What characterizes an organic State, according to you?Originally Posted by ogenoct
What characterizes an organic State, according to you?Originally Posted by ogenoct
A state based on the bond of blood - a racial state.Originally Posted by Siegfried Augustus
Constantin
Though I would agree that a State has to be monoracial in order to be organic (or ideal), I do not believe that is the sole feature. What about the relation between the masses and the leaders? The scope of authority? Form and character of the State's organs? Separation (or unity?) of Church and State? I honestly do not yet have clear answers (only vague ideas), but I do think these questions are important if we are to put forward an alternative to modern society.Originally Posted by ogenoct
I believe that the leader of an ideal state should represent the archetype of the masses' aspirations. He should emphasize the commonality between the various members of the state, be it racial or political. A good example of such a state in practice is North Korea - a nation based on ethnic pride and socialist achievements.Originally Posted by Siegfried Augustus
Constantin
So you think a leader's authority is to be justified through the masses? An interesting viewpoint, though some would disagree with you. Nietzsche, for example, stated that the elite does not exist for the sake of the masses, but the masses for the sake of the elite. This idea is found in a somewhat altered form in Italian fascist doctrine; the nation does not create the State, but the State creates the nation, according to them. Put in a more Evolian way; a spiritual elite affirms itself over a mass of people, thereby bestowing form and meaning upon the masses. I find this latter view rather appealing, especially if these masses share an ethnoracial identity to ensure an organic foundation of the rising nation.Originally Posted by ogenoct
Unity of Religion and State (common outlook and god/s, with the elite being the leaders of the religion), unity of the masses and the elite in a common chain of command without resentment on behalf of the masses, national pride, fraternity.
All men dream, but not equally. Those who dream at night, in the dusky recesses of their minds, wake in the day to find that it was vanity. But the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act their dreams, with open eyes, to make it possible.
To use the word 'organic' in relation to the State is metaphorical.
It means that the State is LIKE an organism [such as a human being].
The conception of the State as being like a human being is familiar from renaissance sources; the feet represent the slaves, hands the farmers, head the king etc., etc.,
This is all based on the essentially ancient theory that everything in the universe complies to such an Order - as above so below; and that the microcosm [i.e., a single organism] is mirrored in the macrocosm [i.e., the State].
From this perspective then, it is not so much that the Fascist State alone is organic, but rather that it represents a particular type of organism.
The multiracial liberal State is one kind of organism, the National Socialist State is another etc., etc.,
So then it comes down to the type of organism one wishes to compare one's State to!
Which organism?
This ...
Or this ...
Or maybe ...
Ah - this ..?
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Why are there beings at all, & why not rather nothing?
[Leibniz/Heidegger]
The question can only be answered by having some conception of what constitutes a non-organic state. I would associate a non-organic state with the hyper-individualism of late capitalist Anglo-Saxon societies and the condition of social anomie and alienation they produce. The freedom of the individual is the fundamental organising principle of such a (libertarian) polity. Indeed, the individual is held to exist prior to the community in non-organic states. Communities are simply voluntary political associations of individuals who exchange their natural liberties for civil liberties (e.g., the social contract theory). Since individuals themselves create communities to secure certain ends, they are free to dissolve such communities when it suits their purposes.What characterizes an organic State, according to you?
The organic state (and this a metaphor that should not be taken literally), on the other hand, would be organised along communitarian lines. Communitarians hold that communities exist prior to individuals and that the central organising principle of the polity should be the virtuous pursuit of the common good of the community (see Alasdair MacIntyre's After Virtue). Indeed, the individual does not exist prior to the community at all, he is born into the community and socialized into its customs. Communitarians agree with Aristotle that man is a social being. The individual does not even think by himself. Instead, thinking is something that people do together. The concepts the individual uses to understand the world (and even himself) are imparted to him by the culture which unites him with other members of his community (which is why such cultures should be preserved). Original thought is actually quite rare. These social bonds and traditions are like a sort of rich tapestry that is passed down from generation to generation. For communitarians, this is the souce of all meaning in life. So in summa, the defining trait of the organic state would be a very high degree of connectedness between its members and rootedness (Bodenständigkeit) in particular ways of life. The organic state privileges the common good of the community above the good of the lone individual. The inorganic state privileges the good of the individual above the common good of the community.
The Phora
"There are no principles; there are only events. There is no good and bad, there are only circumstances. The superior man espouses events and circumstances in order to guide them. If there were principles and fixed laws, nations would not change them as we change our shirts and a man can not be expected to be wiser than an entire nation."
—Honoré de Balzac
But this hyper-individualism is rather an infection of the organism which is the state.Originally Posted by FadeTheButcher
The Anglo-Saxon societies [UK and USA] are both organic in conception/ origin.
It is the THEORY of Individualism and the concomitant attack on tradition and race which is infecting these organisms.
When [if] they are finally destroyed by this infection, then they will be non-states, and therefore 'non-organic' only by that token.
However, I contend that the state qua state is an organic conception.
All states are organic.
Again, I think it is rather a DISorganising principle.The freedom of the individual is the fundamental organising principle of such a (libertarian) polity.
It is a parasite as it NEEDS the organic body of the state in order to exist.
Yes, but this is just a theory with little to recommend it. It is a theory which comes late into the intellectual current of the state, in its decline.Indeed, the individual is held to exist prior to the community in non-organic states. Communities are simply voluntary political associations of individuals who exchange their natural liberties for civil liberties (e.g., the social contract theory). Since individuals themselves create communities to secure certain ends, they are free to dissolve such communities when it suits their purposes.
Non-Organic Individualism is a SYMPTOM of decadence.
Why are there beings at all, & why not rather nothing?
[Leibniz/Heidegger]
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