“The War and Transcendental Order: Critique of Violence in Benjamin, Canetti, and Daniel Paul Schreber.” Tel Aviver Jahrbuch für deutsche Geschichte 43 (2015): 115–144 (original) (raw)
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2018
It is possible that war in modern societies is largely driven by emotions, but in a way that is almost completely hidden. Modernity individualizes the self and tends to ignore emotions. As a result, conflict can be caused by sequences in which the total hiding of humiliation leads to vengeance. This essay outlines a theory of the socialemotional world implied in the work of C. H. Cooley and others. Cooley’s concept of the “looking-glass self” can be used as antidote to the assumptions of modernity: the basic self is social and emotional: selves are based on “living in the mind” of others, with a result of feeling either pride of shame. Cooley discusses shame at some length, unlike most approaches, which tend to hide it. This essay proposes that the complete hiding of shame can lead to feedback loops (spirals) with no natural limit: shame about shame and anger is only the first step. Emotion backlogs can feed back when emotional experiences are completely hidden: avoiding all pain ca...
Iranian Journal of International Legal Studies (IIntbar), 2024
Abstract The convergence of historical events and philosophical doctrines has profoundly shaped the trajectory of numerous social movements. Notably, the role of German philosophers in the emergence of ultranationalist ideologies and movements has been substantial. This article explores the influence of German philosophical thought on the development of movements such as communism, Nazism, and Zionism, tracing their shared roots and divergent paths. Karl Marx's critique of capitalism laid the groundwork for socialist and communist ideologies, advocating for proletarian revolution and a classless society. Friedrich Nietzsche's concepts of the Übermensch and the will to power provided ideological underpinnings for fascism, despite Nietzsche's own disavowal of such interpretations. Arthur de Gobineau's racial theories influenced Nazi ideology, reinforcing notions of Aryan superiority and justifying policies of racial hierarchy. In the realm of Zionism, Theodor Herzl's vision of a Jewish homeland responded to pervasive anti-Semitism in Europe, culminating in the establishment of Israel. The Holocaust further galvanized the Zionist movement, emphasizing the need for Jewish self-determination and security. This study also examines the ethical and philosophical implications of these ideologies, emphasizing the responsibility of philosophers to critically engage with their ideas and counter their potential misuse. The legacy of German philosophy in shaping these movements serves as a cautionary tale, highlighting the dual-edged sword of intellectual influence in political and social contexts. This research underscores the ongoing relevance of philosophical and ethical inquiry into the roots and consequences of ideological movements, offering insights into their contemporary manifestations and future potential for social change. Keywords: German philosophy, ultranationalism, communism, Nazism, Zionism, ethical implications
Violence Volksgemeinschaft and Empire
and reaching its apex in the 1980s, the functionalist argument returned to Franz Neumann's early characterization of the Third Reich as a chaotic, decentralized Behemoth. 2 Even the most oppressive policies were viewed less as the extension of Hitler's will and more the by-product of competing bureaucracies, changing circumstances and unresolved Party-state conflicts. Admittedly, there were important variations in the functionalist critique of 'totalitarianism theory'. Broszat and Mommsen tended to portray Hitler as a 'weak dictator', who rarely intervened in day-to-day affairs. Ian Kershaw, by contrast, stressed Hitler's charismatic leadership and the fact that his subordinates frequently 'worked towards the Fu¨hrer' without clear directives from above. Whatever their differences, functionalist historians offered a more complex, variegated, less totalitarian vision of the Third Reich. 3 The renewed interest in social history also brought attention to groups that had previously been ignored by scholars of the Third Reich. While a number of Anglo-American scholars introduced the field to women's and gender history, the role of religion -specifically that of Catholics and Protestants -received increased attention on both sides of the Atlantic. 4 To be sure, a more traditional kind of political and diplomatic history continued to emphasize the central role of foreign policy, war, and imperialism. 5 But by the mid-1980s all signs pointed to a new social and political history of nazi Germany, which privileged a combination of domestic political factors, personal and institutional rivalries and 'everyday' history (Alltagsgeschichte) in explaining the Third Reich. 6 2 Martin Broszat, The Hitler State: The Foundation and Development of the Internal Structure of the Third Reich (New York 1981); Hans Mommsen, From Weimar to Auschwitz (Princeton, NJ 1992); Hans
2019
What resources does philosophy have at its disposal for a critical analysis of the role of violence in a war of all against all? Faced with this question, Benjamin discovers that legal positivism, which believes in the capacity to derive how law ought to be from the sheer concept of a “correct” law, is constitutively blind to the possibility that values may be misaligned with law, and that the basic structures of law and consensus might come after the fact of power. Drawing on the work of contemporaneous legal theorist Leonard Nelson, this article argues that Benjamin developed a potent critique of the dialectic of recognition at work in the legitimation of violence, making way instead for an analysis of what remains unrecognizable to the normative order: power, loitering as a “nonvalue” in the gap between values and legal ends.
Central European History, 2011
This updated translation of Dirk Schumann's Politische Gewalt in der Weimarer Republik, 1918-1933 (Klartext, 2001) represents an estimable contribution to the scholarly literature on the Weimar Republic. Well researched and rich in detail, the work attempts to open a new perspective on a perennial topic in the scholarship: the role of political violence, in this case, in the important Prussian province of Saxony. Schumann aims to disprove a) that political violence in interwar Germany was an inevitable product of the Bolshevik revolution, and b) that it was primarily the result of the infusion of wartime violence into postwar civilian life. The former contention, a right-wing canard, hardly seems to need disproving given the well-known centrality of violence to the right-wing nationalist and fascist projects. The latter line of interpretation, similarly, is made to bear too much weight; to be sure, as Schumann points out, there was in most cases no direct line of continuity (in terms of personnel) from the violence of the trenches to the street battles of Weimar, but as many scholars (e.g., Richard Bessel) have shown, the war experience was continually recapitulated and recast so as to retain its destructive and habituating power. There would, moreover, have been no Wehrverbände without the war, no matter how much organizations such as the Stahlhelm cast back to the public militarism of the Kaiserreich. Schumann's contention that political violence did not threaten the political order-because it was "controllable," if only authorities had had the will to control it (p. xiii)-likewise seems questionable, unless we consider Schumann's deeper, important point: that the importance of violence lay not in its "military" efficacy, but in its discursive effect; that is, that violence-both rhetorical and actual-helped to stoke "fear[s] of civil war" that were successfully instrumentalized by the radical right to the detriment of the republic. This emphasis on the meaning ascribed to violence (both actual and rhetorical, as opposed to the concrete effects of violence, is one of the work's two main strengths. The other is the nuance and detail with which Schumann considers well-known episodes of political violence. The study is organized chronologically, with sections covering the "circumscribed civil war" of 1919-1921 (which included the Communist "March Actions" of 1921); the political murders of 1921-23; the founding of the right-and left-wing "combat leagues" in the period 1924-1929; and the period of escalating violence from 1929 through the end of the republic. This organization generally works, although the aphorisistic chapter titles and BOOK REVIEWS