Original scientific paper

Rousseau – Revolution – Nacism: Biopolitical Metaphors and Josip Horvat’s Antitotalitarian Discourse

Boris Beck orcid.org/0000-0003-4637-465X ; Zagreb, Croatia

Abstract

During the ‘30s and ‘40s of the 20th century, journalist and author Josip Horvat confronted then current totalitarian discourses through a number of articles and books in which he argued that there is a continuity in political thought and action in Croatia from the French Revolution and the foundation of freemasonry, through Drašković, Gaj, Starčević, and Supilo, to supporters of liberalism in the eve of the Second World War. He places Rousseau at the beginning of this series. The purpose of this historiographical construction was to empower democratic tendencies in the Kingdom of Yugoslavia and the Independent State of Croatia by written words. For this purpose he invented numerous biopolitical metaphors that connect the idea of revolutionary social transformation with the need for political education of the nation.

Keywords

Josip Horvat; Jean-Jacques Rousseau; liberalism; totalitarianism; democracy; revolution; education; biopolitical metaphors

Hrčak ID:

132997

URI

https://hrcak.srce.hr/132997

Publication date:

26.11.2014.

Article data in other languages: croatian

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