The Fourth Political Theory and Heidegger’s Dasein - Alexander Dugin

The Fourth Political Theory and Heidegger’s Dasein - Alexander Dugin

The Fourth Political Theory rejects the capitalism, individualism and ‘religion of money’, within liberalism; in Communism, materialism, atheism, progressivism and the theory of class struggle; in fascism, all forms of racism, totalitarianism and the idea of the dominance of one culture over another. On the other hand, the Fourth Political Theory borrows the idea of the value of freedom from liberalism; the ethical ideal of justice, equality and the harmonious development of coexistence based on the overcoming of alienation from Marxism; and from the ‘Third Way’ it takes the values of ethnos, nation, religion, spirituality, family, and the sacred.

These principles are entirely sufficient to construct a pluralistic and open system of intercultural and inter-civilisational dialogue. The subject of the Fourth Political Theory ought not to be the individual, class, race or the state, but Dasein — human existence, present and wellgrounded in its organic, cultural, linguistic and spiritual history. The term Dasein is the basis of Martin Heidegger’s philosophy and is borrowed by the Fourth Political Theory as essential to understanding the subject of the contemporary political process.

From the philosophical standpoint, the Fourth Political Theory can be attributed to the fields of phenomenology, structuralism, existentialism, ethno-sociology and cultural anthropology. All these philosophical and humanitarian fields of study focus on the variety of human cultures and see this variety as the highest value and the treasure of the human spirit, something that must not be eradicated and levelled out but carefully preserved, supported and protected in every way. All conflicts and disagreements should not be solved via violence, universalism and colonisation (whichever apologist phraseology it may hide behind), but through harmony and a dialogue between civilisations.

The Fourth Political Theory is an answer to the challenge of postmodernity, which stems from the logic of forgetting the essence of being and in removing humanity from its ontological and theological (spiritual) roots. It is impossible to respond to that with ‘one-day solution’ innovations or PR surrogates. It appears that in order to solve the most pressing issues of the global economic crisis, in order to resist the unipolar world, maintain and preserve sovereignty, and so on, it is essential to turn to the philosophical basis of history and to make a metaphysical effort. The Fourth Political Theory cannot emerge on its own. An exertion of will is required here, conceptual work: a disagreement with postmodernity and with the status quo; with the inertia-propelled development of history; with the disappearance of politics from life; and with the utter alienation of the individual from the sphere of politics, spirit, culture, civilisation, and from humanity in general. The Fourth Political Theory is a crusade against postmodernity, and against the post-industrial society, liberalism and globalism. This is the strategy of riding postmodernity; much like how the Eastern practices offer to ‘ride the tiger’. This is a search and a discovery of weak points in the global systems and the hacking of those points. It is not possible to just walk past postmodernity, globalism and hegemony and merely ignore them. Hence why the Fourth Political Theory must turn to the precursors to modernity and to what modernity actively fought, but what became almost entirely irrelevant to postmodernity. We must turn to tradition, to pre-modernity, archaism, theology, the sacred sciences, and ancient philosophy. In Russia’s case that means turning to the full Orthodox tradition, to its sources, to the mystical Orthodoxy of Byzantium, to even more ancient Platonic and Neo-Platonic doctrines, to the archaic layers of tradition, and to the highest super-rational creeds. Within the framework of the Fourth Political Theory we are also talking about a profound philosophical comprehension of being, about opening up the deep ontological source of human existence, and a careful understanding of the philosophical depth of experience that was made by Martin Heidegger — a thinker who made the unique effort of trying to construct a fundamental ontology — a deep, paradoxical, piercing teaching about being.

The Fourth Political Theory cannot be a task undertaken by an individual or even a limited group of people — it is for everyone to partake in. This effort must be a collective one. Representatives of other cultures from both Asia and Europe can help us here, as they feel the eschatological tension of the moment just as sharply, and they are just as desperately seeking an escape from the worldwide dead end.

The Fourth Political Theory must be developed by various peoples and cultures, and everyone can contribute. However, Russia, located in Eurasia, at the intersection of the cultural and civilisational tendencies of East and West, is destined to stand at the focal point of this conceptual process by the merit of its location alone. It comes as no surprise that the first systematic thoughts concerning this theory emerged in Russia.

Gramscian counter-hegemony calls for the formation of a counterhegemonic block, a Global Revolutionary Alliance which joins all those opposing capitalism and hegemony, Eurocentrism and racism, all of which are implicit in the idea of the universality of Western cultural values, the superiority of Western civilisation and modernisation. In the context of the theory of the multipolar world and the Fourth Political Theory, the theory of counter-hegemony gains a concrete cultural and civilisational space of a non-Eurocentric pluralistic universe. Contemporary counter-hegemony must be inclusive, which means engaging with all types of resistance to hegemony; this involves the Left and the Right, and positions and theories that are outside the boundaries of the political ideologies of modernity within the framework of the Fourth Political Theory.

The Fourth Political Theory and Heidegger’s Dasein - Alexander Dugin

The Fourth Political Theory rejects the capitalism, individualism and ‘religion of money’, within liberalism; in Communism, materialism, atheism, progressivism and the theory of class struggle; in fascism, all forms of racism, totalitarianism and the idea of the dominance of one culture over another. On the other hand, the Fourth Political Theory borrows the idea of the value of freedom from liberalism; the ethical ideal of justice, equality and the harmonious development of coexistence based on the overcoming of alienation from Marxism; and from the ‘Third Way’ it takes the values of ethnos, nation, religion, spirituality, family, and the sacred.

These principles are entirely sufficient to construct a pluralistic and open system of intercultural and inter-civilisational dialogue. The subject of the Fourth Political Theory ought not to be the individual, class, race or the state, but Dasein — human existence, present and wellgrounded in its organic, cultural, linguistic and spiritual history. The term Dasein is the basis of Martin Heidegger’s philosophy and is borrowed by the Fourth Political Theory as essential to understanding the subject of the contemporary political process.

From the philosophical standpoint, the Fourth Political Theory can be attributed to the fields of phenomenology, structuralism, existentialism, ethno-sociology and cultural anthropology. All these philosophical and humanitarian fields of study focus on the variety of human cultures and see this variety as the highest value and the treasure of the human spirit, something that must not be eradicated and levelled out but carefully preserved, supported and protected in every way. All conflicts and disagreements should not be solved via violence, universalism and colonisation (whichever apologist phraseology it may hide behind), but through harmony and a dialogue between civilisations.

The Fourth Political Theory is an answer to the challenge of postmodernity, which stems from the logic of forgetting the essence of being and in removing humanity from its ontological and theological (spiritual) roots. It is impossible to respond to that with ‘one-day solution’ innovations or PR surrogates. It appears that in order to solve the most pressing issues of the global economic crisis, in order to resist the unipolar world, maintain and preserve sovereignty, and so on, it is essential to turn to the philosophical basis of history and to make a metaphysical effort. The Fourth Political Theory cannot emerge on its own. An exertion of will is required here, conceptual work: a disagreement with postmodernity and with the status quo; with the inertia-propelled development of history; with the disappearance of politics from life; and with the utter alienation of the individual from the sphere of politics, spirit, culture, civilisation, and from humanity in general. The Fourth Political Theory is a crusade against postmodernity, and against the post-industrial society, liberalism and globalism. This is the strategy of riding postmodernity; much like how the Eastern practices offer to ‘ride the tiger’. This is a search and a discovery of weak points in the global systems and the hacking of those points. It is not possible to just walk past postmodernity, globalism and hegemony and merely ignore them. Hence why the Fourth Political Theory must turn to the precursors to modernity and to what modernity actively fought, but what became almost entirely irrelevant to postmodernity. We must turn to tradition, to pre-modernity, archaism, theology, the sacred sciences, and ancient philosophy. In Russia’s case that means turning to the full Orthodox tradition, to its sources, to the mystical Orthodoxy of Byzantium, to even more ancient Platonic and Neo-Platonic doctrines, to the archaic layers of tradition, and to the highest super-rational creeds. Within the framework of the Fourth Political Theory we are also talking about a profound philosophical comprehension of being, about opening up the deep ontological source of human existence, and a careful understanding of the philosophical depth of experience that was made by Martin Heidegger — a thinker who made the unique effort of trying to construct a fundamental ontology — a deep, paradoxical, piercing teaching about being.

The Fourth Political Theory cannot be a task undertaken by an individual or even a limited group of people — it is for everyone to partake in. This effort must be a collective one. Representatives of other cultures from both Asia and Europe can help us here, as they feel the eschatological tension of the moment just as sharply, and they are just as desperately seeking an escape from the worldwide dead end.

The Fourth Political Theory must be developed by various peoples and cultures, and everyone can contribute. However, Russia, located in Eurasia, at the intersection of the cultural and civilisational tendencies of East and West, is destined to stand at the focal point of this conceptual process by the merit of its location alone. It comes as no surprise that the first systematic thoughts concerning this theory emerged in Russia.

Gramscian counter-hegemony calls for the formation of a counterhegemonic block, a Global Revolutionary Alliance which joins all those opposing capitalism and hegemony, Eurocentrism and racism, all of which are implicit in the idea of the universality of Western cultural values, the superiority of Western civilisation and modernisation. In the context of the theory of the multipolar world and the Fourth Political Theory, the theory of counter-hegemony gains a concrete cultural and civilisational space of a non-Eurocentric pluralistic universe. Contemporary counter-hegemony must be inclusive, which means engaging with all types of resistance to hegemony; this involves the Left and the Right, and positions and theories that are outside the boundaries of the political ideologies of modernity within the framework of the Fourth Political Theory.