The Fourth Political Theory

beyond left and right but against the center

On August 1, 2020 the First Online International Conference on Fourth Political Theory (4PT) was organized by Professor Dugin (author of the Fourth Political theory), which was hosted by Paideuma TV. Around 200 participants from at least 40 countries have participated in the conference with different philosophical perspectives on the Liberal totalitarianism and liberal world disorder. This was the first international congress on the emerging Fourth Political Theory, which will play a crucial role in shaping the future of human civilization. The major theme of the conference was the brief discussion on the three political theories of modernity i: e liberalism, communism and Fascism, which are also the central focus of Professor Dugin’s book."

Partly after the adoption of Christianity, the first function was assigned to the clergy, to the priesthood, and primarily to the black priesthood and monkhood, but at the same time, the veneration of the tsar or the Great Knyaz (prince) as a special figure, perhaps, continued the more ancient, pre-Indo-European traditions, when our Slavic ancestors, most likely, had special political structures - either together with the Sarmatians and with nomadic Iranian tribes, or maybe the Germans, either in parallel, or under their influence - this issue is completely unknown, there are no documents, but most likely the Slavs had a figure of a sacred king a very long time ago (judging by legends, traditions, fairy tales, etc.). The second caste is knyazes (princes) and boyars (military squad or "grid’", prince's bodyguards). And the third caste is the peasants (Rus. “krestiane” = Christians, and in the pre-Christian era they were called differently, because peasants are simply "Christians", ordinary people, but possessing the fullness of political rights: a certain household, wealth and rights, i.e. the civil status of free people).

By the close of the 20th century, the violent battle between the three political theories of Modernity, i.e. Liberalism, Communism and Fascism, ended with the spectacular worldwide victory of the First Political Theory, Liberalism. This yielded the unipolar moment, Francis Fukuyama’s declaration of the “End of History” (as it at least seemed to be so in the 1990s), and globalization. “One World” began to be discernible based on one universal ideology – liberal globalism. In the 1990s, the overwhelming majority of analysts and experts, public figures and political scientists were inclined to believe that henceforth the economy and civil society would gradually replace politics and competition among nation-states. This created a new paradigm of truths and new obligatory epistemological criteria, such as those represented by such trends as cognitivism, techno-science, political correctness, and “LGBT+ culture.” This unipolar moment lasted until the year 2000, after which something went wrong (for the First Political Theory). The 9/11 attack, the gradual recovering of sovereignty of Putin’s Russia, the spectacular rise of China, the populist wave in Europe, and finally Trump’s election marked symptoms of the fact that Liberalism is in trouble, submerged in a crisis that has become more and more serious and irreversible.

In Greek it was designated by three states: "moné" (the state of being in permanent calm), "próodos" (the state of exiting; precisely this term "pro", from, and "odos", to leave, meant at the same time "odos", journey and "pro", to: "exiting to", "from something to something" and thus exiting the state of "moné") and the third element, "epistrophé", "return". Thus there was a specific picture, at first a certain Origin that (always) remains in itself (the Being, apophatic, not yet outwardly manifested One, the human Soul, Spirit, Tradition, Philosophy, Thought, Logos) and to which corresponded various structures; it is that which in permanence is the most valuabe, sound, unchanging (for neoplatonics it didn't change depending on the other two motions). This means that in fact these vertical movements (exiting and return) didn't alter that Nature of Permanence, which equaled itself (dispassionately, always).

A criminal was considered not only to be a person in full health and consciousness who had made a negative impact, but also as a person marked by a dark spirit. There was something abnormal about the criminal in the eyes of this society. This kind of  abnormality was also associated with disease; for instance, being infected with cholera or the plague was considered a crime. Physical pathology, moral pathology and the commission of a crime were brought closer together in the minds of people, leading to the isolation of both criminals and the sick.

Russia has been hit by the pandemic in a relatively mild form. I can not say that the measures the government has undertaken were (or are) exceptionally good but the situation is nevertheless not as dramatic as elsewhere. From the end of March, Russia began to close its borders with the countries most affected by coronavirus. Putin then mildly suggested citizens stay home for one week in the end of March without explaining what the legal status of this voluntary measure actually was. A full lockdown followed in the region most affected by pandemic. At the first glance the measures of the government looked a bit confused: it seemed that Putin and others were not totally aware of the real danger of the coronavirus, perhaps suspecting that Western countries had some hidden agenda (political or economic). Nonetheless, reluctantly, the government has accepted the challenge and now most regions are in total lockdown.

In the beginning we will talk about the ontology of the theater. Ontology is the study of being. So, in the ontology of the theater, we will consider how the theater relates to such a major philosophical category as being. That is, if Martin Heidegger’s main work is “Sein und Zeit”: Sein – being and Zeit – time, “Being and time”. This is the main philosophical work of the XX century and perhaps one of the most important in the whole history of philosophy. Our course is dedicated to “Sein und Theater”, that is “Being and Theater”. So, theater will be for us the same problematical category as "being" for Heidegger.

The plague gods teach us humility. God sends plague in monotheistic cultures so that a person remembers how insignificant and weak he is. And if we fight the plague by means of a state of emergency, a new number of masks, ventilators, only relying on doctors – then we, as Ereshkigal, say that we are not convinced – we will defeat the plague ourselves, we will not change our way of life, we will make fun and live as before, we will restore the capitalist economy, our secular values, our entertainments, our path of autonomous humanity, our research in the field of high technologies and AI, we will continue to modernize and digitalize our society, we will implant everyone during the epidemic and the quarantine with microchips, and thus overcome the plague ourselves.

A brave slave who sacrifices himself, having his own dignity, is no longer a slave, he is a master. And a cowardly master thinks that his bureaucratic merits, his belly, his stealage and meanness will protect him from imminent death is not a master any more. Today, coronavirus shows us that it knows no boundaries, that it destroys artificial social models, that it comes to ordinary and unordinary people with the same clarity. And everyone should give an answer to this.

If a person belonging to today's elite escapes from the coronavirus, it becomes a slave. And if a simple person looks coronavirus in the eye, it becomes master. Thus a new assertion of the elites takes place, and any emergency creates a new class of masters and a new class of slaves. This is the second reflection on the existential metaphysical mission of the plague.

We ended the era of peremptory existence in an open global world, we were forced to find ourselves in a closed commercial state, and I propose to seriously think over this perspective. We can return, I do not exclude this possibility that we can return to globalization, it will be, however, a different globalization, we will not return there soon, but there are very great reasons that we will never return to this globalization, and will exist for a very long time in a closed commercial state. In order to prepare for this second scenario, which we are already doomed to, and we don’t know how much time it will last: the coming months, maybe years, maybe even longer. That is why I propose to make this mental experiment and, in fact, to make a choice. Without this choice, we cannot move on. The situation is very serious, and Russia will have to make this choice, but all other countries will also have to make this choice. So, either we temporarily take a step back from globalization, to which we will return after the end of the coronavirus, as Bill Gates, Gordon Brown (speaking about world government) and George Soros say (in fact, he keep silence now, because now to advocate for globalism is like to make a coming-out, that is, if you say “I'm a liberal,” you can be hospitalized for this, so only people with a bunker or some kind of reliable shelter such as Bill Gates or Gordon Brown can afford it. In principle, today, of course, everyone understands that only closeness is saving, but nonetheless, voices even from these dungeons, from secret shelters are heard that propose however to make a world government. But, of course, today no one is listening.

What is happening now is a global breakdown of the world order. It does not matter at all whether the nature of the coronavirus is artificial or not, nor is it even of principal importance whether, if it is artificial, it was deliberately released by the “world government” or not. The epidemic has begun - it is a fact. Now the main thing is to trace how the "world government" has reacted to it.

To clarify, the "world government" is the totality of global political and economic elites and the intellectuals and media (mediacrats) that serve them. Such a "world government" necessarily exists, because on a global scale there are strictly-defined, fundamental norms that determine the basic parameters of politics, economics and ideology.

Having said this, we consider that the reading of the aforementioned work reveals, in between the lines, a specific methodology, so to speak, a way of universal action to be adopted apt to allow the construction of positions informed by the Fourth Political Theory on the most diverse topics and in the most diverse areas of knowledge. In this sense, regarding the methodology, we are talking about something which belongs to the “praxis”, but in the measure in which this methodology depends on the comprehension of the Fourth Political Theory in order to be unveiled and, simultaneously, points towards the work of permanent construction of the same, this also belongs to the “theory”.

Fourth Political theory with the fall communism in Russia, which marked a significant ideological crisis around the globe. For Dugin, all three ideologies either Liberalism, fascism or Communism was the product of European Modernity, which is under severe decline. Moreover, what Dugin emphasizes is the Post-modern critic on the degenerated European modernity that has given materialism an upper hand above the social and traditional domain.

The state of emergency, Ernstfall, it is very very serious and one who is in power in such a situation, is not likely to give it up voluntarily to anyone. This is, let's say, the positive side of the epidemic in which we now live. Of course, it’s important to deal with it, it’s important to survive, but you can’t reduce everything to solution of purely technical issues, it is essential to think about the future. And at the exit from this pandemic we will come across a completely new post-global reality.