The book can be interpreted as a continuation of his most popular book, as I already said before, and about the comparision resp. the juxtaposition of Prussiandom and socialism. According to Spengler Prussiandom is just the opposite of socialism in a Marxistic sense. Spengler debunks Marx and says for example, that the Marxism betrays itself by any sentence that it stems from a theological and not political mindset, and that Marxism has internalized the “Manchestertum” (“Manchesterdom”) in spite of denying it. In another chapter of the book Spengler compares Prussians and Englishmen as well as Prussians and Spaniards by interpreting their history, comnig to the conclusion that they are the most “socialistic” (not meant in a Marxistic but in a Spenglerian or Goethean sense, namely in a “morphological” sense, as a way of life) peoples of the Occident, whereas Frenchmen and Italians are their antipodes. In order to understand Spengler rightly, one has to know that his method is a Goethean one, mostly based on contrastive pairs.
The chapters:
- “Einleitung” (“Introduction”).
- “Die Revolution” (“The Revolution”).
- “Sozialismus als Lebensform” (“Socialism as Way of Life”).
- “Engländer und Preußen” (“Prussians and Englishmen”).
- “Marx” (“Marx”).
- “Die Internationale” (“The International”).
There is, for example, an internet version of the book as it has been translated by Donald O. White. Note: The appropriate translation of “Preußentum” or “Preussentum” is not “Prussianism” (as it is translated by Donald O. White) but “Prussiandom”, because it was never meant as an “ism”. That also is important for the right understanding.