"Dictatorship and freedom cannot be considered separately": a critique of contemporary plebiscite democracy in Ernst Junger's essay "Going into the Forest"
The end of World War II marked a new page in stories Germany, which suffered a crushing defeat and was divided by the allies into four occupation zones. The efforts of the allies, and then the new German authorities of the FRG and the GDR, were aimed at overcoming the Nazi past. The "right" political position has become a real rarity in the country, because the German public is entirely focused on overcoming the totalitarian mentality.
However, in Germany there remained "right" thinkers who, in spite of everything, managed to maintain their moral identity. One such person was Ernst Junger (1895–1998). The liberal German public was rather skeptical and wary of the non-political works of the German writer and philosopher. Historians often make him a scapegoat for Nazism, and some texts are called promoting the romanticization and glorification of the war, which the Nazis took advantage of. The generation of 1968 rather narrow-mindedly called E. Junger a fascist or a pro-fascist.
However, as the historian Oleg Plenkov notes, even after 1945, Ernst Junger, despite the beginning of national repentance in Germany for National Socialism, continued to largely remain on the same positions in assessing the significance of many political realities.
“This was completely contrary to the anti-totalitarian culture of the FRG that had been developing since the mid-1960s, which developed a democratic political culture in the country by ignoring or excluding the entire right-wing tradition, which Junger seemed (and was) unfair ...
It seems that in Jünger's judgments there is a fair amount of logic and consistency in his assessments of the historical past [2]."
It seems that in Jünger's judgments there is a fair amount of logic and consistency in his assessments of the historical past [2]."
Being a nonconformist in his spiritual and mental make-up, E. Jünger was skeptical first of the Weimar Republic, then (after a short charm) of Nazism (his novel On the Marble Cliffs, written in 1939, is considered a pamphlet on all kinds of tyranny, contemporaries recognized it alludes to concentration camps), and then to modern German democracy.
One of Jünger's post-war works, in which one can see criticism of modern Western democracy and the processes of globalization, is Leaving for the Forest. It is this work, as well as Jünger's post-war views, that we will consider in this material.
Ernst Junger in the first years after the end of World War II
After the end of World War II, Ernst Junger managed to maintain his moral identity as a right-wing thinker who sought to fence himself off from Nazism. When the Americans entered Germany in 1945, he wrote that the consequences of such a catastrophe cannot be got rid of over time, as the Germans and French once recovered from the trauma of defeat at Jena or Sedan. The defeat of 1945 meant, in his opinion, a radical change in the life of European nations, including the Germans.
Not only many people perished, but many previously significant and significant values \u1945b\u3bthat moved people and gave meaning to life have sunk into oblivion. The Germans had an acute need to resist the consequences of total defeat, a need that should be turned into a channel of constructive continuity and the revival of the old German tradition. Jünger was the first European conservative thinker to understand that the German catastrophe of XNUMX meant a general collapse of the anti-Enlightenment project [XNUMX].
As the historian Sergey Kazakov notes, the concrete historical criticism of time and the essential metaphysical approach form the complex basis of the mechanism of his conservative style of Ernst Junger [4]. Perhaps that is why Hans-Peter Schwartz believes that Junger at that time, like Donoso Cortes, Chateaubriand, de Maistre, was characterized by differentiation between “traditional forms of being”, subject to time, and the eternal “above-time” order [5].
At the end of the war, Jünger was ready to move from concrete reflections and comprehension of events to a metaphysical overcoming of Nazism and building a continuum through generalizing works, reflecting his manner of the most distant view of current events, which is to no small extent a common feature of the conservative assessment of Nazism in post-war Germany.
Despite the fact that Jünger was not a member of the NSDAP, close attention to his person due to the work of the 20s of the twentieth century was provided to him. His metaphysical form of protest during the years of Nazism did not inspire confidence among the majority of representatives of the left and liberal camp. Such German "literary emigrants" as Thomas Mann and Karl Zuckmayer, Bertolt Brecht and Theodor Adorno differed in their assessments of Ernst Junger's position in the era of Nazism [4].
On the other hand, it does not take much courage to criticize the political regime while in exile and advise what compatriots should do in their homeland. It is quite another thing to do this, with a real threat of falling under the rink of repression. Jünger himself, in his essay Leaving for the Forest, writes about the accusations against the Germans that they accepted and did not resist National Socialism, the following:
“In Germany, open resistance to the authorities was and remains especially difficult, since since the days of the legitimate monarchy there has been preserved reverence for the state, which has its advantages along with its dark side. Therefore, it was difficult for an individual to understand why, after the entry of the armies of the victorious countries, he was held accountable for insufficient resistance not only as a collective defendant, but also individually - for example, for fulfilling his professional duties as an official or bandmaster ...
In one case, the occupiers label you as a collaborator, in the other case, the parties label you as a fellow traveler. So the loner finds himself in a situation between Scylla and Charybdis; he is threatened with liquidation, both for participation and non-participation [1].”
In one case, the occupiers label you as a collaborator, in the other case, the parties label you as a fellow traveler. So the loner finds himself in a situation between Scylla and Charybdis; he is threatened with liquidation, both for participation and non-participation [1].”
Ernst Junger was also criticized for refusing to fill out a denazification questionnaire to test his beliefs in 1945, in connection with which the British occupation authorities banned his publications in Germany for 4 years. It is worth noting here that due to the fact that Jünger was extremely close to the participants in the conspiracy against Hitler, he was retired from military service in October 1944 (and was not killed only due to luck), but on his publication banned in the Third Reich. Ironically, the censorship ban of the Nazi regime lasted, as did the ban on the publication of the writer's books in the western zone of Germany by the British military administration, until 1950.
Nevertheless, at the beginning of 1949, Junger received from the French military command the right to publish in Germany, and the first post-war novel, published in the same year, was Heliopolis. Retrospective of one city. It is interesting that, as Yury Solonin, a researcher of Junger's work, notes, in the public opinion of the French, his name was never associated with the concept of an occupier, and a prominent member of the Resistance movement F. Mitterrand even visited Junger in Wilfling during the celebration of the 90th anniversary of the writer, where he spent the last decade of his life [6].
Junger's post-war views have become somewhat more moderate, he is moving away from radicalism, but he does not cease to be anti-republican and remains an adherent of conservative realism, to which traditionalist pessimism is added. For the thinker, as for the right-wing traditionalist, there is no fundamental difference between democracy and totalitarian dictatorship, which is further confirmed by his essay “Going into the Forest” (1951).
Criticism of the democratic regime in E. Junger's essay "Leaving for the Forest"
Reflecting on how to behave in the face of and within the catastrophe of our era, and trying to find a force that can preserve freedom in a total state, Jünger, following the figures of the worker and the unknown soldier, brings the gestalt into the arena of history (gestalt is defined as “the whole that embraces more than the sum of its parts") - a partisan who "went into the forest" [7].
In the work “Leaving for the Forest”, Jünger addresses the important topic of preserving personal integrity and the right to existential human freedom from unifying power through criticism of the democratic regime [8]. He begins his work with a passage that “Going into the Forest” is by no means an idyll” and it will be about “questions of the kind that always carry a threat”.
One of the first questions that Ernst Junger asks is the problem of elections and questionnaires in modern democracy, which has not guaranteed security since the beginning of the XNUMXth century and is fraught with consequences.
“The ballot paper is designed to determine simple numerical ratios and to count them. He must find out the will of the voter, and the entire electoral process is aimed at ensuring that this will be direct, without extraneous influences on the result. Therefore, elections are accompanied by a sense of security and even a sense of belonging to power, which, in fact, distinguishes free will within the legal field.
Our contemporary, undergoing the questioning imposed on him, is very far from such security. The answers he gives are fraught with consequences, often his fate depends on them ...
The questions get closer and closer to us, they become more insistent, and the way we answer becomes more and more important. At the same time, one must remember that silence is also an answer [1]”,
Our contemporary, undergoing the questioning imposed on him, is very far from such security. The answers he gives are fraught with consequences, often his fate depends on them ...
The questions get closer and closer to us, they become more insistent, and the way we answer becomes more and more important. At the same time, one must remember that silence is also an answer [1]”,
Junger writes.
The German thinker notes that the ballot paper turns into a questionnaire, and free elections are nothing more than an illusion. Elections are largely predetermined.
“Why, then, are elections needed if there is no choice anymore? The answer is this: our voter is given the opportunity to participate in the act of acclamation with his ballot. Not everyone is recognized as worthy of this privilege - so in the electoral rolls, of course, there are no names of countless unknowns, from which armies of new slaves are recruited. Therefore, the voter usually knows what is expected of him [1].”
Considering elections as a form of participation, Jünger recalls that in dictatorships they are replaced by a plebiscite and become just one of its forms. At the same time, propaganda plays an important role, which influences the masses and enlists the support of the majority.
“The sight of huge, passionately excited masses is the most important sign that we have entered a new era. In this area, if not unanimity, then certainly unanimity prevails, because if a dissenting voice is suddenly heard, whirlwinds immediately rise, destroying the one to whom it belongs.
Therefore, a loner who decides to draw attention to himself in this way may just as well dare to political assassination: the result for him will be the same [1].”
Therefore, a loner who decides to draw attention to himself in this way may just as well dare to political assassination: the result for him will be the same [1].”
According to Jugnger, the goal of the dictatorship is to prove that it relies not only on the overwhelming majority, but also that its approval is an expression of the free will of individuals.
“The directors of this process are trying to convince a person who came to the polling station with the firm intention of voting “no” that he is very lonely. It can be assumed that this voter, thanks to his common sense, resisted a long, unequivocal propaganda, which was intensified more and more subtly until the very day of the elections. It wasn't that easy; add to this that the will demanded of him is dressed in the most worthy forms; he is asked to participate in the choice of freedom or the vote for peace.
Who doesn't love peace and freedom? It must be only non-humans. This alone gives the answer "no" a criminal character [1]."
Who doesn't love peace and freedom? It must be only non-humans. This alone gives the answer "no" a criminal character [1]."
German thinking notes that from a technical point of view it is not difficult to organize elections in which one hundred percent of the votes are given to those who need it, but “propaganda always refers to a situation in which the enemy of the state, the enemy of the people, the class enemy has been utterly defeated and has become a laughingstock, but still did not disappear [1].
Thus, Jünger asks the question: is it possible to gain freedom and resist the power of the omnipresent state, when the dictatorship hides behind formal democratic practices, and any opposition is skillfully used by the regime to strengthen control and confirm its own strength [7].
“In fact, tyranny and freedom cannot be considered separately, even if from the point of view of temporality they replace each other. One can, of course, say that tyranny abolishes and abolishes freedom - but, on the other hand, tyranny becomes possible only where freedom has become tame and has reduced itself to an empty concept [1]”,
Jünger concludes.
“Leaving for the Forest” is a conscious choice of a loner who is able to think independently
Referring to the image of the "spiritual partisan", Jünger uses the metaphor of going into the forest to describe a new type of resistance and assertion of freedom in the context of the strengthening of new forms of power [7].
“By Going into the Forest, we mean the freedom of a loner in this world... We call a person who has gone into the forest one who, in the course of great changes, found himself alone and homeless and, ultimately, saw himself betrayed to destruction...
The one who has gone into the forest decides to resist, intending to enter into a fight, most likely hopeless.
Thus, the one who has gone into the forest is the one who has retained the original connection with freedom, which, from the point of view of time, is expressed in the fact that he, resisting automatism, refuses to accept its ethical consequence, that is, fatalism [1]”,
The one who has gone into the forest decides to resist, intending to enter into a fight, most likely hopeless.
Thus, the one who has gone into the forest is the one who has retained the original connection with freedom, which, from the point of view of time, is expressed in the fact that he, resisting automatism, refuses to accept its ethical consequence, that is, fatalism [1]”,
writes the German National Conservative.
“Going into the forest” is not an escape from reality, it is a new type of consciousness and behavior aimed not at a political confrontation with the system, but at a conscious choice of a loner who is able to think independently, choose, say “no” and be guided by his own, and not imposed on him from the outside by ideals [7].
As the philosopher Alexander Mikhailovsky notes, it is permissible to consider "leaving for the forest" as a kind of memorandum of a partisan. This is not an instruction that lies in a special box in case of an emergency state, but a unique life experience of a loner, recorded in a word for those who, like Manuel Venator from Eumesvil, learn the art of escaping from the networks of Leviathan and at the same time as a supporter and protector of his lot.
The true motto of the one who has gone into the forest, Jünger writes, is "here and now" - he is a man of free and independent action. Only a tiny fraction of the entire mass of the population can be attributed to this type, however, according to the thinker, “this is how a small elite is formed, capable of resisting automatism, in the struggle against which the use of naked violence will fail. It is still the same ancient freedom in the clothes of time: the essential, elemental freedom that awakens in healthy peoples when the tyranny of parties or foreign conquerors oppresses their country [1].
In the essay Leaving for the Forest, Jünger repeatedly raises the topic of the division of Germany. In particular, in paragraph 32, the writer speaks of a test more difficult than the test of the war that befell the German. The German passed this test, "withstood silently, without weapons, without friends, alone, without advisers in this world. He also expresses fears that the two divided Germanys "will go to war against each other", believing that in this case "going into the forest is the only means that can be devoted to common goals, without regard to artificial borders [1]."
In general, Jünger's work is permeated with pessimistic notes. Speaking about the possibility of a technocratic catastrophe, the author resorts to the metaphor of the Titanic - a ship that first became a symbol of the victory of civilization and technology over nature and later turned into a symbol of collapse and fear. According to the writer, a person is too accustomed to comfort and relies too much on technology.
“Are we really gaining something of value by living in this world of insurance agencies, vaccinations, pedantic hygiene and an increase in the average age of life?
It is not worth arguing about this, since all this is only being formed, and the ideas on which this world stands have not yet been exhausted.
The ship will continue its voyage, even if it takes it from one catastrophe to another. True, catastrophes bring with them terrible victims. When a Ship dies, its medkit sinks with it.
And then everything depends on other things, for example, on whether a person can withstand several hours in ice water. A multiple-vaccinated, clean, drug-trained team with a high average life expectancy is less likely than one that doesn't.
Minimal mortality in times of peace is not a criterion for true health; it can suddenly, in one night, turn into its complete opposite [1].”
It is not worth arguing about this, since all this is only being formed, and the ideas on which this world stands have not yet been exhausted.
The ship will continue its voyage, even if it takes it from one catastrophe to another. True, catastrophes bring with them terrible victims. When a Ship dies, its medkit sinks with it.
And then everything depends on other things, for example, on whether a person can withstand several hours in ice water. A multiple-vaccinated, clean, drug-trained team with a high average life expectancy is less likely than one that doesn't.
Minimal mortality in times of peace is not a criterion for true health; it can suddenly, in one night, turn into its complete opposite [1].”
As the historian Sergei Kazakov notes, in the early 50s, Ernst Junger became not only one of the pioneer diagnosticians of globalization, but also clearly one of its first critics. In particular, in the essay “Leaving for the Forest”, he notes that “from a technical point of view, only two powers are capable of political and strategic behavior based on huge military means and pursuing planetary goals” (it was about the USA and the USSR).
Junger subsequently develops the theme of the global state and the globalized world in a work entitled “The World State. Organism and Organization" (1960). "Organization" as a unifying principle of the global state becomes the subject of criticism of the thinker. However, a detailed discussion of this work is beyond the scope of the main topic of this material.
Thus, it should be noted that Junger's image of the one who went into the forest is a political program of a loner on the eve of the postmodern era. Going into the forest allows the individual to resolve the issue of sovereignty, which Jünger's colleague in the "conservative revolution" in Germany, Carl Schmitt, considered the most important for the political essence of the state. Considering the political reality with which Junger's thoughts are connected, it is also important that the thinker did not consider the Cold War a problem for "going into the forest", since it is "possible anywhere on the Earth" [9].
E. Jünger - a consistent critic of democracy (as a conclusion)
E. Jünger did not occupy a proper place in the fiction and political culture of the FRG, and he himself did not seek to follow and read modern German literature.
Nevertheless, in the late 1970s, the literary merits of the writers were appreciated by the state: in 1977 he was awarded the Order of Merit for the FRG, in 1982 - the Goethe Prize of the city of Frankfurt, which caused a political outcry in the political and journalistic circles of the FRG. A landmark event was his participation in 1984 in the procession to Douaumont, a symbolic reconciliation of Germany and France, when the veteran of the Great War Ernst Junger, the Federal Chancellor of the Federal Republic of Germany H. Kohl and the President of France F. Mitterrand marched to the famous fort. In 1985, on his 90th birthday, he was awarded the Order of Merit for the Federal Republic of Germany, a large cross with a star and a shoulder ribbon [10].
V. Senderov, in his article devoted to the publication of the Russian translation of the writer's novel "On the Marble Rocks", notes that in the FRG "the complete conservative Junger was very reserved about the beautiful new world. But he still accepted signs of attention and awards from the Federal Republic. However, the publicist believes that Jünger's influence after the Second World War is incomparable with the former Weimar time, and he "receded into an incomprehensibly distant past [11]".
Junger was indeed quite skeptical of the FRG, because he believed that West German democracy was flawed, since it was created by the grace of the victors. In his later writings, he notes that the emerging plebiscitary democracy is not much different from the dictatorship of the masses and opposes the liberal welfare state, technocracy, and the loss of metaphysics. The thinker of the "conservative revolution", as before, shares the concepts of freedom and democracy, continuing to be an irreconcilable opponent of the latter.
Quite often, publicists tend to accuse Ernst Junger of romanticizing the war and "propaganda of militarism", but he was a patriot of his country, a veteran of the First World War, who received the highest Prussian military order Pour le mérite for participating in it, did he, as a front-line soldier, really have no right to write about war as he saw fit?
In addition, as some historians note, the spirit and style of Junger's books about the war had the same effect on the public as good Soviet prose about the Great Patriotic War once did, and such concepts and topics as military partnership, military duty, honor, selflessness, straining the spiritual and physical strength of soldiers in the name of great goals, cannot be ignored for the sake of pacifism, if people fought, risked their lives and aspired to lofty goals [12].
As historian Oleg Plenkov rightly notes:
“Those who see in Jünger only an incorrigible Nazi sympathizer are missing the most essential thing in the perception of his personality - his constant desire to be ahead of his time. Jünger remained true to himself until the very last moment, maintaining a strong critical distance, including towards contemporary German democracy. It seems that such stability of views and temperament deserves only respect [3].”
Использованная литература:
[1]. Junger, Ernst. Leaving for the Forest / Ernst Junger. – M.: Ad Marginem Press, 2020.
[2]. Plenkov O. Yu. Notes to the diaries of an eternal nonconformist. // E. Junger. Years of occupation (April 1945 - December 1948). St. Petersburg, 2007.
[3]. Plenkov O. Yu. E. Junger and his contribution to modern conservative thinking // Conservatism in Russia and the world: past and present: Sat. To 65 scientific. works. Issue. 1 / Ed. A. Yu. Minakova. - Voronezh: Voronezh State University Publishing House, 2001.
[4]. S. O. Kazakov. Ernst Junger's Conservative Transit: Dissertation... Candidate of Historical Sciences: 07.00.03 / Sergey Oganovich Kazakov. – Perm, 2014.
[5]. Schwarz HP Die konservative Anarhist. Politik und Zeitkritik Ernst Jungers. – Freiburg in Br.: 1962.
[6]. Yu. N. Solonin. Diaries of Ernst Jünger: Impressions and Judgments // Jünger E. Radiations (February 1941 - April 1945). - St. Petersburg: Vladimir Dal, 2002.
[7]. Ernst Junger's "Departure into the Forest": Paths to Freedom in the Era of Posthumanism [Electronic resource] // URL: https://monocler.ru/uhod-v-les-yunger/
[8]. Kazakov S. O. Variations of conservative criticism of modern Western civilization in the late works of Ernst Junger // Vestn. Sev. (Arctic) feder. university Ser.: Humanite. and social Sciences. 2016. No. 6. P. 5–14.
[9]. Smirnov D. A. Political problems of post-war Germany as reflected in the intellectual searches of Ernst Junger in the early 1950s. [Electronic resource] URL: https://cyberleninka.ru/article/n/politicheskie-problemy-poslevoennoy-germanii-v-otrazhenii-intellektualnyh-iskaniy-ernsta-yungera-nachala-1950-h-godov
[10]. S. V. Artamoshin. Ernst Junger: Warrior, Writer, Thinker (1895–1998) To the 125th anniversary of the birth // History. Society. Policy. 2020, No. 1 (13) - RIO FGBOU HE "Bryansk State University named after Academician I. G. Petrovsky", 2020.
[eleven]. Senderov V. A. Standing cliff. Ernst Junger. On marble cliffs // decree. op. S. 11.
[12]. Plenkov O. Yu. Myths of the Nation against the Myths of Democracy: German Political Tradition and Nazism. - St. Petersburg: Publishing house RHSH, 1997.
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