DISSERTATION / DOCTORAL THESIS Titel der Dissertation / Title of the Doctoral Thesis “The German Influence on Raymond Aron’s Political Thought” verfasst von / submitted by Scott Nelson, MAIS angestrebter akademischer Grad / in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doktor der Philosophie (Dr. phil) Wien 2017 / Vienna 2017 Studienkennzahl lt. Studienblatt / A 792 312 degree programme code as it appears on the student record sheet: Dissertationsgebiet lt. Studienblatt / Geschichte Field of study as it appears on the student record sheet: Betreut von / Supervisor: o. Univ.-Prof. Dr. Wolfgang Schmale Dr. José Colen This dissertation examines the cohesion of Raymond Aron’s political thought and argues that its unifying principles are to be found in certain intellectual problems with which he was confronted early on in his life, thanks to his deep reading of various German thinkers. These intellectual problems consist of the relation between man and history, knowledge and action, and philosophy and politics. These problems are explored in three intertwined facets of Aron’s thought – History, Sociology, and Praxeology – which are elaborated by setting Aron in dialogue with three key German thinkers: Wilhelm Dilthey, Karl Marx, and Max Weber respectively. This dissertation demonstrates not only that the roots of Aron’s political thought reach back to the 1930s, but that his ongoing meditation on the philosophical problems raised at that time endure and provide the framework for his thought over the course of his entire life. Diese Dissertation betrachet den inneren Zusammenhang des politischen Denkens Raymond Arons, indem sie dessen vereinigende Prinzipien in gewissen intellektuellen Fragestellungen darlegt, denen Aron besonders früh in seinem Leben durch deutsche Denkweisen und Philosophien begegnet ist. Diese intellektuellen Probleme bestehen aus dem Verhältnis zwischen Menschen und Geschichte, Erkenntnis und Handeln und Philosophie und Politik. Diese Probleme werden in drei verflochtenen Dimensionen seines Denkens – Geschichte, Soziologie, Praxeologie – erforscht, die ausgearbeitet werden, indem Aron in einen Dialog mit Wilhelm Dilthey, Karl Marx, und Max Weber gesetzt wird. Diese Dissertation demonstriert nicht nur, dass die Wurzeln des politischen Denkens Arons in den 1930er Jahren auftauchen, sondern auch, dass er sein ganzes Leben damit verbracht hat, über diese philosophischen Probleme anhaltend nachzudenken. 2 Table of Contents Introduction .................................................................................................................................................. 4 1. Summary – Raymond Aron ....................................................................................................................... 4 2. Problems to be addressed and State of the Art ........................................................................................ 6 3. Methodology ........................................................................................................................................... 10 4. Dissertation Plan ..................................................................................................................................... 12 Part 1 – History – Influence of German Historicism .................................................................................. 14 1a – Context: Pilgrimage to Germany ......................................................................................................... 14 1b – Influence of Historicism: Dilthey ......................................................................................................... 26 1c – German Phenomenology ..................................................................................................................... 36 1d – The Pathos of the Introduction à la philosophie de l’histoire ............................................................ 44 1e – Dilthey Revisited: The Incomplete Trilogy .......................................................................................... 50 Part 2 – Sociology – Industrial Society ....................................................................................................... 61 2a – Context: The Sorbonne, Modern Society, and Sociology .................................................................... 61 2b – Aron’s Marx ......................................................................................................................................... 73 2c – Industrial Society ................................................................................................................................. 83 2d – Class Struggle ...................................................................................................................................... 93 2e – The Constitutional-Pluralist Regime .................................................................................................. 103 Part 3 – Praxeology – Principles of Political Action ................................................................................. 116 3a – Context: Drama in History – Thinking like a Statesman .................................................................... 116 3b – Max Weber and the Problem of the Conflict of Values .................................................................... 127 3c – Aron’s Machiavellianism ................................................................................................................... 143 3d – Totalitarianism .................................................................................................................................. 153 3e – Praxeology in Peace and War ........................................................................................................... 161 Part 4 – Conclusion ................................................................................................................................... 171 4a – Summary Conclusion ......................................................................................................................... 171 4b – Final Note: Action in History ............................................................................................................. 174 Bibliography – Works Cited ...................................................................................................................... 183 Acknowledgements .................................................................................................................................. 200 3 Introduction 1. Summary – Raymond Aron Raymond Aron was a French intellectual of the 20th century who lived from 1905 to 1983. No one doubts his role as a chapter in the history of ideas and intellectuals in France.1 Although there have been more studies about his counterparts, Aron remains more influential today in many fields of study in France and the Anglo-Saxon world.2 Exceptionally intelligent from an early age,3 Aron was a contemporary of other leading French intellectuals at the time such as Jean-Paul Sartre, Simone de Beauvoir, Albert Camus, and Emmanuel Mounier. Unlike these other intellectuals, however, Aron was both a French liberal and often characterized as an anti-Communist thinker.4 While he was most certainly anti-Communist, it would be foolish and hasty to lump him in with the right-wing French Gaullists, for while he sympathized occasionally with de Gaulle – and was at the General’s side in London during the Second World War – he was never a Gaullist partisan in the strictest sense of the word, save for a brief period after the war when he worked in Malraux’s Ministry of Information.5 In many ways Aron’s political thought hovered in the middle at a time, and in a country, where politics was heavily polarized. For this refusal to align himself with the intellectual establishment, and his steadfastness in remaining a spectateur engagé, Aron was rebuked by many and would not come to enjoy the praise that his schoolmate Sartre had enjoyed until late in his life, around the time when Sartre’s renown was beginning to dwindle.6 Reprobation and accusations of cold-heartedness7 were the price that Aron paid for lucidity and intellectual honesty during the age of extremes – as Eric Hobsbawm termed it8 – and intellectual disingenuousness.9 Nevertheless, he did have far-flung admirers, some of whom were in high places.10 1 See, among others, Judt, Burden of Responsibility; Hughes, The Obstructed Path; Sirinelli, Sartre et Aron; Pierce, Contemporary French Political Thought; Huguenin, Histoire intellectuelle des droites; Chebel d’Appollonia, Histoire politique des intellectuels en France. 2 The various dimensions of his thought have recently been studied in collections such as Colen and Dutartre- Michaut, eds., The Companion to Raymond Aron; Bevc and Oppermann, eds., Der souveräne Nationalstaat; De Ligio, ed., Raymond Aron, penseur de l’Europe et de la nation; Baehr, ed., “Special Issue: Raymond Aron”; Frost and Mahoney, Political Reason in the Age of Ideology. 3 Hepp, “Souvenirs des années 20,” 10. 4 Laloy, “Un libéral passionné,” 36-38; Lazitch, “Aron et le communisme,” 47-49; Fleischmann, “Ce qu’est un vrai libéral,” 103-105; Bloom, “Le dernier des libéraux,” 174-182. 5 For Aron’s account of the brief time spent there, see Aron, Mémoires, 279-281. 6 Judt, Past Imperfect, 245, 304. 7 Aron, Mémoires, 485-486; Aron, La révolution introuvable, 13, 133; Winock, “La Tragédie algérienne,” 271. 8 Hobsbawm, The Age of Extremes. 9 On the