[Political Interest]

There appears to be conflicting opinions as to whether or not the Traditionalist philosopher Julius Evola was a fascist or not. We know that he was never a member of the Italian fascist party and he criticised a lot of its philosophical doctrines.

At the same time he did not dismiss fascism completely. In fact he praised what he considered to be the positive elements of it and felt that fascism did initially have potential to be something good, simply it did not happen. Furthermore he tried to work within fascism to try and steer it in a Traditionalist direction. Evola is quoted as saying that the extent to which he considered himself a fascist was the extent to which fascism upheld certain Traditionalist principles. Moreover he said that he wanted a more extreme and complete form of fascism.

Therefore where can we place Evola ideologically? Was he a fascist or not? Or maybe it is not so black and white? Maybe he represented an alternate Traditionalist form of fascism, a different ideological trend within the wider umbrella of fascism? Or was he completely outside fascism and was simply trying to infiltrate it from the inside by involving himself with it? Perhaps he was separate from official Fascism but not from fascism in general?

Does Evola's thought fall within fascism or is it outside it?

For me it is tempting to say that he was a Traditionalist and not a fascist but that he simply agreed with what he saw as the parts of fascism that were in line with his Traditionalist philosophy. At the same time how can we be certain that he was not a fascist and a Traditionalist at the same time (in other words not simply a Traditionalist operating within fascism)? Could it not be possible that he was a true believer in fascism but rather in his own brand of fascism (as opposed to the brand of Mussolini)?

[Orestes]

If we agree that nationalism stands at the core of the fascist ideology (which I think is hard to deny), then that would make Evola's fascist credentials problematic, since he had bit of a problem with nationalism, as a post-1789, "horizontal", levelling concept (class/caste were more his things).

From the same root grew scepticism towards Nazism, in which he saw some leftovers of the people's sovereignty doctrine (Führer was supposed to be kind of an emanation of the Volk).

I am neither a fascist nor a Right-winger, but in a way I admire Evola's system as perhaps the most consistent expression of what it means to be of the Right (sort of like what Anarcho-Capitalism is to Liberalism).

[InnesI]

My understanding of Evola is that he was beyond fascism in many way but also that he saw this very movement as the one that would me most likely to be steered in his traditionalist direction. He was continuously drawn to far right politics even after the war but as far as I know he never identified himself as being one of them. Or perhaps it was the far right that was drawn to Evola and not the other way around?

Evolas relationship to Fascism indicates that he was indeed a person who wasn't afraid to stand by what he said. He has both put forth venomous critique towards the movement and praised it. He was never a member of the Italian Fascist Party but did try to influence it. Mussolini both rejected and praised Evola at different times.

His Autodifesa is a nice read where he explains his post-war relation towards Fascists movements.

Edit [quote from the source listed above]:

I have defended, and I still defend, "fascist ideas," not inasmuch as they are "fascist" but in the measure that they revive ideas superior and anterior to Fascism. As such they belong to the heritage of the hierarchical, aristocratic, and traditional conception of the State, a conception having a universal character and maintained in Europe up to the French Revolution.

[Varg]

Julius Evola was not a fascist. He was more inclined to nazi ocultism than to italian fascist movement. I for one believe that "traditionalist" is the best word to describe him. The fascists were seen by him as a bullwark against western degeneration, i mean the decadent western democracies and the bush-league communist scum. In his work one can find useful phrases that confirm what i'm saying just like:

Existentially . . . interventionism had its own autonomously revolutionary significance, and the war was an occasion for the awakening of forces that were intolerant of bourgeois Italy, forces like the veterans’ movement that nourished Fascism. By rejecting a return to “normalcy” in this climate, these forces changed poles ideologically and oriented themselves towards the Right, towards the ideal of the hierarchical state and the “military nation.”

It's also important to analyse some os his ideas considering the specific time he lived in. For example, he used to criticize natalism and defended spiritual issues over racial ones. But if we consider the situation now; the italian population shrinking and millions of blacks and other third world immigrants invading the country, such scenario would probably make him defend natalism against italians and some brutal and "commoner" aspects of fascism. In fact, fascism is some kind of necessary Jacobinism. Even if some aristocrats don't understand the need for such extremism.

[SolarCross]

I am kind of new to Julius Evola, but I have heard of him through the neo-reactionaries. I found this quote which seems to tell a great deal on where he comes from..

"My principles are only those that, before the French Revolution, every well-born person considered sane and normal.”

So what he is then, without too much laborious deduction, is an absolute monarchist, he is a reactionary in the original sense of the word. A jacobite [<-edited], essentially. Since fascism is essentially progressive and demotist he certainly couldn't be called even a fellow traveller of fascism. However in that the era in which he lived, fascism was the closest thing to reactionary anywhere on the political landscape (though still a totally different animal) and therefore in some dim way interesting to him. However that interest is like the interest that a meat eater has in eating fungi based meat substitutes where the only other things on the menu are vegtables...

[Potemkin]

So what he is then, without too much laborious deduction, is an absolute monarchist, he is a reactionary in the original sense of the word. A jacobin, essentially.

Lolwut? The Jacobins were anti-monarchist - they were the ones who guillotined the French monarch and re-booted history to 'Year Zero', remember? Whatever the Jacobins were, they weren't "reactionaries".

Since fascism is essentially progressive and demotist he certainly couldn't be called even a fellow traveller of fascism. However in that the era in which he lived, fascism was the closest thing to reactionary anywhere on the political landscape (though still a totally different animal) and therefore in some dim way interesting to him. However that interest is like the interest that a meat eater has in eating fungi based meat substitutes where the only other things on the menu are vegtables...

He could be described as a "fellow traveller" of fascism, just as the Bolsheviks attracted some 'progressives' in the West just after the October Revolution, who became "fellow travellers" of Communism (the phrase was actually invented by Trotsky, btw). Fascism, just like Communism, had many such "fellow travellers" in the 1920s and 1930s.

[SolarCross]

Lolwut? The Jacobins were anti-monarchist - they were the ones who guillotined the French monarch and re-booted history to 'Year Zero', remember? Whatever the Jacobins were, they weren't "reactionaries".

Sorry meant jacobite.

[Potemkin]

Sorry meant jacobite.

Lol. That makes rather more sense.

Still, even the opponents of the Jacobites were still monarchists; they just disagreed about which monarch should be sitting on the throne. The Jacobites were therefore 'reactionaries' only in a rather limited sense, since their opponents were, in their own way, just as 'reactionary' by modern standards.

[SolarCross]

Lol. That makes rather more sense.

Still, even the opponents of the Jacobites were still monarchists; they just disagreed about which monarch should be sitting on the throne. The Jacobites were therefore 'reactionaries' only in a rather limited sense, since their opponents were, in their own way, just as 'reactionary' by modern standards.

Standing where we are in history in the deep infra-red of progressivism looking back at the restoration and the "Glorious Revolution" that is a fair perception. However the difference between the jacobites and their opponents was not so much a preference on whom should be king but more to do with how a king gets his authority. The jacobites held that it came from God, their opponents asserted it came from parliament, or at least came from god through parliament. The jacobites' opponents were the thin-end of the wedge of progressivism you might say.

[Potemkin]

The jacobites' opponents were the thin-end of the wedge of progressivism you might say.

Good point. However, in no sense were the Jacobites' opponents populist or democratically-minded. On the contrary, they wanted to sweep away the last remnants of feudal social relations which had traditionally protected the working class and the poor from the depredations of the nascent bourgeoisie. From a capitalist point of view, the Jacobites' opponents were indeed progressives, but from the point of view of the working classes, they were a wild beast which had broken free from its leash.

[slybaldguy]

Jonathan Bowden - Julius Evola: The World's Most Right Wing Thinker

[youtube]4YqKf3v2aPs[/youtube]

[SolarCross]

Good point. However, in no sense were the Jacobites' opponents populist or democratically-minded. On the contrary, they wanted to sweep away the last remnants of feudal social relations which had traditionally protected the working class and the poor from the depredations of the nascent bourgeoisie. From a capitalist point of view, the Jacobites' opponents were indeed progressives, but from the point of view of the working classes, they were a wild beast which had broken free from its leash.

That narrative is heavily marxist.. If you step outside of the marxist paradigm and into the reactionary one, then the bourgeoisie are just a faction within the broader demotic decay that includes the left populism of socialism and right populism of fascism. They are all shades of red.

[Potemkin]

That narrative is heavily marxist.. If you step outside of the marxist paradigm and into the reactionary one, then the bourgeoisie are just a faction within the broader demotic decay that includes the left populism of socialism and right populism of fascism. They are all shades of red.

Aha! So you believe in the aristocratic principle? That explains a lot. From your viewpoint, of course, society went off the rails sometime back in the 18th century (or perhaps even earlier, in the 17th century). Everything in politics since then has just been so much progressivist nonsense.

[SolarCross]

Aha! So you believe in the aristocratic principle? That explains a lot. From your viewpoint, of course, society went off the rails sometime back in the 18th century (or perhaps even earlier, in the 17th century). Everything in politics since then has just been so much progressivist nonsense.

I wouldn't phrase it quite like that of course. I think politics is evil; it is lies, theft and violence. It would be better if there were no politics. Since there will always be some politics it is best kept to a minimum. Anarchy, in the an-cap sense, is too utopian, not in the economics which is just fine but only in the sphere of force. Competition in force is catastrophic. Only where the capability of violence is overwhelmingly allied to one agency such that attempts at competing with it is hopelessly doomed can there be peace and consequently any chance of justice, prosperity and happiness. The business of war making is the only natural (and desirable) monopoly. Since this is so, governance, which is violent monopolism, must be less than anarchy but should not extend any more beyond the art of war making than absolutely necessary. Governance should not extend into pie making, scholarship, personal relationships, medicine and all the rest. The most perfect expression of the containment of politics into the realm of war and peace then is an absolute monarchy. The problem with demotism and progressivism is that it relentlessly enlarges politics into where it does not properly belong and in so doing corrodes everything that is good until everything is politics and so there is nothing but evil. The final phase of democracy is always the zombie apocalypse.

[Dagoth Ur]

Well at least you abandoned warlordism.

[SolarCross]

Well at least you abandoned warlordism.

On the contrary I have reconciled myself to warlordism. I could even say quite directly that I have embraced warlordism. An-caps are in denial, they think they can have peace without unity of arms. I am past that and making the best of it.

[Dagoth Ur]

... Warlords cannot exist in an absolute monarchy because they would be a threat to his monopoly on violence. I mean unless you favor a Shogun style "monarchy" which can hardly be called absolute by any standards.

[SolarCross]

... Warlords cannot exist in an absolute monarchy because they would be a threat to his monopoly on violence. I mean unless you favor a Shogun style "monarchy" which can hardly be called absolute by any standards.

lol, what I mean is in some sense the monarch is a warlord himself. A warlord in the general sense of the term.

[Dagoth Ur]

I tend to think of Warlorism as a loose confederation of Warlords. While in a sense a monarch is a warlord, he is more than a figure simply held aloft by military prowess. There are certain respects that must be accepted to have a king, and calling him a warlord isn't very respectful.

[Potemkin]

lol, what I mean is in some sense the monarch is a warlord himself. A warlord in the general sense of the term.