Abstract
This chapter take its bearings from some important comments made by Leo Strauss and Alexandre Kojève during their debate on tyranny that sheds light on the political predicament besetting America by the ascendancy of Donald Trump as the President of the United States. The chief assertion of the essay can be stated thus: the disagreement between Kojève and Strauss regarding the ills of globalization is less important that their agreement on the need for civility in politics. In the first part, it is argued that for Kojève the “end of history” is only a hypothesis and Trump is judged accordingly. In the second part, it is stated that Strauss was not a defender of the modern nation-state on grounds highlighted by classical ancient Greek philosophy. The idea is advanced that Strauss would have not regarded Trump’s nationalism as a way out of the dilemmas facing the American polity.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Similar content being viewed by others
Notes
- 1.
He says that the election pitted “globalism versus nationalism, universalism versus particularism, levelling similarity versus genuine diversity, the “universal and homogeneous state” versus a heterogeneous community of separate and distinct nations .” “A progressive Smear against Pro-Trump Intellectuals ” American Greatness, October 17, 2016.
- 2.
The locus classicus is Leo Strauss , On Tyranny, Corrected and expanded edition, including The Strauss-Kojève Correspondence, ed. Victor Gourevitch and Michael S. Roth, (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2013). However, the quotations here correspond, in the case of Kojève to Philosophy, History and Tyranny, Reexamining the Debate between Leo Strauss and Alexandre Kojève , ed. Timothy W. Burns and Bryan-Paul Frost (Albany: State University of New York Press, 2016). This edition contains an English translation of the second printed version of Kojève’s manuscript, as Tyrannie et Sagesse, in De la tyrannie (Paris: Gallimard, 1954), 215–280. As for Strauss, the quotations are taken from the fall issue, 2008, of Interpretation (Henceforth Interpretation), which contains an English translation of the more complete French version of Strauss’s “Restatement” (29–78).
- 3.
See footnote 15 of this essay.
- 4.
Decius: “For Strauss, the political and philosophic lives are the two highest answers to the fundamental question: How should I live?” American Greatness, “A Progressive smear against Pro-Trump Intellectuals ”, October, 16, 2016. On this point I agree with Heinrich Meier that the main alternatives are the philosophical life or the theological life. Although this point cannot possibly be developed here, I refer the reader to Meier’s work for further provocation. See especially Über das Glück des philosophischen Lebens: Reflexionen zu Rousseaus Rêveries in zwei Büchern, (München: C.H. Beck, 2011) and Heinrich Meier, Politische Philosophie un die Herausforderung der Offenbarungsreligion, (München, C.H. Beck, 2013).
- 5.
Alexandre Kojève, Introduction à la lecture de Hegel, (Paris: Gallimard, 1947), 139. Heretofore LHI.
- 6.
According to Kojève contemplation allows us to negate the historically given.
- 7.
Among the attendees of Kojève’ s courses on Hegel were Raymond Queneau, George Bataille, Maurice Merleau-Ponty, André Breton, Jacques Lacan , Raymond Aron, among others.
- 8.
Whoever has read Kojève’s en guise d’introduction, to his collection of lectures on Hegel , should not overlook the tentative, hypothetical character of several of his sentences. One important example is the following: “Car si l ‘histoire de l’homme est l’histoire de son travail et ce travail n’est historique, social, humain qu’à condition de s’effectuer contre l’instinct ou «l’intérêt immédiat» du travailleur, le travail doit s’effectuer au service d’un autre, et il doit être un travail forcé, stimulé par l’angoisse de la mort”. ILH, 30. This sentence leaves open the possibility that the history of man may not be the history of his labor, a hypothesis which would bring Kojève’s whole project into a collapse.
- 9.
Ibid. Leo Strauss agrees with Kojève on this point. See his judgment on Friedrich Heinrich Jacobi in Leo Strauss on Moses Mendelssohn (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2012), 283.
- 10.
Since his youth, Kojève had seen himself as a philosopher in a Socratic fashion. See Tagebuch eines Philosophen, Matthes & Seitz Berlin (translated from the Russian into German by Simon Missal), 2015.
- 11.
ILH, 82.
- 12.
ILH, 15–16. The political theologian Carl Schmitt leaves open these two possibilities in The Concept of the Political, 53–54.
- 13.
Strauss and Kojève are both against historicism but admit the historical character of human thought. Kojève, Interpretation, 7.
- 14.
See the correspondence between Kojève and Schmitt in Interpretation, Vol. 29, No. 1 (Fall 2001), 103. The key statement by Kojève is located in the letter Paris, 11/VII 55. In responding to Schmitt’s objections to Kojève’s assertion that history has ended, Kojève writes: “But—as I have mentioned—a philosopher , and a Hegelian in addition, may not play the prophet.”
- 15.
“À l’heure actuelle ce sont ces États -nations qui, irrésistiblement, cèdent peu à peu la place aux formations politiques qui débordent les cadres nationaux et qu’on pourrait désigner par le terme «d’ Empires»”. “Esquisse d’un doctrine de la politique française” paragraph 10 in Hommage a Alexandre Kojève : Actes de la «Journée A. Kojève » du 28 janvier 2003 (Paris: Éditions de la Bibliothèque nationale de France, 2007), 86–98.
- 16.
In a note to the second edition of his lectures on Hegel , Kojève , corrects his previous view that the end of history will be tantamount to the re-animalization of human beings. Having spent some time in Japan, Kojève reached the conclusion that the future of the world belongs to the Japanese culture where the relation between subject and object has become totally formalized. Human beings are snobs. ILH, 436–437.
- 17.
Ibid. Paragraph 25. Kojève refers to the term “dolce farniente”.
- 18.
Alexander Dugin, Putin vs Putin: Vladimir Putin viewed from the Right, (Budapest: Arktos, 2015). Although Dugin supported Putin’s backing of Trump, his work can be read as a meditation of the insurmountable gulf that separates liberal America from Orthodox Slavic civilization.
- 19.
Extrait, paragraph 25.
- 20.
Alexandre Kojève , The Notion of Authority (A brief Presentation) Edited and introduced by François Terré and translated by Hager Weslati, Verso: 2014. For Kojève , elections do not give authority . On the contrary, someone is elected because he already possesses authority, 80.
- 21.
ILH, 85.
- 22.
The Art of the Deal can be read as a treatise promoting the life of pursuing leadership . In a speech in Mobile, Alabama occurring during his campaign Trump recommends that all politicians read this book to govern better. Trump’s book, philosophically speaking, takes its bearings from American pragmatism. Trump, of course, never held any public office before his election.
- 23.
ILH, 136–137.
- 24.
Max Weber, die Protestantische Ethik und der Geist des Kapitalismus, Edition Holzinger. Taschenbuch, Berlin, 2016, 197.
- 25.
James Burnham , The Managerial Revolution, New York, The John D. Company, Inc., 1941. James Burnham , The Machiavellians: Defenders of Freedom, New York, The John Day Company, Inc., 1943. Francis Fukuyama, “American Political Decay or Renewal?” Foreign Affairs, July/August, 2016.
- 26.
See Kojève’s retort to Strauss in their debate on tyranny.
- 27.
This is Kojève’s answer to Strauss’s query on whether the universal and homogeneous state is a political framework for the rise of the last man. ILH, “Note de la Seconde Édition,” 436–437.
- 28.
See essays on the subject in Philosophy, History and Tyranny, Reexamining the Debate between Leo Strauss and Alexandre Kojève . Op Cit.
- 29.
“Classical philosophy created the idea of the universal state. Modern philosophy, which is the secularized form of Christianity , created the idea of the universal and homogeneous state” Interpretation, 70.
- 30.
Leo Strauss read carefully the theoreticians of “The Lonely Crowd” such as David Riesman and was aware of the nihilistic and leveling potential of American society. See Leo Strauss, On Nietzsche ´s Thus spoke Zarathustra (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 2017), 65.
- 31.
“Hiero comes close to the Prince.” Interpretation, 39.
- 32.
“Ordinary return to the beginning means return to the terror accompanying the foundation .” Thoughts on Machiavelli, (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 167.
- 33.
Interpretation, 47–48.
- 34.
“The full authority under law should therefore be given to men who, thanks to their good upbringing, are capable of “completing” the laws (Memorabilia IV 6.12) or of interpreting them equitably.” Interpretation, 53.
- 35.
The classic study is Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr., The Imperial Presidency (New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1973 [2004])..
- 36.
Interpretation, 50.
- 37.
Interpretation, Ibid.
- 38.
Leo Strauss, What Is Political Philosophy (Chicago: University of Chicago Press: 1959 [1988]), 41.
- 39.
Interpretation, 63.
- 40.
Interpretation, 64.
- 41.
“Note on the Plan of Nietzsche’s Beyond Good and Evil” in Laurence Lampert, Leo Strauss and Nietzsche , (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1996), 197.
- 42.
Francis Fukuyama, Ibid.
- 43.
Interpretation, 64.
- 44.
Leo Strauss, Liberalism Ancient and Modern (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, (1968) 1989), 35.
- 45.
Interpretation, 72.
- 46.
“There will always be men ανδρες who will revolt against a state which is destructive of humanity or in which there is no longer a possibility of action and of great deeds.” Interpretation, 73.
- 47.
Interpretation, Ibid.
- 48.
Interpretation, 74.
- 49.
Ibid.
Bibliography
Burnham, James. 1941. The Managerial Revolution. New York: The John Day Company, Inc.
———. 1943. The Machiavellians: Defenders of Freedom. New York: The John Day Company, Inc.
Burns, Timothy W., and Byan-Paul Frost, eds. 2016. Philosophy, History and Tyranny, Reexamining the Debate Between Leo Strauss and Alexandre Kojève. Albany: State University of New York Press.
Dugin, Alexander. 2015. Putin vs Putin: Vladimir Putin Viewed from the Right. Budapest: Arktos.
Fukuyama, Francis. 2016. American Political Decay or Renewal? Foreign Affairs, July/August.
Hommage a Alexandre Kojève: Actes de la «Journée A. Kojève» du 28 janvier 2003. Paris: Éditions de la Bibliothèque nationale de France, 2007.
Kojève, Alexandre. 1947. Introduction à la lecture de Hegel. Paris: Gallimard.
———. 2014. The Notion of Authority (A Brief Presentation). Edited and introduced by François Terré and translated by Hager Weslati. New York: Verso.
———. 2015. Tagebuch eines Philosophen. Trans. Simon Missal. Berlin: Matthes & Seitz.
Lampert, Laurence. 1996. Leo Strauss and Nietzsche. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Schlesinger, Arthur M., Jr. 1973(2004). The Imperial Presidency. New York: Houghton Mifflin Company.
Schmitt, Carl. 1976. The Concept of the Political. Trans. George Schwab with comments on Schmitt’s Essay by Leo Strauss. New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press.
Strauss, Leo. 1958. Thoughts on Machiavelli. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press.
———. 1959. What Is Political Philosophy? Chicago: The University of Chicago Press. 1988.
———. 1961. On Tyranny. Corrected and expanded edition, including the Strauss-Kojève Correspondence, ed. Victor Gourevitch and Michael S. Roth. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. (2013).
———. 2008. Restatement, (edited by Emmanuel Patard). Interpretation: A Journal of Political Philosophy, 36: 1 (Fall), 29–78.
———. 2012. Leo Strauss on Moses Mendelssohn. Translated, edited, and with an interpretative essay by Martin D. Yaffe. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
———. 2017. On Nietzsche’s Thus spoke Zarathustra. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press.
Trump, Donald (with Tony Schwartz). 1987. The Art of the Deal. New York: Ballantine Books.
Weber, Max. 2016. Die Protestantische Ethik und der Geist des Kapitalismus. Berlin: Edition Holzinger.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2018 The Author(s)
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Torres, A.J. (2018). Nationalism, Universalism and Nihilism: Trump’s Politics in Light of the Strauss-Kojève Debate. In: Sable, M., Torres, A. (eds) Trump and Political Philosophy. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-74427-8_17
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-74427-8_17
Published:
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-319-74426-1
Online ISBN: 978-3-319-74427-8
eBook Packages: Political Science and International StudiesPolitical Science and International Studies (R0)