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Afterthoughts on PosthistoireAuthor(s): Lutz Niethammer and Bill TemplerSource: History and Memory, Vol. 1, No. 1 (Spring - Summer, 1989), pp. 27-53Published by: Indiana University Press

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27

Lutz Niethammer

Afterthoughts n Posthistoire

The Zeitgeist tries to elude specification by resorting to a

host of termsprefixed by themorpheme "post-": post-modern,

post-industrial, post-revolutionary society. That list can be

extended - yet the most encompassing of these epithets,

namely "posthistoire," enjoys only apocryphal popularity. In

articles or notes on research inprogress, you may occasionallychance upon the observation, almost inpassing, that historyis at an end, thatwe live in "posthistorical" times. The bald

statement usually stands without any further commentary, as

if littlemore need be added. Interest in the posthistorical era

is rivetedmore on aesthetic playfulness as an approach to thepotpourri of the past, simulation of arbitrarily selected

fragments drawn from bygone eras: one engages in a gamewith tokens that have some semblance of enduring value, yetare quoted out of context, and thus annulled.

The historian reading these terse pronouncements about

the supposed demise of the very subject and pith of his professional craft is

bewildered,since his field would

appearto

be enjoying something of a rejuvenation: a rare conjunctionof increased historical interest, encouragement by themedia

and an aesthetic reanimation of elements culled from the

cultural heritage. He is unnerved and troubled by what the

heralds of posthistoire seem to insinuate: that the entire pro

ject of rehistoricization may ultimately be littlemore than

some sort of simulation itself a phoney spectacle staged and

directed by the culture industry.He is plagued by gnawingdoubts: perhaps all the historian is in fact involved with issome ambitious enterprise ofmanipulation, a project akin to

the cataloguing of tiny fragments of stone, chosen arbitrarily.He endeavors to arrange them into a pattern, without knowingwhether or not they form part of a largermosaic. Beyondthese small specimens looms a chaos: a pile of past debris and

detritus, formless and without plan. Is thisdust-blown heritagethe reflection of posthistoire?Before the historian's object of study evaporates into a

mirage, itwould be useful to examine some of the more

explicit discussions of theZeitgeist, focusing on the nature of








28 Lutz Niethammer

thepresumed "post-ness" of thepresent era. Scrutiny of such

debates reveals that these frequent expressionsare

neithera

passing fashion, nor have they kept to their basic meaning

signifying theportentous final conclusion of something.Mean

while we continue to refei;paradoxically, to "our postmodernmodern era." This expression does not signal the abrupt end

of a dynamic structure, but rather only a diminution of the

hopes once pinned upon it.Things go on, but confidence that

they could have any meaning is eroded. The various

"post"diagnoses are not non-sensical, but theirmeaning must be

carefully plummed. One must probe their origins.

On theHistorization ofPosthistoire

The concept "posthistoire"1 can be encountered in the 1980s

particularly in thework ofWest German post-Marxist philo

sophers and social scientists, and has definite links with

French post-structuralism. Its history as a concept is somewhat

unclear: it is older than its current popularity as an allusion,but more recent than those who originally coined the term

would like to have us believe. Arnold Gehlen, who introduced

the unusual expression "das post-histoire" into German

sociology in 1952, made repeated references to its supposedorigin in the work ofA.A. Cournot, although Gehlen appar

endy had never read Coumot. Cournot propounded theoptimistic notion in the late nineteenth century that history was a

contingent transitional phase between two sociocultural situa

tions: on the one hand the primitive, instinct-based societies;on the other civilization - administered by socioeconomic

intelligence.Such notions were also advanced in kindred

form afterWorld War II byRoderick Seidenberg and Teilhard

de Chardin. That unusual term did not appear in the work of

either thinker; but rather arose in the strained ambience of

Franco-German relations around the Second World War.

Ithas two discernable taproots. One isAlexandre Kojeve's

readingofHegel influenced yHeidegger,with which heintroduced French reception of Hegel during the era when

existentialism and phenomenology held sway in Paris at thetimeof thePopular Front. Kojeve readHegel's Phenomenology

against the background of its contemporary veneration for

Napoleon as a "world soul": Bonaparte, conceived as a

figurewho had established the universalist state of theworld








Afterthoughtson Posthistoire 29

spirit, abrogating the dialectic of master and servant, and

thus bringing historyto

its fruition and completion. Kojeveat that time was a Communist, and put this concept into

optimistic practice by viewing Stalin as the fulfillment of

history.After thewar Kojeve, now a high-ranking OECD official,

switched historical chessmen, replacing Stalin once again by

Napoleon. The new realities of a worldwide culture spelledthe final consummation, as itwere, ofNapoleon's abrogationof history. The "American way of life," in universalized

guise, emerged as theprevailing cultural pattern of a civiliza

tion of "posthistorical animals." In this Kojevean view, the

Russians were perceived as being highly similar toAmericans,

though blessed with far less material prosperity, and Mao's

revolution was simply the belated introduction of the Code

Napoleon to China. In the late 1950s, Kojeve added that in

this "one world," where the dialectic between master andservant had been done away with (along with the abolition of

work and struggle itself),man could only preserve his human

ityby pursuing a snobbish life inaccordance with totally for

malized values - within an aesthetic-subjunctive realm of

make-believe, of simulation.

The term's second taproot- no less grandiose, and inter

twined inmany ways with the first-

was to become farmoreimportant as a factor in popularizing and spreading the

notion of posthistoire inpostwar German society.This taproothas its concrete basis in an analysis of the growth of state

power written in Swiss exile byBernard de Jouvenel. Jouveneladmired Kojeve's reading ofHegel and was a member of de

Man's French propagandists at the beginning of the 1930s,before he became an intellectual

proponentof French fascism.

In this volume he returned to his noble origins and to the

neoliberal position that in the twentieth century state powerhad mushroomed ominously as a result of the welfare state.

The state now risked becoming a totalitarian "welfare protectorate." The masses would flock willingly to serve and

obey that protectorate; in it,de Jouvenel believed he saw a

merging of the structures of fascism, theNew Deal and Sta

linism. For de Jouvenel, these regimes reflected the effects ofthe uncontrollability and structural constraints of despoticrule.De Jouvenel regarded the disappearance of the traditional

freedom enjoyed by governing elites as a transitional phaseon the path to non-history.








30 Lutz Niethammer

The threat ofmacroorganizations taking on an autonomous

life f theirwn,and thedetachmentfdecisionsbypoliticalleaders from human purpose and itshistorical context were

seizedupon byHendrik deMan as a pointofdepartureforhis diagnosis of the advent of posthistoire. He presentedthese notions in the form of a concerned deliberation on de

Jouvenel. Kojevc translated de Man's anti-Marxist Socialist

Idea (1933),whichhad beenbanned inGermany, nto renchin 1948 while in exile in Switzerland. He had just been

sentenced inBelgium to twenty years in prison as a leadingcollaborates Arnold Gehlen had borrowed this diagnosisfromhim,buthad referrednthe1950swith growing nd

imperious disgust to "stationary mobility": world civilization

viewed as a massive mechanism, as a standstill full of fury,devoidof anyanimating dea,signifyingothing.

Ernst Jungei; in an exchange with Martin Heidegger and

Carl Schmitt (who was in contact, in turn, with Kojeve)formulatedeitmauer (1959) and a novel (Eumeswil1972).InEutneswil,Junger evelopsthe igure f theposthistorical"anarchist," a servant of despots and a historian a la Spengler.

Junger lauds the "return to the forest" of his hero as a with

drawal from the social world of despotism when the regimeis indanger, That return isdepicted as a retreat into amythic

solitude. In the 1950s, Hans Freycr and Helmut Schelsky,who together with Gehlen in Leipzig had shaped the "Ger

man" sociology f the hirdReich,orhad been shaped by it,propounded thenotion in cultural criticism of a "second system" of an inevitable technology. In theirview,man employedthis "second system" in order to free himself from the con

straints of nature and create his own world of self-generatedstructural and material constraints. These then eroded the

mobility of history and the structures of democratic control.

That body of theory,which had already exercised a certain

attraction in the 1960s onMarxists influenced byHeideggeror Carl Schmitt, such asMarcuse, Anders and Taubes, held

out appeal in the 1980s to leftists in search of a post-Marxistorientation. Among younger writers, however itwas often

merely a game played with quotations culled from the corpus

of "grand thought." The posthumously discovered notes ofPeter Bruckner on his approach toGehlen, Marcuse, Daniel

Bell, and others can serve to give some notion of how such

ideas were employed in an attempt to confront and conquer

the oidafter he opesofthe ate 0shad failed omaterialize:









"Bourgeois society was thus the trulyhistorical society. In it,various

ages overlappedincreative

tension,and their

upheavals linked together - innational states and a world market -

numerous other regions, populations, social processes andeconomies which up until then had only been loosely inter

connected. One upshot of this is indisputable: themode of

production of industrial society already had begun, preciselyby thisprocess of interlinkage, to create a relative universalityin living conditions for countless castes, classes, strata and

provinces.That

universalitywas

unprecedentedin

historicalterms: it encompassed modes ofwork and transport, leisure

time and communication, social organization of the family,

sexuality and the hospitalization of dying ... As a result of

the equalizing elements inherent in the industrial milieu,there arises the shadow of the 'posthistoire'

- a humankind

becoming ever more similar in its Views and behavioralmodes ... interests and value judgments' (Gehlen).... The up

shot of thisforming' and integration is a new configurationof 'reality': a ubiquitous 'normality', which views the particular, the qualitatively differentmerely as aberration - some

thingbasicallybesthandledby thecops, or treatedby a

physician. What isunique, special disappears, shunted to the

margins of society... The differences between supcrordinatederas are levelled and plowed under: urban cores and transportsystems, education and nuances of language, forms of social

intercourse and modes of perception are all 'modernized'.This reality, now one-dimensional, no longermanifests itselfas a historical period, slowly unfolding and evolving, offeringtime and space for competing parties; rather, it itself has become a party to the conflict... Even incountries with a devel

oped class structure, classes and their fatesmove from the

margin's edge into the shadow of the new version of the'basic contradiction'. That contradiction is now between the

forces of themaintenance of (technical) rationality, administration, and the production of normality on the one hand,and a 'non-simultaneity' (Ungleichzeitigkeit) of revolts encom

passing elements of pre-bourgeois and post-industrial criticismon the other.Here lies a powerful source of that second para

digm of upheaval: the revolt against the structures of posthistoire. This population, revealing itself to us 'at itspoint of

cleavage', no longer allows fora synthesis using the constructof a 'collective

subject'

- least of allqua

classsubject."

One of the oddest features among numerous proponents of

theposthistoire diagnosis- deMan and Anders excluded - is

their "optimistic pessimism", so to speak. Their essential








32 Lutz Niethammer

position is thatworld civilization is continuing its uninter

rupted forward march

-

its unity, growth, technicalization,the securing of welfare and expansion of consumerism. In

numerous Utopian blueprints, such as those sketched by Ernst

Junge^ theremay have been certain catastrophes, but these

remained without any irreversible consequences: the world

was unchanged. The principal factor alarming the advocates

and proponents of posthistoire isnot that themegamachines,

takingon a lifeof their own,

might pose

a serious threat and

that theworld lives in the shadow of possible self-destruction.

Rather,what theyfinddisquietingis the impossibilityf

piloting theworld, steering iton course: the rudder has been

tornrom thehandsof the aptains fculture nd the oliticalavantgardes. In other words: theproclamation of the "end of

history" generally goes hand-in-hand with an unshakable be

lief in the continuing progress of modernization. Or; as in

Ernst Junger, a belief in the availability of simulated history alaOswald Spengler. In posthistoire, it isnot theworld which

declines, but rather interest in thatworld, and the belief in

the role of the great intellectual as a motive force. As Kojeve

said, therewas nothing more that could be expected in anycase from the rest of humanity except contented animality.

Or; as Gehlen phrased it: "Development has reached an end

point, what comes now is already present: the syncretism of amelange of all styles and possibilities, the posthistoire." Its

nightmare is the continuation of dubious "progress", rather

than any dangers itmay pose- not the end of theworld, but

the end ofmeaning.In view of thispeculiar finding, the intention in the following

remarks isnot to expand and extrapolate on these diagnoses,but rather to reflect

uponthree

questions:1.What sort of history reaches its final conclusion in posthistoire?

2.What is the historical locus of thisdiagnosis?3. Does ithave ameaning for thework of thehistorian?

The Legacy of theHistory of Salvation

In Jewish-Christian tradition, three aspects of historical

material, which also appear elsewhere, are linked here in a

unique manner: themyth of origin (story of creation) is con

tinued in a temporalstructuref theworld inwhich the









believer's expectation for salvation is embedded (history of

salvation). The nearing of salvation and/or Judgment Day isbrought about or proclaimed by a process inwhich the divine

takes on human form (Messiah). Thus, in the religious heritageof Judaism and of theWest, there is a basic understanding of

theworld as something historical. This is interwoven with

thehopes for salvation of the individual and the identification

of (incarnate) God with man as the redemptive turning pointin this

history.However, an

experientialscience of

worldlyevents also developed within this framework, based on his

toriographical precedents from classical antiquity. It aimed at

preserving the past in its individual detail (including ex

ceptional events and deeds) and the normative evaluation of

recurrent situations.

Such a situation, where chronicle narrative and analogicalhistorical thought were contained within the framework of

the history of salvation, necessarily entered a crisis phasewhen reasons which were quite clearlyworld-immanent arose

for changing the basic conditions of existence, freeing them

from the cyclicity of nature. Whenever discoveries broke

through the former limits set to the world - and commerce,

technology and institutionalized power relations liberated at

least certain segments of society from a direct bond with

natural processes -, itbecame possible to transpose elementsof a total explanation for the world. They were now no

longer subordinate to the authority of history of salvation,but had been shifted to another sphere: the scientificprocessingof experiential data. On the other hand, such experiential

processing had tomeasure itself increasingly in terms of the

embracing character and meaning of thehistory of salvation.In other words: "world history" had now to be

crystallizedfrom the numerous individual (hi)stories inwhich humans

communicated about the origin of their respective groupsand institutions and passed on experience useful for the

business of living.And this ina double sense: by incorporatingthese histories within a historical perspective encompassingthe entire world, and simultaneously providing a basis and

framework for themeaningful understanding of theworld, a

role which had formerly been the function and province ofreligion.The critical phase of this process of intermingling was

reached when itcould be claimed that the historical element

in the history of salvation had been relegated to the sphere of








34 Lutz Niethammer

human authority and competence, and that the religious

element houldbe limited o therelationshipetweenGodand the individual believer's soul. This process had already

begun in preliminary form during theReformation. By the

Enlightenment period, the critical phase in thought ("axial

period") had been reached. It then commenced with restruc

turingf the social sphere ia the gency f thepoliticalandtechnical-industrial revolutions.

The advance of scientific claims into thereligious

realm of

thehistory of salvation rendered the intellectual efforts of the

axial period truly grand in their scope and sweep, because

they had tomeasure themselves against the embracing and

profound character of myth. This was the heroic age of

intellectualism, the passing ofwhose depth and breadth later

generations of Bildungsburger (educated burgher class) and

cultural workers, right down to the present day, have not

ceased nostalgically tomourn. Intellect tasted here theprospectof power. During the victorious phase of the expansion of the

Bildungsburgertum claims were staked out in those areas

that had been wrenched from the control of the history of

salvation. This was done in a systematic fashion: by development of architectonic edifices of thought projected to include

the entireworld. Such intellectual edifices attempted to struc

ture thatworld genetically, imbuing itwith ameaning linkingthe efforts of the individual with the development of the

world as a whole. In actual fact, the theoretical blueprintssuccessful here have a history of impact inseparable from the

evolution of bourgeois society in the 19th and 20th centuries.

All subsequent theoreticians stood on the shoulders of giantslike Kant, Hegel orMarx, whose Promethean feats were a

responseto the

gigantic challengeof the substitution of

mythby reason. However, the world-historical substitute formyth

clung to itsmold. This was most clearly manifested in the

fact thathistoryin the earlyphase of thephilosophyof

historywas conceptualized asmoving toward a final endpointwhose quality was oriented in terms of the earlier hopes that

had been pinned on a world beyond theworld: eternal peace

would arise from themidst of history itself, spirit come home

to itself, resulting ina society without exploitation and alien

ation.

Such a conspectus surveying the entire span of history, and

the discovery of itsmotive principles, was only feasible bymeans of a drastic reductionism and the presupposition of









weighty assumptions. The desire for ameaningful explanation

of existence could only be satisfied by transposing basic features of the aspired meaning into history itself.The passage

through history, however, provided the previous positions of

the arly hilosophyfhistoryithanobjectifiedegitimation:theyhelped bolster theclaims raisedby knowledgeto thereins of political leadership and the hopes to find a substitute

for theworld beyond in thismundane world.

That concomitant end to humility contradicted the fund of

experience of all ancient cultures. Yet ithad been unleashed

by the same release of the forces of production which had

also facilitated a reduction of theprimacy previously accordedto religion; in a countermove, it served to strengthen the ex

pansion of the new civilization. In other words: themeaningof progress, historically certified and teleologically fixed, be

came the lubricating agent, as itwere, for the dynamic of so

cial progress. That meaning provided the privileged with anuntroubled conscience, while granting the disadvantaged and

downtrodden a modicum of hope.Yet that lasted only for a certain limited period of time.The

philosophy of history grated against the abrasive surfaces of

social reality.The empirical involvement with history which

ithad galvanized showed history to be farmore contingent

and differentiated than anticipated, militating against derivingbinding conclusions or synthesizing total, all-embracing per

spectives from thathistory.Above all else, however, theprocessof progress in society itself did not lead to the predicted

goals: fraternity, eternal peace, autonomous freedom, the

spirit come home to itself, the realm of beauty, and that social

revolution meant to usher in an emancipated new era in

which the needs of one and all were to be satisfied. Itwas

precisely the sensitive observers at the end of the 19thcenturywho diagnosed the reality and future prospects of a societycharacterized by increasingly hardening structures and bureau

cracies. This was a societywhich, with historical inevitability,was trammeling the vitality and spirit of itsbourgeois class in

economic chains and bureaucratic fetters,while it expandedthemisery of the proletariat, ameliorated in certain circum

scribed strata, to the entireworld. Though the old masterswere gone, the servants had remained servants nonetheless.

The answer consisted in renouncing the notion that historywas ruled by ineluctable law - which one might accomodate

oneself to and grasp through reflection, thus accelerating its








36 Lutz Niethammer

pace. IfGod was indeed dead, therewas no need to transpose

the humility owedto

himto

the plane of history. Rather;men

could liberate themselves from the grip of history by means

of thewill to power. Now, those goals forwhose sake men

had once embraced the history of salvation could be forced

upon history more generally. For bourgeois individualism,thismight mean, in a Nietzschean perspective, the fragmentation of historical reality into an eternal recurrence of the

same, thus draining history of itsmeaning- and replacing

thatmeaning by the claim to power or the asocial aesthetics

of the "great personality". Following Sorel, one might, in the

intermediate strata, seek a renewal of vitality through violence,in order to forge a thirdpath between "capital'' and "labor"

and tomediate these politically in the name of the nation. In

terms of a Leninist view, itwas still possible within the proletariat to bring to bear historical regularities which as such

were inadequate - bymeans of a collective organization of

power in centralized party bureaucracies.

Such voluntaristic approaches were still in theminority as a

programme inall these spheres beforeWorld War I, butwere

given amass existential basis via the experience ofwar: In the

postwar period, they developed into themost dynamic forces,

seeking fulfillment in the implementation of goals legitimated

intermsf the hilosophy fhistoryleadershipy intellectualelites, realization of national greatness, classless society

- if

possible on a global scale). All authors who have formulated

concepts of posthistoire sinceWorld War IIwere shaped bysuch aggregates.

We can formulate our firstdiscovery more generally: history,which terminates inposthistoire, isan attempt at ameaningfulconstruction of

thoughtwhich

pointstoward a historical de

velopment concerning theworld as awhole. Its essence consists

of generalizing experiential knowledge about reality (earlier

events, thenature ofman, the dynamics of process structures).

Moreover, that generalization should not clash with a deter

mination of the telos of history, but should rather enhance it.

Since this fund of experiential knowledge surpasses the

intellectualbilities fanysingle ndividual,hat isbasicallyinvolved here are interpretations of selective knowledge. Their

interpretive criteria are derivable from speculative or norma

tive statements about the future. Insofar as man is accorded

freedom, the interpretation can appeal to his freewill to ef

fect change in the perceived trends in history by means of









action. If such action fails, or turns out to be catastrophic or

criminal,what remains is either the choice of

interpretingreality - or human freedom as such.

The Will toPowerlessness

Posthistoire isnot a developed theory.Rather, its character is

more like a symptomatic feeling about reality. It isa codeword

full of allusions for the initiated, expressive of a mood and

presupposing a great deal of theory. Its firstkey criterial pre

supposition is themeaningful, goal-oriented history contained

in the classical philosophy of history. Its second presuppositionis a voluntaristic shift in that philosophy: the implementationof themeaning and objective of such history, no longer dis

coverable within historical reality,using the agency of power.

This marriage of intellect and power, however, was not inkeeping with that frequently encountered mesalliance inwhich

science and art prostitute themselves as a meretricious orna

mentation and instrument for those already holding power.On the contrary: Geist seeks to recruit and instrumentalize

power in the revolutionary educated middle classes, inorder

then to utilize that power to promote itsmeaningful designs

againstthe

prevailing powerstructures in

society.This rebel

lious rearing-up before the abyss of unmeaning derives from

the contradictory consciousness of the claims of intellectual

greatness2 and the absence of its impact on themasses. Thesemasses are conceptualized as being unconscious. Yet as longas this spirit of bourgeois decadence wishes to revolt againstthe social power structures and does not flee from them into

an aesthetic form of existence, it is compelled to enter into a

pact with itsadversary, themasses. This brings us back to thethird presupposition of posthistoire: namely, that such an

enterprisewas in fact a failure.

Any attempt and its associated failure involve a subjectiveand objective dimension, a type and a locus. The temporal

specification of that locus is simple: it is the postwar period,

and, in a laterwave, the period beginning with the 1970s.

The situation is characterized biographically by previous experience: fascism and itsdebacle on the right; on the left,the

replacement of various militant forms of communism -initially

of Stalinism, later of the various communist sects and grouplets.But that isonly one element. The strangemixtures inour








38 Lutz Niethammer

group of authors are also striking: in later years, de Jouvenel

became a memberof theClub ofRome, and Carl Schmittwrote about Che Guevara. Ernst Junger experimented with

drugs, Kojeve journeyed to see Schmitt, deMan read aloud

extracts from the biography of a German socialist in theGerman Institute for Industry, etc. For this reason, Iwould like

to sketch what I feel is typical in the life and work of ten

posthistoire authors.3

The term "revolutionary Bildungsburger" mentioned earlier

is descriptive and meant to differentiate this category from

those revolutionary intellectuals who were in fact loyal adher

ents of some political organization for a longer period of

time. In this group of authors, only de Man fits that description: over the span of a decade, he held positions in the bu

reaucracy of Belgian socialism, yetwas also a professor at the

same time and in between. At least five more authors were

members of radicalmass parties (NSDAP, PPF,KPD, PCF),but never served as functionaries (in the sense of a way of

life).Their organizational involvement was too brief for this,as in the case of JouvenePs two years as head of theDoriot

party organ, or too peripheral: Baudrillard, for example,served togetherwith Althusser ina commision of intellectuals

of the PCF; Gehlen attempted to organize Leipzig professors

for theNSDAP. All stem at the very least from middle-classbackgrounds (onlyHeidegger and Schmitt were parvenus in

these social circles), all were endowed with great intellectual

gifts.They were neither disposed toward nor condemned to a

professional career inpolitics- the fastest yet riskiest upward

ladder in the twentieth century. Seven of the ten became pro

fessors, twowere well-known writers, one was a high-rankingbureaucrat.

However^such

positions onlydescribe them ex

ternally. They were all, by temperament and interest, public

men, hommes de lettres, insiders of theZeitgeist-

and, in any

case, an elite in terms of any criteria, especially their own.

About half were politically active on the extreme left,half

on the extreme rightduring crucial phases of their lives -i.e.,

theywere involved inprogrammatic-propagandistic activitytoward political forceswhich sought to galvanize themasses

into taking political action aimed at bringing about funda

mental systemic change. More characteristic than their

orientation toward a specific political direction, however^ is

the sociocultural tension and brevity of duration of these

pacts between intellectual circles and large organizations. In









the case of eight of the ten, it ispossible to note at least one

more orless voluntary change in fundamental political outlook. Given thepolitical breaks and changes thathave shaken

Europe in this century, that fact would not be particularly

noteworthy,f hey ad nottalked nd behaved s if hey adnever changed theirminds, or claimed theyhad always been

correct in their views. With two exceptions in each group,

theywere all born before or around the turn of the century,and lived on into the 1970s. Several of them (have) reached a

ripe old age. As a rule, they all lived through the experienceof twoWorld Wars, at least three breaks incultural continuity,and two ruptures inpolitical continuity.

These were times that were changing more rapidly thanever before, and they had to change with those times -

pas

sionately, though for some with an apparent gesture of in

difference to their era.World War I lefta powerful imprint

on the intellectual profile of at least two of them. One wasforced after the October Revolution, with which he sym

pathized, to leave his Russian homeland due to his "unsuit

able" social background. Another grew up in a foreign en

vironment, since his father had been compelled as a rabbi to

emigrate. Five oscillated between several countries, and it is

not always possible to clearly distinguish political from oc

cupational reasons in this regard. One was forced to leaveNazi Germany as a Jew and left-wing intellectual; he returnedin 1950 toAustria. Two so-called "half-Jews"

- one from a

communist family, the other in the wake of a flirtwith

fascism -sought out "marginality as a safe refuge." Four lost

theirpositions during thewar or at itsend; fourwere obligedat that time to change countries. The minority, all of these

right-wing

- deJouvenel, Freyer, Gehlen, Jiinger

-

managedto achieve success under all prevailing regimes, though theywere forced to bide their time.Although none was without a

fairly respected elite position from the 1950s on, those on the

lefthad a more trying time of it:Bruckner was fired from his

job, scapegoated and hounded after (and even before) the re

pressive-violent "German autumn" of 1977 (though thecourts

later ruled that this had been unlawful), and not finally re

habilitated posthumously until 1980.Yet these historical breaks and tensions in the biographies

of our authors are not just an arbitrary example of the con

fusion of our century.Moreover, in themajority of cases,there is no justification for a simplistic explanation of their








40 Lutz Niethammer

changes inposition: by reference, for example, to that "bundle

of excessenergy"

with which therenegade

is endowed.Theyneither see themselves as pawns at themercy of history, nor

do theywish to help preservetheworld from their wnearlier political errors. Rather, the intellectual productivity of

thesemen goes on inunbroken continuity- as though itwere

necessary to demonstrate the independence of their intellect.

Their work, as in the case of Gehlen or Baudrillard, remains

untainted by any biographical references to their own personas a topic, or - as in the case ofHeidegger or Kojeve - it is

liberated from history bymeans of self-interpretation and by

transforming it into a kind of principle. In some instances, as

with Junger and deMan, the autobiography has been goneover and reworked until a level of personal consistency had

been reached which is tantamount to a declaration of inde

pendence from society.

In actual fact, theywere not simply at themercy of events -unlike the greater proportion of the countless victims of the

war and the dictatorships. Rather, they engaged in radical

political action for the sake of themeaningfulness of "history"and gave those radical currents theirpen, name, and counsel.

Even their elitist self-image was not merely illusion: because

they did in fact have substantial amounts of intellectual pow

er.The illusionary aspect of theirmegalomaniacal imaginationlay in thepractical sphere: in their view that itwas possible to

both keep one's distance from themasses and the bureau

cracies, and yet lead them. That illusion became evident at

the very latest when political activity, radicalized by the

search formeaning, was transposed from open oppositionand transformed into an embarrassed relationship with an

establishedpower.

Acompromise

inregard

to details was

then unavoidable; such a compromise had not been envisagedas part of theproject toprovide meaning. In the confrontation

with the violence of bureaucracy, the sense of self of these

men was offended to thepoint ofmeaninglessness. Instead of

leading the pact between bourgeois intellect and themasses,

they experienced themselves as theornamental embellishment

of a pact between power and themasses.

In accordance with their self-respect and chances of survival,this insight led to a retreat from the sphere of history. That

defeat in the practical realm was compensated by intellectual

production. Such productivity linked up with the content of

the recent past in order to shield and protect that content









from any suspicion that itwas responsible for their own

defeatand for the historical

consequences flowing fromthe

abortive pact. The warding off of this suspicion, which was a

powerful threat to their self-understanding as intellectual

leaders, blocked a concrete discussion of theirown participation in and experience of history. In place of that discussion,therewas an exonerating diagnosis of the external world: the

pact between power and themasses had, this diagnosis held,become a self-regulating system on the historically acquiredbasis of the technical domination of nature. This system,with marginal differences in political configuration, encom

passed virtually the entire planet and was in the process of

unceasing self-reproduction, irrespectiveofwar and upheavals.This "second system", which neither required new ideas nor

permitted them, had detached itself rom nature, from realityas a plane open to empirical experience, from time as amean

ingful evolution - and from the intervention of each individualactor. In the view of this diagnosis, itwas no longer possibleto associate the freedom of the individual in a meaningful

manner with the totality of events as a whole. Rather, that

freedom realized itselfonly inniches of that totality: in recol

lective phantasy, inmyth, in simulation, the hypotheticalityof the "as if".

History and Posthistoire

My interpretation here of the genesis of posthistoire notionsas a specific projective relief, an exoneration (Entlastung), is

based on a reading of these authors against the very grain of

their opus. It gathers together fragments of historical attach

ment and involvement precisely at that point where these

writers speak about a loss ofmeaning inhistorical thought. Itturns inward where theauthors ofposthistoire point outward.

If one subtracts the exonerating element from the genesis of

the notion of theposthistoire, as well as an exit out of historyback toward thenotion of histoire based on a voluntaristicallyshiftedHegelianism, then thediagnosis itself isnotmeaningless

and devoid of any objective referent.Rather; itopens itselfupfor amore differentiating evaluation for thehistorian's work.

In all posthistoire authors, there is an evaluative categorization of world civilization which is often termed "crystallization." This metaphor has been borrowed from the bio








42 Lutz Niethammer

logical theory of evolution; it posits that from accidental

genetic mutations and the survival ofthe

fittest variants,species evolve. These then stabilize genetically and continue

to reproduce in the same manner for as long as they can

survive in their environmental niche. In transposing this to

history, there isa process of sociocultural development: human

history arrives at the end of itsqualitative changes concomitant

with a high degree of independence of advanced, technical

industrial civilization fromnature and itsuniform

implementation on a world scale. It then congeals and hardens into a

structurewhich reproduces itself, uasi-genetically. This could

be viewed as an evolutionarily expanded theory ofmodern

ization. Yet it iswritten in a minor chord, so to speak, because crystallization simultaneously portends the end of free

dom and meaning; i.e., it is a "reanimalization" ofman.

De Man and Anders note a further consequence of such

evolvement: namely, the tendency toward thanatos. Bothauthors are under theheavy impact of the destructive energiesunleashed inWorld War II and the uncontrollable machineryofwar and destruction. Peculiarly, it is precisely the personwho coined the concept of the posthistoire who likewise

hopes for a "mutation," like Teilhard, Bertaux, or Serres.

"Mutation" here signifies a basic change in social structure

and attitudes, and thus an epoch-making historical transformation. The most important slogans appearing then on

the agenda are: an end to "exterminism," limits on growth,

decentralization, protection of resources, environmental and

social compatability and non-material satisfactions.

While such a catalogue can still be comprehended as a kind

of paraphrase of the programme of the Enlightenment-

namely, as a return of alienated progress to the inward world

bymeans of thepowers of reason - this framework is shattered

by furthertheories applying the slogans "entropy" and "death

wish" to society as a whole. Their global conceptions of de

clining life-energies and diminishing options, along with the

notion of lifeas a detour to death, were not conceptualized as

thefinal historical "mutation" in the expansive hope forpro

gress during the axial period. Since the historicity of nature

belongs among the great discoveries of the last century, andhas relativized theoppositions between the natural and human

sciences, itwould be reasonable to expect that a theoretical

mediation between the finitude of human existence and that

of theworld on the level fhistory nd society ould give









rise to alternatives to the paradigm of growth and modern

ization.The posthistorical appropriation of sociobiological metaph

ors (crystallization, termite state), which have accompanieddiscourse in this realm since the Enlightenment, fails to do

this. Such an appropriation arbitrarilymixes the dimensions

of nature and culture in itsguise as a kind of social Darwinism- instead of conceptualizing culture within the framework of

nature on the one

hand,and as a social dimension on the

other. It remains fixated on traditions it rejects as long as it

fails, adhering to the tradition of theEnlightenment, to under

scorethe initude fnature, gnoreshedeathof the ndividual

subject in species-historical terms and fails to consider societal

clashes of interest, thus eliminating right from the start anyelement ofmotion from history.

For this reason, the perspective of posthistoire as an elitist,

cultural-pessimistic revaluation of the optimism of progress

appears tome to be a diagnosis of the times that ismore con

fusing than enlightening. Most of its proponents stress the

primacy of theirown interest, instead of concentrating on the

new problems of the century. They are enthralled by the ex

aggerated symptoms of the palsy of civilization, instead of

calling attention to its capacity for self-destruction. The ques

tion about meaning eclipses the existential question. FromKojeve and Gehlen to Baudrillard, the proclamation of the

end of history (as amovement beyond thebound of traditional

horizons of meaning) rests on the ossified phantasy of a

meaningless but infinite flow of events.

Moreover, posthistoire presupposes meaningful construc

tions in the form of "mega-narratives9 on world history, and

thus the legacy of the history of salvation. In this traditionalmold, work on a concept of what ishistorical, taking cognizance of the finitude ofman and theworld, would only under

go a radical volte-face, shifting from euphoric optimism about

the future to itspolar opposite: apocalyptic anxiety. On the

other hand, thepseudo-empirical narrative structure ofworld

history would be retained, as though we knew something in

contential terms about its beginning and end. But we do

not have such knowledge, so that a macrotheoretical framework for historical data always remains a hypothetical con

struct. The origin and verificational status of theory-makingdiffer from a historical-critical processing of tradition. It is

true that meaningful history generally comes about via a








44 Lutz Niethammer

process ofworking through preliminary interpretations usingthe

sparse,trace-like

legacyof actual events.

However; another proviso is decisive for the relationshipbetween history and all practical action: the status ofmacro

historical patterns of interpretation (and their derivatives)must not be blurred in such away by historical processing as

to let it appear as though the interpretation arrived at were

immanent to the events themselves. It should be underscored

that without suchmacrohistorical patterns of interpretation,there isno possibility to demonstrate ameaningful connection

between the segments of past event-sequences examined byresearch. All attempts at reification of the tentative, model

like character ofworld history by a pseudo-empirical embel

lishment, as in the grand cyclical theories of Spengler or

(moremodesdy) Toynbee, eventuate ina meglomaniacal self

deception of predictive certainty- instead of leading to the

creative cross-tension generated by differingmodes of orientation toward historical reality.Most posthistoire authors adhere to one or another tradition

of theHegelian philosophy of history. That approach seeks

to elaborate ameaningful genetic explanation for the realityof universal history. This enterprise comes up against at least

two difficulties. For one, a meaningful rough blueprinting of

the perception of historical reality is always the first step inthe process. It can deal with such perception only sector

wide, and with a concomitant drastic reduction of its com

plexity. Even in themost optimum case, selective reduction

limits thepower of concepts forprognosis, and such prognosisis often given the lie by historical events viewed from later

retrospective vantage. Secondly, a history (due to its narrative

structure) does not reveal itsmeaning until its final chapter is

closed. The enterprise thus presupposes that all of historymust be nearly at an end before its significance

- as "mean

ingful" history- can finally be elucidated. This helps to ex

plain the close affinity between thematerialist philosophy of

history and various chiliastic currents. Such currents may,likeRomanticism, contend that the apocalypse is nigh

- or

may, likeMarxism, regard the repeal of the necessity of his

torical motion within the framework 6f a desired society as

being an option which is historically preordained and ma

terially practicable. Or the interpretive analyst himself may,likeHegel, believe he isprivy to absolute knowledge (which,on thisplane, can only be followed after the end of history by









a return of the eternally recurrent). Shortcircuiting the pointof

departurewith the

goalof a re<z/-historical

interpretationof meaning, such an end of history reveals itself to be little

more than an artifact of thought.

However, even by means of such objections, one cannot

dispose so facilely of the diagnosis of posthistoire. On a se

cond level, there is still thematter of its characterization of

the current societal configuration and its relationship with

the individual. What is striking in this connection are the

similarities between the various diagnoses made sinceWorld

War II of the "megamachine" (Mumford), "post-industrial

society" (Bell) and "social protectorate" (de Jouvenel), "se

condary systems" (Freyer) and the "new normality" (Bruck

ner). What links these diagnoses is that they relativize the

importance of the political constitution, property relations

and other basic categories of traditional social theory; in

their stead, theyposit a common technical-social structure -self-reproducing, and slipping out of control. As a result, the

conditions for that control are of secondary importance. This

socio-technical structure isconceptualized as a state of affairs

which has been produced historically, but is in itself no

longer historical - since there isno longer any basic contra

diction at work in advanced societies, impelling structural

change. Rather, it is hypothesized that the contradictionswhich exist are only partial and marginal, and therefore sub

ject from the outset to the enduring power of inertia common

to basic social structures. Consequently, these contradictionsno longer tend toward revolution or a transformation of

societal reality, but rather are discharged via the safety valves

of an innocuous rebelliousness or a retreat into the inner self.

The dynamics of social homogenization can be observed on

several planes, and linked with technical progress. On the

economic plane, increases inproductivity have made possiblea relatively broad mass prosperity without class struggle,

transforming the contradictions between capitalists and workers into a tension-laden cooperative relationship between

capital and labor. This relationship is bolstered by corporative

organizations, and isboth underpinned and relativized by the

secular growth of public service bureaucracies and privateservice industries. In the socialist countries, homogenizationhas progressed even further as a result of state control over

theorganization and disposition of capital and labor, yet that

unification is less efficientlyorganized.








46 Lutz Niethamtner

On the political plane, spheres free from state influence -

and thus social autonomyin

pure form

-

have largely disappeared in the wake of bureaucratization, the growing powerand presence of state bureaucracies of violence, the interlacingof the social fabric with governmental regulations, and the

dependence of all individuals, and every "private" initiative,on state support and subsidies (especially in the area of in

dividual social welfare). The augmentation of this simul

taneouslycompact and immobile power eliminates the elbow

room forpotential development of a fundamental oppositionwithin society, and impedes even quite minor corrections in

political direction. On the other hand, internal conflict regulation isbased largelyn thedistributionf thefruitsf economic growth, a circumstance which dictates a perpetuationof these systems in their fundamental dynamic of expansion.

Finally, on the cultural plane, the relative autonomy of

regional and class cultures has been eroded as a result of high

mobility, state-controlled education and theomnipresent mass

media. That autonomy has been supplanted by a market

oriented culture of atomized masses, whose temporal and

spatial horizons grow hazy, a culture inwhich appearanceand reality can no longer be differentiated, and where simula

tions and simulacra are frequendy more fascinating, and at

times even more realistic, than primary experience of reality.The principal feature of this culture is a contradiction which

has been shifted to the locus of the individual: on the one

hand, his practical behavior is determined by the practicalbehavior of economic constraints and the bureaucracies, now

an indelible component of everyday routine; on the other

hand, his expressive world is released into a whimsical pot

pourriof fanciful

flight.There would appear to be a great deal of evidence in favor

of such a tentative description of current social realities, since

this perspective can accomodate a large number of everydayand scientific observations. However, the problem with this

draft is the vantage point fromwhich it has been sketched:

perhaps itwas authored by an observer from another planet.Can itpossiblyhave been drawnbyanyone subjecthimself

or herself to the estrangement of experience (Entwirklichung)and the inescapability of the structures described?

Yet maybe there is really something akin to a "man-from

Mars" point of vantage: detached observers who, although

contemporaries, are so littlea part of their era that they are in









a position to look down upon itfrom the outside, as itwere.

If one wishes to open oneself upto

the diagnostic power ofthose who have stepped- or fallen - out of history, one

should listen to theirmessage very carefully, heedful of its

limitations. The basic problem of the posthistoire authors is

that they have a mistaken view of the relationship between

intellectuals and themasses in a critical phase. As educated

bourgeois- a Bildungsbiirger elite or avantgarde

-theywere

unable to countenance the notion ofseeing

themselves as

part of thesemasses, thus dissolving the concept of the 'mass'

into individual subjects. In this regard, their error is identical

with that distancing which makes them valuable inour eyesas detached observers. However, this distance can be objec

tively qualified by the specific perspective of the authors.

That specific perspective consists, on the one hand, in the

inclusion of contemporaries in the objective concept of the

societal mass and, on the other hand, in the attempt to blurand mask their own responsibility for the content of their

political commitment. These excesses must be remedied. In

the latter instance, the requisite remedy is obvious: attention

must be redirected back to the differences between systems.These differencesmust then bemade evident using the criterion

of the level of life-quality the differing systems facilitate, the

sacrifices they engender and the ability they contain for galvanizing self-reflection upon their problems.When itcomes to the relationship between subjectivity and

themasses, the problem ismore complex. The posthistoireauthors do not view themselves as a part of themasses; they

regard the masses as an entity reacting instinctively and

mechanically to societal demands, and thus devoid of itsown

subjectivity,

or

any abilityto achieve historical

knowledgeand undergo change. To that extent, theirmodel of societalstructures - inwhich themasses constitute themediating link

between economy, politics, and culture - would like to exit

from history. That blueprint would be less objectivistic and

pessimistic if the individuals composing the social masses

were equipped with subjectivity.This would mean that despitethe totalityof structural constraints, thoughtwould be opened

up by thatmodicum of freedomwhich the observer claims, inany case, for his own. As soon as the observer of themasses

realizes that he himself is a part of that entity, those masses

dissolve into individuals who are aware of their inclusion in

social processes, reflect on such processes and are able to








48 Lutz Niethammer

relate to them.Of course, there should be no illusionary hope

that the individualwill, by himself, e able to effect nysubstantial change in these structures. Yet he - or she - isnot

alone: all have the same option, though itwould appear to be

extremely insignificant in view of the immensity of the

problems. Hope then would be based precisely on themass

character of reflective and communicating subjectivity- rather

than on any process of "subjectivization" of the object "mas

ses" or of any other collective singular entity.Posthistorical diagnosis views societal formation as being

shaped by an objective process of homogenization/unificationvia power structures moving from the center outward. This

process no longer holds out the promise of any qualitative

movement, but rather extends outward until itcongeals and

hardens. Any deviations from this are residues from earlier

histories, elements of the non-European world, and a post

historical, aesthetic realm of simulation. Reflected in thisdialectic of center and periphery, drained of reality, is the

marginalization of the intellectual leader. If, based on a per

spective of mass subjectivity, one does away with the anti

thetical contrasting of intelligence and themasses, so necessaryfor defining the intellectual, then itwill also be possible once

again to perceive the true differences within and between so

cieties as points of departure forhistorical action. This couldbe done without completely sacrificing the value of the posthistorical description of societal development. But itwould

then alter its status: a menacing image impelling reflective

subjectivity toward a search for initiatives to action emergesfrom theparalyzing diagnosis that these structures have indeed

become independent and threaten annihilation. Posthistoire

becomes historical if it is not read as a general diagnosis, but

rather as a specific negative Utopia for the loss of future per

spective within advanced industrial societies.

Yet is itpossible to imagine any historical perception and

reflection whatsoever of mass subjectivity in contemporary

culture? In his posthistorical fiction Eumeswil, history for

Ernst Junger becomes the paradigmatic activity within post

histoire. In privileged Luminar; the anarch occupies himself

with itscontents in simulated timelessness and lack of respon

sibility: i.e., with the eternal recurrence of the same in the

kitchen cabinet of power- towhich he offers his services in

his main profession. In this hybrid admixture ofNietzsche

and Baudrillard, history- with the estranging of themean









ingful coherence of itsmega-narratives-

degenerates into a

video archive packed with past figures and events, whosefascination offershim solace in the face of themeaninglessnessof his own existence and theworld. In visionary form, there

appears here the elitist variant of the intended addressee at

which the postmodern culture industry and cultural bureau

cracy seem to direct theirmessages. That variant is characteriz

ed by the simultaneous availability, reification and simulatab

ilityof arbitrarily selected bits of tradition, the

structuring

of

thismaterial in terms of the educative goals as laid down bythe given power relations, as well as the aesthetic processingof thatmaterial forpassive and isolated observers. The recipienthere is indeed posthistorical, in that he is constantly con

frontedwith fragments of the past which estrange him from

his own historical situation and subjectivity. Such fragmentsdo not permit him to find his own true self, so to speak, but

rather catalyze his departure fromhis own historical existence,as he is literally inundated with material from the past.

I have attempted to show that on themost general plane,the posthistoire diagnosis

- as a disappointed postscript to

nineteenth-century philosophy of history- fails to recognize

the essential problems of a relevant communication regardingworld history, and that its interpretation of the present only

makes sense if substantially altered. The aesthetic, mediaoriented dimension of posthistorical history, in contrast, is

highly ractical nd inkeeping ith therhymend rhythmfthe times. The search for a critical alternative would have to

proceed from the question as to the type of services which a

historian can offer in order to bolster the subjectivity of the

individual in his/her historical self-perception. Such a per

spectiveould link

upwith the

legacyfbourgeois

individualism, butwould have to abandon its ideal of greatness and

power, inorder to achieve a realistic evaluation of the available

options and scope for action within - and against- societal

structures. It could also link up with material interests and

collective traditions, but should not harbor any hope that

objective featureswill automatically be transformed into action- ifone really wishes to utilize possible options for action.

Such a perspective could also be labelled "history from below,99since it upends the traditional hierarchy of historical tasks.

What is involved snot a philosophy fhistorywhich canvouch formeaning, and which, in structured constructions or

narrative presentations about broader contexts, events and








50 Lutz Niethammer

persons, suggests an impression of a realitywhich has reallybeen proven and demonstrated - and is then

ultimatelyserved

up didactically for consumption inaesthetically pleasing forms.

Rather; thepoint of departure here lies in the explication of

the life-history of the individual, embedded in its social and

historical contextual web, its experiences and omissions; in

the abilities of the individual to reflect upon this life-history,to narrate to interested others about himself, and in thiswayto establish communication with them about the history

which links them all. Such a process of clarification must

necessarily also come to include aspects of contemporaryhistorical reality and the earlier histories of one's family,group, factory, locality, political direction, etc. - because it

requires such histories for its own self-understanding and

self-explanation. Many people need exemplary models before

embarking upon the search for such a clarification of their

own life-history.This helps account for the current popularityof oral history and the numerous talk shows on radio and

TV. Every person requires the aid of professional historio

graphy when the extended web of interconnections of a con

temporary-historical and personal-prehistorical nature is

involved. The further these extend temporally and in the

dimensions under consideration, themore exclusive is a person's

dependenceon the elucidative and communicative func

tion of historical science. What can historiography offer if it

wishes to enhance an individual's historical self-understandingand ability to take action, rather than subordinate the

individual to the fiction of an objectively meaningful historical

process, or brush him off with an arbitrarily selected handful

of aesthetic fragments? There are at least three possible areas

which appear crucial.

1.Narrative reworking of data and contexts in contemporaryhistorical reality, and the respective historical presuppositions of a group: these extend over a broad range, including

objective conditions, political decisions, sociocultural in

fluences on everyday life, and collective and exemplaryindividual experiences. Such elements offer a possible basis

for giving a societal framework to the outreaching process

of individual understanding of one's own life-history.2. The structuring of large-scale historical contexts (extending

allthe ay toglobalhistory) salwaysbasedonhypotheticalconstructs. Some conceptualization of such contexts isneces

sary forhistorical communicable self-understanding. How









ever, it is equally important not tomistake such constructs

forreality,

but rather tocomprehend

them in their character

as blueprints or provisional sketches. For this reason, read

able theoretical summaries and discussions of differing ap

proaches would bemore useful thanpseudo-empirical syntheses for the elucidation ofmore distant and larger-scalerealms of historical reality.

3. Finally, amode of communicable historical understanding

proceeding

from the conditions and experiences of one's

own existence requires the exemplary experience ofwhat is

alien and different: the foreigner, the stranger. Such experience serves to broaden social phantasy indealing with the

fund of experience. It renders recognizable what isnormallytaken for granted as self-explanatory, allowing one to pin

point such material and thus make it amenable to change.Suchamode ofexperiencefwhat isforeignnddifferent

does not require any overly hasty transposition to the "hereand now," but rather raises this into consciousness throughtheperception of distance. Nor does itneed the construction

of a linkingontext, venthough tmay triggeruriosityabout such a context. Rather, itdemands a complex concrete

ness,which also illuminates thedeep strataof another culture

bymeans of example.

Historical effortwhich can be linked with the elucidation ofone's own experience, shattering what it takes for grantedand disclosing orientational blueprints of historical intercon

nection, moves beyond the juxtaposition of intellectual leader

vs. broad masses. Trammeled over by that antithesis of the

intellectual against themasses, the interpreters take on a task

which is too demanding, and individuals are not encouraged

in practicalterms to

make historyon

their own, with thepowers and abilities at theirdisposal. In such a juxtaposition

(and this iswhat a reading against the grain of posthistoire

diagnoses reveals), history freezes solid or explodes- not

simply abstractly, but in concrete actuality.Potential explosions loom as a threatwhenever thehistorical

groundwork for a self-understanding inhistory is unable to

reach Subjekte in their own existential locus, but rather leads

their search for orientation into fundamentalistic collective

identities, discharging it in the short circuit between popularmasses and political power. The return of political theologythen signals cultural bankruptcy and the violent collision of

unmediated identities. The other extreme might be labelled








52 Lutz Niethammer

"crystalline or atomic death by freezing." This can arise from

the autonomous functioning of "secondary systems," theircultural paralysis and the risk they entail of a catastrophe for

all humankind. That danger; rooted in the system, can be

pointed out by intellectuals, but its threat can only be gen

uinely diminished by the action of the "masses" - an aggre

gate of individuals endowed with amodicum of freedom and

responsibility, to whose inclusive ranks the intellectuals

ultimately also belong.









Notes

1 I can only make a few rough references to this here. De

tailed comments and materials on the discourses inwhich

this concept arose and took on significance are contained

inmy small book on "Posthistoire," to be published in the

autumn of 1989. Theconcluding

remarks of that book are

presented in the following sections.

2 Characteristic of themeaning-crisis of the bourgeois intel

lectual is the self-attribution of an authoritative special

role, defined as someone who manipulates time in event

sequences construed according to thephilosophy of history.The conservative segment of the intelligentsia then discovers

its "nobility of intellect": it isprecisely the bourgeois intel

lectual who is thereby raised above thematerial push-andshove of bourgeois society, and ismeant to be thus grantedthe audience befitting theGrandes in the ancien regime.This is the predominant attitude among posthistoireauthors. The movement party, in contrast, sees itselfas an

aristocracy of (historical) propellant velocity: as "avant

garde," it rushes on out ahead of the forward motion of

history, experimenting and setting the direction.3 Those authors under scrutiny are mentioned here in the

order inwhich the perspective of posthistoire appears in

their work: de Jouvenel, Kojeve, Jiinger, deMan, Gehlen,

Freyer, Anders, Baudrillard, Bruckner, Taubes. As related

thinkers, Benn, Schelsky, Heidegger, and Carl Schmitt, for

example, might also be considered -along, more generally,

with certain French post-structuralists and recentGermancontemporary philosophers and philosophical anthropolo

gists.

Translated from theGerman by Bill Templer

niet hammer

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