El espacio para la poltica.

Dada la caracterizacin que hace Heidegger de la existencia

humana, Cules son las condiciones para el desarrollo de la poltica como prctica
humana? 1) presentar dicha caracterizacin, 2) presentar las crticas de sta con sus
implicaciones polticas, 3) Explicar las limitaciones de las crticas, 4) presentar La
pregunta por la Tcnica desde una lectura poltica (junto con los Cuadernos Negros.)
Marcuse: (rejection of everydayness)
In a strict sense, then, Heideggers existentialism left him ideationally defenseless against
the militaristic-heroic bombast of National Socialism. In his view, its potential for
authenticity followed from its vehement rejection of the mediocrity of bourgeois
everydayness. (Wolin 7)
The establishment of the total-authoritarian state was accompanied by the annunciation of
a new political weltanschauung: heroic-folkish realism became the governing theory.
(Marcuse 1)
Para Marcuse, la ontologa heideggeriana, en particular la analtica existencial del Dasein,
elimin toda posibilidad de resistencia ideolgica por parte de Heidegger ante el
militarismo heroico del Nacionalsocialismo. 1 En una entrevista que le hiciera Frederick A.
Olafson, publicada en 1977, Marcuse parece afirmar que el pensamiento heideggeriano
carece de los elementos bsicos para poder servir de fundamento para una teora social o
poltica. Desde su perspectiva, aquello que fuera el motivo por el cual gran parte de su
generacin se viera atrada hacia la filosofa heideggeriana, fue al mismo tiempo la causa
de una desilusin que mostraba ex-post las insuperables deficiencias de dicha filosofa.
La promesa de un modo radicalmente nuevo de llevar la filosofa a los fundamentos
concretos de la existencia o condicin humana, era el elemento de atraccin de Sein und
Zeit para la generacin alemana de aquel entonces. No obstante, afirma Marcuse, slo
despus del planteamiento pblico de la pregunta por los vnculos de Heidegger con el
Nazismo, qued expuesto el carcter ficticio de dicha concrecin. Pareciera que
Heidegger utilizara en dicha obra la analtica existencial y el anlisis ontolgico de la
historicidad para escapar de la realidad social e histrica en vez de hacerle frente. De tal
suerte, parecera que Marcuse comparte el diagnstico de Arendt y Habermas en torno a
la presencia de un pensamiento poltico en la obra de Heidegger. Si como Marcuse

1 Cfr. (Wolin 7)

afirma, If there is an ontology which, in spite of its stress on historicity, neglects history,
throws out history, and returns to static transcendental concepts, I would say this
philosophy cannot provide a conceptual basis for social and political theory. (Marcuse,
Heidegger's Politics: An Interview 168), entonces la filosofa de Heidegger bien podra ser
calificada como una ontologa que no aterriz, ni poda aterrizar, en la poltica.
No obstante, el alumno de Heidegger reconoce una excepcin para este diagnstico,
There may be one exception: Heideggers late concern (one might say: preocupation) with
technology and technics. (Marcuse, Heidegger's Politics: An Interview 168) A pesar de
reconocer una comprensin superficial del pensamiento heideggeriano en el contexto de
Die Frage nach der Technik, Marcuse lleva a cabo una crtica en trminos polticos de la
filosofa heideggeriana a partir del siguiente supuesto: el vnculo entre Heidegger y el
Nazismo es de carcter terico, y slo puede comprenderse si suponemos que las obras
posteriores a la Kehre son un reflexin de carcter poltico cuya base se encuentra en la
analtica existencial expuesta en Sein und Zeit.

When the totality is no longer the conclusion but the axiom, the path of theoretical and
practical social criticism leading to this totality is blocked off. Totality is programmatically
mystified. It can never be grasped by hands, nor seen with outer eyes. Composure and
depth of spirit are necessary in order to behold it with the inner eye. In political theory this
totality is represented by the folk (Volk), as an essentially natural- organic unity and
totality that is prior to all social differentiation into classes, interest groups, etc. With this
thesis universalism rejoins naturalism. (Marcuse 4)
Compared with heroic-folkish realism, liberalism is a rationalist theory. Its vital element is
optimistic faith in the ultimate victory of reason, which will realize itself above all conflicts of
interest and opinion in the harmony of the whole. (Marcuse 10-11)
The total-authoritarian state brings with it the organization and theory of society that
correspond to the monopolistic stage of capitalism. This organization and its theory, it is
true, also contain new elements that go beyond the old liberal social order and its mere
negation: elements in which a clear dialectical reaction against liberalism is perceptible,
but which presuppose for their realization the abolition of the economic and social
foundations preserved by the total- authoritarian state. The new political and social theory
must not, therefore, be interpreted simply as a process of ideological adaptation. In order

to contribute to comprehension of its real social function, we shall interpret its basic
features by analyzing its three constitutive components: universalism, naturalism
(organicism), and existentialism. (Marcuse 13)

(1) Universalism:
The priority and primacy of the whole over its members (parts) is a basic thesis of heroicfolkish realism. The whole is understood not only as a sum or abstract totality, but as the
unity that unifies the parts, a unity which is the precondition for the fulfillment and
completion of each part. The demand for the realization of such a totality occupies the first
place in the programmatic proclamations of the total-authoritarian state. (Marcuse 13)
We shall not go into the various attempts that have been made to define the concept folk.
What is decisive is that it aims at a primal given that, as a natural one, is prior to the
artificial system of society. It is the social structure of the organic level of occurrence and
as such represents an ultimate, germinated unity. The folk is not a structure that has
originated through any human power; it is a divinely willed groundwork of human society.
In this way the new social theory arrives at the equation through which it is led to the
premises of irrationalist organicism: as a natural-organic whole, the first and last totality,
the foundation and limit of all ties and obligations, is the genuine, divinely willed, eternal
reality in contrast with the inorganic, derived reality of society. As such, owing to its
origins, it is largely withdrawn from the range of all human planning and decision. Hence
all attempts are a priori discredited that would overcome the present anarchically
conflicting strivings and needs of individuals and raise them to a true totality by means of a
planned transformation of the social relations of production. The path is cleared for heroicfolkish organicism, which provides the basis necessary for totalitarian political theory to
fulfill its social function. (Marcuse 15)

(2) Naturalism:
In ever new formulations, heroic-folkish realism emphasizes the natural properties of the
totality represented by the folk. The folk is subject to blood, it arises from the soil, it
furnishes the homeland with indestructible force and permanence, it is united by
characteristics of race, the preservation of whose purity is the condition of the folks

health. In the train of this naturalism follows a glorification of the peasantry as the only
estate still bound to nature. It is celebrated as the creative, original source, as the eternal
pillar of society. The mythical glorification of the renewal of agriculture has its counterpart
in the fight against the metropolis and its unnatural spirit. This fight expands into an attack
on the rule of reason in general and sets loose all irrational powers a movement that
ends with the total functionalization of the mind. Nature is the first in the series of
restricting conditions to which reason is subordinated. The unconditioned authority of the
state seems to be the last. Nature as celebrated by organicism, however, does not appear
as a factor of production in the context of actual relations of production, nor as a condition
of production, nor as the basis, itself historical, of human history. Instead it becomes a
myth, and as myth it hides the organicist depravation and forcible displacement of
historical and social processes. Nature becomes the great antagonist of history. (Marcuse
15-16)
Thinking of the emergency in which sacrificing ones own life and killing other men are
demanded, Carl Schmitt inquires into the reason for such sacrifice: There is no rational
end, no norm however correct, no program however exemplary, no social ideal however
beautiful, and no legitimacy or legality that could justify mens killing one another.

49

What,

then, remains as a possible justification? Only this: that there is a state of affairs that
through its very existence and presence is exempt from all justification, i.e. an existential,
ontological state of affairs justification by mere existence. Existentialism in its political
form becomes the theory of the (negative) justification of what can no longer be justified.
(Marcuse 21)

(3) Existentialism:
There is no fundamental or general criterion in existentialism for determining which facts
and conditions are to be considered existential. That remains left in principle to the
decision of the existential theoretician. But once he claims a state of fact as existential, all
those who do not participate and partake in its reality are to keep silent. Predominantly
political conditions and relations are sanctioned here as existential, and within the political
dimension it is the relation to the enemy, or war, that counts as the simply and absolutely
existential relationship (the folk and folk membership have been added as a second,
equally existential, relationship). (Marcuse 22)

With good reason, philosophy avoided looking more carefully at the historical situation,
with regard to its material facticity, of the subject to which it addressed itself. At this point
concretion stopped, and philosophy remained content to talk of the nations link with
destiny, of the heritage that each individual has to adopt, and of the community of the
generation, while the other dimensions of facticity were treated under such categories as
they (das Man), or idle talk (das Gerede), and relegated in this way to inauthentic
existence. Philosophy did not go on to ask about the nature of this heritage, about the
peoples mode of being, and about the real powers and forces that are history. It thus
renounced every possibility of comprehending the facticity of historical situations and
distinguishing between them. (Marcuse 22)
Genuine historicity presupposes a cognitive relation of existence to the forces of history
and, derived from it, the theoretical and practical critique of these forces. But in existential
anthropology the corresponding relation is limited to one of accepting a mandate issued
to existence by the folk. It is considered self-evident that it is the folk and not any
particular interest group which issues the mandate and for which it is exercised. A
secularized theological image of history emerges. Every folk receives its historical
mandate as a mission that is the first and last, the unrestricted obligation of existence.
(Marcuse 24)
Existentialism, too, needs an explicit political theory: the doctrine of the total state.
(Marcuse 24)
The political and social meaning of the concept metaphysical gives itself away: A
government that governs only because it has a mandate from the folk is not an
authoritarian government. Authority is possible only if it comes from transcendence... The
word transcendence ought to be taken seriously here. The foundation of authority lies
beyond all social facticity, so that it does not depend on it for validation. Above all, it
surpasses the folks factual situation and power of comprehension: Authority
presupposes a status that is valid over against the folk because the folk does not confer it
but acknowledges it. Acknowledgment is the foundation of authority: a truly existential
proof! (Marcuse 26)
Existentialism, however, was originally based on the private character of individual
existence, its irremovable, personal always-being-my-own (Jemeinigkeit). The total state
takes over total responsibility for individual existence; existentialism had claimed the

inalienable self-responsibility of existence. The total state decides existence in all its
dimensions; existentialism had put forth as the fundamental category of existence that
decidedness (Entschlossenheit) which can be the project only of each individual
existence. The total state demands total duty without even allowing inquiry into the truth of
such obligation; existentialism (here in agreement with Kant) had celebrated the
autonomous self-giving of duty as the real dignity of man. The total state has overcome
[individual freedom] as a postulate of human thought ...; existentialism (again in accord
with Kant) had placed the essence of human freedom, as the autonomy of the person
at the origin of philosophizing, and made freedom the condition of truth.

68

67

This freedom

was seen as mans self-authorization for his existence and to the realm of beings as such;
conversely man is now authorized to freedom by the authoritatively led community of the
folk. (Marcuse 27)
Existentialism collapses the moment its political theory is realized. The total-authoritarian
state for which it longed gives the lie to all its truths. Existentialism accompanies its
debacle with a self-abasement unique in the history of ideas, bringing its own history to
end as a satyr play. In philosophy, existentialism begins as the antagonist in a great debate
with Western rationalism and idealism, intending to save their conceptual content by
injecting it into the historical concretion of individual existence. It ends by radically denying
its own origin; the struggle against reason drives it blindly into the arms of the powers that
be. In their service and with their protection, it turns traitor to the great philosophy that it
formerly celebrated as the culmination of Western thought. (Marcuse 28-29)

Jonas: (contentless nature of resolve [Entschlossenheit])

Jonas sees the fatal link between philosophy and politics in Heidegger as deriving from
the existential category of resolve or decisiveness (Entschlossenheit). According to
Jonas, the problem with this concept is its contentlessness. It possesses virtually no

evaluative components by virtue of which, for example, ethical versus unethical worldly
commitments could be gauged. Instead, the determinants of authentic resolve are purely
formal or (to highlight the important parallels Lwith will establish between the thought of
Heidegger and Carl Schmitt) decisionistic. Ones resolve is judged, therefore, purely by
the quantum or degree of ones engagement on behalf of this or that cause, without regard
to the specifics ends of action. So formal is the level of analysis in Being and Time that I
could be equally resolved as a Nazi, a Bolshevik, an anarchist, and so forth. (Wolin 8)

Lwith:
I was of the opinion that his partisanship for National Socialism lay in the
essence of his philosophy. Heidegger agreed with me without
reservation, and added that his concept of historicity was the basis of
his political engagement.
Yo opinaba que su partidismo por el Nacional Socialismo yaca en la esencia de su
filosofa. Heidegger estuvo de acuerdo conmigo sin reservas y agreg que su concepto de
historicidad era la base de su compromiso politico.

weilichderMeinungsei,daseineParteinahmefrdenNationalsozialismusimWesen
seinerPhilosophielge.HeideggerstimmtemirohneVorbehaltzuundfhrtemiraus,da
seinBegriffvonderGeschichtlichkeitdieGrundlagefrseinenpolitischenEinsatzsei.
(Lwith 57)
Nicht Lehrstze und Ideen seien die Regeln Eures Seins. Der Fhrer selbst und allein
ist die heutige und knftige deutsche Wirklichkeit und ihr Gesetz. Lernet immer tiefer zu
wissen: Von nun an fordert jedwedes Ding Entscheidung und alles Tun Verantwortung.
Heil Hitler!