R.G. Collingwood's Critique of Nazism: Liberal, Marxist or Conservative?

R.G. Collingwood was one of the staunchest intellectual opponents of Nazism in Britain throughout the interwar years and Second World War until his death in 1943. However, the ideological basis of his philosophical critique of Nazism is a matter of serious dispute among scholars. It has been describ...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Author: Paylor, Adrian (Author)
Format: Electronic Article
Language:English
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Published: Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group 2015
In: Politics, religion & ideology
Year: 2015, Volume: 16, Issue: 2/3, Pages: 154-172
Online Access: Volltext (lizenzpflichtig)
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Summary:R.G. Collingwood was one of the staunchest intellectual opponents of Nazism in Britain throughout the interwar years and Second World War until his death in 1943. However, the ideological basis of his philosophical critique of Nazism is a matter of serious dispute among scholars. It has been described as liberal, Marxist and conservative. The aim of this article is to de-contest the ideological nature of Collingwood's critique. Through performing a philosophical analysis on the theoretical components that made up Collingwood's critique of Nazism, this article rejects the Marxist reading and argues that its ideological basis was both liberal and conservative. As a result, this article claims that, although the liberal and conservative readings can account for part of its ideological basis, by themselves both readings ultimately provide inadequate accounts of Collingwood's critique. Instead, it is only when taken together that the liberal and conservative readings are able to adequately account for the ideological nature of Collingwood's critique of Nazism. Indeed, this article demonstrates that the liberal-conservative basis of Collingwood's critique is a product of a broader tension between the two ideologies that runs throughout his political philosophy on account of his understanding of the dynamic nature of politics.
ISSN:2156-7697
Contains:Enthalten in: Politics, religion & ideology
Persistent identifiers:DOI: 10.1080/21567689.2015.1059761