of political myths and narratives prove to be a complex and coherent theoretical tool that allows us to link main concepts such as form, myth and narrative thereby strengthening the crossroads between political, cultural and literary studies. They also illustrate significant relevance for a comprehension of literary and political orders of the twentieth century. In three consecutive steps, the political theory of Münkler can be grasped in ways that are relevant to literary and cultural studies: empire and imperial mission; imperial mission, form and myth; and myth building and demythologising through narration. In regards to the last this chapter goes beyond Münkler in order to emphasise the epistemological power of literature, especially in the form of the post-imperial novel.
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Notes
- 1.
Some passages included have been translated from an earlier work by the author: see Chap. 1 in Christine Magerski, Imperiale Welten. Literatur und politische Theorie am Beispiel Habsburg© Velbrück Wissenschaft 2018.
- 2.
For a critique of the ahistorical perspective of postcolonial theory, see Kennedy 1996.
- 3.
For the most recent discussion on the difference between empires and nation-states, see Malešević 2017.
- 4.
Particularism is to be understood here as the striving of nations or regions to enforce their own special interests against general interests. On the other hand, universalism, which claims to protect general interests, denotes a mode of thinking or doctrine, which emphasises the primacy of the universal, of the whole, or in this particular case, of the empire over particular nations.
- 5.
On the topic of imperial expansion through assertion of “civilizing missions” see Münkler and Straßenberger (2017, 378).
- 6.
According to Münkler, an imperial power develops a real portfolio of forms: alongside political power are cultural, military and economic ones.
- 7.
On Ernst Cassirer as the key figure of the cultural turn, see Rudolph (2004, 39 and 42).
- 8.
This question does not arise for the first time with the imperial mission; early cultural science research tried to support the power of the symbolic, systematizing the semantic space with the concept of symbolic forms. A brief reminder of the early days of formalistic cultural science may illuminate Münkler’s position between cultural and political sciences: as cultural sociologist Georg Simmel used the symbolic form of money to demonstrate the reciprocal effect that stands behind any process of cultural objectification, cultural philosopher Ernst Cassirer turned myth towards that symbolic form. Münkler picks this up, following the “turn from the general concept of the world to the general concept of culture ” (Cassirer 1987, I: 11) in political science. But while Cassirer stops before myth, Münkler continues answering the question surrounding myth’s consecrating power with narration.
- 9.
An analysis of Musil’s parallel action as one of collectively binding decision-making is pending. It would demand what Frank Nullmeier pretends for the analysis of politics as a whole: the methodically guided recording of relevant collectivities of intended or actual decisions, and of the types of liability creation and security in question. For further information, see Nullmeier (2004, 490).
- 10.
The so-called parallel action is explained by Musil himself in 1926 in the famous interview with Oskar Maurus Fontana : “The year 1918 would have brought the 70th jubilee of the reign of Franz Joseph I and the 35-year-old Wilhelms II. From this future meeting a race of mutual patriots develops, which want to beat each other and the world, and end up in the Kladderadatsch of 1914”. The novel covers only the year of the turn from 1913 to 1914.
- 11.
On the concept of the responsive structure and its manifestation in the field of science, see Kaldewey (2005).
- 12.
On the difference between fictional and non-fictional narratives with regard to their argumentative function, see Olmos (2013).
- 13.
This critical narrative space must be distinguished from those narratives , which, as Siniša Malešević (2017, 9) notes, “invoke the historical legacies of former empires in order to boost their national narratives ”, even for a small nation-state such as Austria.
- 14.
For more details, see Magerski (2018b).
- 15.
On the “meaningful function of narration” and the “cultural achievement” of narration for each form of identity formation, see Fulda (2011).
- 16.
On the strong and weak forms of narration , see Weber (1998, 20 and 64–70).
- 17.
On the special nature of the narrative form from an ethical perspective, see Meuther (2004, 154).
- 18.
On meaning as a relational construct, see Fulda (2004, 263).
- 19.
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Magerski, C. (2021). Theory of Empire, Mythology and the Power of the Narrative. In: Chovanec, J., Heilo, O. (eds) Narrated Empires. Modernity, Memory and Identity in South-East Europe. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-55199-5_14
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