Nietzsche's Great Politics - Paperback

by Hugo Drochon (Author)

"A superb case of deep intellectual renewal and the most important book to have been written about [Nietzsche] in the past few years."-Gavin Jacobson, New Statesman

Nietzsche's impact on the world of culture, philosophy, and the arts is uncontested, but his political thought remains mired in controversy. By placing Nietzsche back in his late-nineteenth-century German context, Nietzsche's Great Politics moves away from the disputes surrounding Nietzsche's appropriation by the Nazis and challenges the use of the philosopher in postmodern democratic thought. Rather than starting with contemporary democratic theory or continental philosophy, Hugo Drochon argues that Nietzsche's political ideas must first be understood in light of Bismarck's policies, in particular his "Great Politics," which transformed the international politics of the late nineteenth century.

Nietzsche's Great Politics shows how Nietzsche made Bismarck's notion his own, enabling him to offer a vision of a unified European political order that was to serve as a counterbalance to both Britain and Russia. This order was to be led by a "good European" cultural elite whose goal would be to encourage the rebirth of Greek high culture. In relocating Nietzsche's politics to their own time, the book offers not only a novel reading of the philosopher but also a more accurate picture of why his political thought remains so relevant today.

Back Jacket

"This excellent, illuminating book deserves to become a standard work for all scholars and students of Nietzsche, and it will be indispensable to scholars of his political thought. Hugo Drochon provides a great deal of new insight into Nietzsche's work as well as its relevance in the contemporary world."--Tamsin Shaw, New York University

Author Biography

Hugo Drochon is a historian of nineteenth- and twentieth-century political thought and a postdoctoral research fellow at CRASSH, the Centre for Research in the Arts, Social Sciences, and Humanities, at the University of Cambridge.