Do you know Francis Fukuyama and his thesis?
According to Hegel’s “Dialektik” e.g. Fukuyama interprets the “extreme liberalism” as the “Thesis”, the “totalitarianism” as the “Antithesis”, the “liberal democracy” as the “Synthesis”. So for Fukuyama the “liberal democracy” is the final stage. According to Peter Scholl-Latour Fukuyama’s thesis has been absurd since its beginning; the global spread of parliamentary “democracy” and an uninhibited market economy would bring mankind a final state of well -being and harmony; thus, the final line would be drawn under the obsolete antagonisms. In this way Fukuyama’s notion of the “End of History” can be resumed. (Cp. Peter Scholl- Latour, Koloß auf tönernen Füßen, 2005, S. 47). In addition, Peter Scholl- Latour found - to his surprise - that Peter Sloterdijk coined the phrase: “By ‘nation building’ you get at best democratically cladded dictatorships with market economy.” Scholl-Latour: “I would have added: ‘Serving the market economy’.” (Ibid., 2005, S. 50). Fukuyama’s bold thesis of the “end of history” of eternal fights, because the Western model (i.e.: Western culture) has triumphed globally, provides at least for Huntington no substantial analysis. Rather, Huntington sees in the clashes, frictions , conflicts between the great cultures on the basis of different religions and divergent world views, the main role of future disputes.
Fukuyama’s thesis is assessed by Norbert Bolz in this way: “In the initial diagnosis, there is a surprisingly large consensus among thinkers. The famous title of Francis Fukuyama*s book - The End of History and the Last Man - summarises quite simply together the positions of Hegel and Nietzsche.” (Norbert Bolz, Das Wissen der Religion, 2008, S. 53). This world has been defined as “housing of servitude” by Max Weber, as the “Gestell” (something like “frame”) by Martin Heidegger, as “managed world” by Theodor W. Adorno, as “technical government” by Helmut Schelsky), and that are only different names for the end product of a specifically modern process, which Arnold Gehlen has brought on the notion of “cultural crystallisation”.
Peter Sloterdijk sees Fukuyama’s work as “the recovery of an authentic political psychology on the basis of the restored Eros-Thymos polarity. It is obvious that this same political psychology (which has little to do with the so-called “mass psychology” and other applications of psychonalyse to political objects) has been moved to new theoretical orientations by the course of events at the center of the current demand. … The time diagnostic lesson, that is hidden in The End of History, is not to be read from the title slogan, which, as noted, citing only a witty interpretation of Hegelian philosophy by Alexandre Kojève in the thirties of the 20th century (had for its part, the ‘dated end of history’ in the year of publication of Hegel’s Phänomenologie des Geistes [“Phenomenology of Spirit”], 1807). It consists in a careful observation of the prestige and jealousy fights between citizens of the free world, who just then come to the fore when the mobilization of civilian forces has ceased for fighting on external fronts. Successful liberal democracies, recognises the author, will always and because of their best performances be crossed by streams of free-floating discontent. This can not be otherwise, because people are sentenced to thymotic restlessness, and the ‘last men’ more than all the rest …” (Peter Sloterdijk, Zorn und Zeit, 2006, S. 65-67).
For Fukuyama “thymos” is nothing other than the psychological seat of the Hegelian desire for “Anerkennung” (appreciation, recognition). (Cp. Francis Fukuyama, The End of History, 1992, p. 233 ); this is the “real engine of human history” (ibid., p. 229). The main features of which Fukuyama is based and from which he derives his ideas are the Hegelian view of history and the Platonic-Hegelian conceptual constructions, especially that what is concerned with thymotic. Something near that ist what Sloterdijk has done in his work “Zorn und Zeit” (“Rage and Time”, 2006). Both Sloterdijk and Fukuyama are also influenced by Hegel and Nietzsche, Sloterdijk in addition by Heidegger.
But Sloterdijk’s work mentiones also the Christan era refering to revenge and resentment:
„Vor allem muß heute, gegen Nietzsches ungestümes Resümee, bedacht werden, daß die christliche Ära, im ganzen genommen, gerade nicht das Zeitalter der ausgeübten Rache war. Sie stellte vielmehr eine Epoche dar, in der mit großem Ernst eine Ethik des Racheaufschubs durchgesetzt wurde. Der Grund hierfür muß nicht lange gesucht werden: Er ist gegeben durch den Glauben der Christen, die Gerechtigkeit Gottes werde dereinst, am Ende der Zeiten, für eine Richtigstellung der moralischen Bilanzen sorgen. Mit dem Ausblick auf ein Leben nach dem Tode war in der christlichen Ideensphäre immer die Erwartung eines überhistorischen Leidensausgleichs verbunden. Der Preis für diese Ethik des Verzichts auf Rache in der Gegenwart zugunsten einer im Jenseits nachzuholenden Vergeltung war hoch - hierüber hat Nietzsche klar geurteilt. Er bestand in der Generalisierung eines latenten Ressentiments, das den aufgehobenen Rachewunsch selbst und sein Gegenstück, die Verdammnisangst, ins Herzstück des Glaubens, die Lehre von den Letzten Dingen, projizierte. Auf diese Weise wurde die Bestrafung der Übermütigen in alle Ewigkeit zur Bedingung für das zweideutige Arrangement der Menschen guten Willens mit den schlimmen Verhältnissen. Die Nebenwirkung hiervon war, daß die demütigen Guten selbst vor dem zu zittern begannen, was sie den übermütigen Bösen zudachten.“ - Peter Sloterdijk, Zorn und Zeit, 2006, S. 4.
My translation:
„Especially must now against Nietzsche’s impetuous résumé be considered that the Christian era, on the whole, just was not the age of the force exerted revenge. Rather, it represented a period in which very seriously the ethics of revenge deferral was enforced. The reason for this must be sought not for long: He is given by the faith of Christians, God’s justice will one day, at the end of times, make the correction of the moral balance sheets. With the prospect of a life after death in the Christian sphere of idea the expectation was always connected of an hyper-historical suffering compensation. The price of this ethic of renunciation of revenge in the present in favour of a backdated retribution in the afterlife was highly - Nietzsche has clearly judged that. It consisted in the generalisation of a latent resentment that projected the repealed revenge desire itself and its counterpart, the damnation fear, into the heart of the faith, the doctrine of the Last Things. In this way, the punishment of the proud in all eternity became a condition for the ambiguous arrangement of people of good will with the dire conditions. The side effect of this was that the humble good ones (do-gooder) began to shake theirselves against what they intend for the wanton evil.“