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Pocket Guide to Postmodernism
by the term. Rather than ends in themselves, Hegel argued that “individuals come under the category of means to an ulterior end.… [He] must dedicate himself to the ethical whole.” What Hegel called “world-history” was this path toward the Absolute, and even morality may be ignored when a “world-historical individual” rises to power and makes progress toward the “One Aim.” Overall, we observe in these four figures not only a distaste for liberalism, but also for the conservative agenda of returning to feudal societies. Instead, the collectivist Right’s plan was progressive rather than conservative, pushing forward toward a kind of society with governments strong enough to subordinate its citizens so that they may be sacrificed to goals of national “progress.”
Left versus Right in the 20th Century Both collectivists on the Left and Right had a favorable stance on socialism: it meant a progressive agenda toward public works and a strong community ready to work, fight, and die for the needs of the state. Much hinged on the success of the collectivist Right in the Great War, what was later called World War I. Moeller van den Bruck, an avid anti-Marxist, wrote, “We have lost the war against the West. Socialism has lost it against Liberalism.” Germany suffered a devastating military and spiritual defeat. In The Decline of the West, author Oswald Spengler, a man of the German Right, described the decadence found in the liberal West due to its love of democracy, capitalism, and technological progress. Spengler further rose to intellectual life after writing Prussianism and Socialism in 1920. His strategy was to steer away from international socialism, the strategy of the Left, and to urge a national socialist
