After starting the interview series on conservative revolutionism, I realised that we do not know Italian intellectuals. There are different intellectual basins accumulating differently in the Mediterranean. We talked with Cospito about conservative revolutionism, the rising right, Evola.

Evola is known in Turkey as a member of the traditionalist school. Evola’s influence on the Italian right surprised me while I was researching him. How did Evola influence the Italian right wing? How did he become such an important figure?

Evola was and remains in Italy one of the main inspirers not only of right-wing intellectuals but also of traditionalist political circles both before and after the Second World War. Author of numerous publications translated into various languages, before the war he exerted his influence mainly with works such as ‘Diorama filosofico’, a supplement to the daily newspaper ‘Il Regime Fascista’ The Theory of the Absolute Individual (1930), Man as Power (1927), The Hermetic Tradition (1931), Revolt against the Modern World (1933) and, after the war, with essays of great depth such as Riding the Tiger (1961), Men and Ruins (1953) and Mask and Face of Contemporary Spiritualism (1949).

Moving from a Hegelian idealism, seen, however, in a romantic key, influenced by Nietzsche’s thought, in the exaltation of an ‘individual’ made absolute by a profound self-awareness sublimated by the predisposition to action, Evola draws attention to the world of Tradition characterised in remote antiquity by values based on an aristocratic hierarchy (based on virtues), on a ‘solar’, virile, limpid, proud spirituality, on an organic vision of the State, as opposed to the decadent, liberal, democratic, obscure world born with the Kali Yuga and which accentuated its decadence with the advent of the French Revolution and modernity in which man became a slave to the ‘demon of the economy’, losing contact with a superior civilisation. Above all Revolt against the Modern World and Men and Ruins, but also the short essay Orientamenti, have become a sort of Bible for those who have wanted to engage in an action of ascent, of searching for the horizons of the spirit, going to occupy a battlefield that can never be conquered or occupied by any enemy. The pages of Orientamenti, as was recently written in the magazine IL CINABRO, penetrate the heart of the reader and trace a direction, an orientation to follow, awakening ideals of great strength. Rutilio Sermonti, one of the leaders of the Ordine Nuovo Movement, the formation most inspired by Evola’s teachings, affirmed: ‘in reading Evola, I did not discover Evola, but myself. And there is no more precious gift I have ever received‘. In the face of the destructive work of the modern world, Julius Evola launches his watchwords: ‘only one thing is to keep oneself standing in a world of ruins’. Today, then, we are witnessing an ‘Evola Renaissance’ that is also reflected in the thought of Alexander Dugin, who, alongside the new geopolitical frontiers, contemplates the search for a new spiritual dimension that contrasts with the false myths and icons of the liberal democratic world, inspired by the ideas of Julius Evola.

In 19th century Germany, how did the Wandervogel movement and other similar movements construct the German spirit? Who were the most important figures of this period and what impact did their ideas have on modern Germany?

The Wandervögel movement, also known as the Jugendbewegung (Youth Movement), takes its name from a poem by the Romantic writer Joseph von Eichendorff and was born in Berlin as a circle of student stenographers dedicated to the Wanderungen (great walks in the German forests and valleys). The history of the Wandervögel began towards the end of the last century, around 1896 to be precise. According to some historians, who see in the German migratory birds only a movement of rebellion against the rigid and schematic school system of the Wilhelmine era, it ended in 1914 on the eve of the First World War, according to others in 1933 with the Machtübernhame, the seizure of power by the National Socialists, and finally other scholars are of the opinion that it cannot be considered as definitively finished . All, however, agree in recognising the extraordinary importance and significance of this youth movement, knowledge of which is indispensable for understanding and rightly interpreting the radical psychological, political and social transformations that characterised Germany in the last years of the 19th century and the first half of the 20th. Founded by Hermann Hoffmann, a student at the University of Berlin, the movement saw several alternating leaders, the most influential of whom was Karl Fischer, who imparted great dynamism by promoting its strong expansion throughout Germany. The greatest historian of the Jugendbewegung was Hans Blüher who dedicated several books to it. Memorable was the large gathering in 1913 on Mount Meissner where more than two thousand young people took part. At this gathering the paths for the reform of life were mapped out: the fight against alcohol, smoking, the rediscovery of the sacred in nature, the enhancement of the Germanic national identity and the lines for a new pedagogy were drawn. The understanding of the Wandervogel phenomenon would not be possible without taking into account that it has its deepest roots in the romantic movement of the early 19th century and the national-patriotic mysticism that pervaded the soul of German youth at the time of the wars of liberation when students were in the front row in the crusade against Napoleon. It is thus that in the post-World War II period the attention of researchers and scholars focused on the German history of the last two hundred years, with the specific intent, on the part of some, to identify in the Romantic, anti-Enlightenment and anti-rationalist culture of the first decades of the nineteenth century the origins of what George L. Mosse referred to as ‘the crisis of German ideology’ and which found its greatest expression in the dimensions and political forms of National Socialist totalitarianism.

When one thinks of ‘fascism’, one usually thinks of Hitler and the National Socialists. What distinguishes Italian Fascism, represented by Mussolini, from German Fascism?

Fascism, compared to National Socialism, can boast the merit of primogeniture in the birth of a movement that immediately aimed at the creation of a welfare state capable of putting distributive justice and the interests of citizens at the centre, re-establishing the primacy of politics over economics. Mussolini showed his determination when in 1926, in the face of international financial speculation, he set by authority the exchange rate of the pound sterling which was then the currency of reference at 90 lire. This measure saved Italy from the 1929 crisis when the Wall Street stock market collapsed. In this respect, however, it should be noted that the two movements certainly had much in common in terms of overcoming 19th century ideologies, the aversion to Marxism and its classist principles, the rejection of all materialistic and unpatriotic views, and the need to forge a new man with a strong identity. Fascism in Italy was distinguished by its public works. Even today, it is still possible to look with wonder and admiration at the impressive architectural work of Fascism with its openness to an airy vision of town planning based on the exaltation of large spaces. There were many cities founded by Mussolini’s Regime that still today show their solidity even in the face of natural disasters. Unlike National Socialism, Fascism, while exalting the past and imperial Romanity, was not characterised by the myth of blood and the Aryan race, which, on the other hand, played a prominent role in Germany. Likewise, the racial laws of 1938, passed at a time of international isolation and rapprochement with Germany, did not appeal to the Italian population, which was never anti-Semitic. Anti-Semitism remained confined to narrow intellectual circles gathered around Giovanni Preziosi and his magazine ‘La vita italiana’. Even during the 600 days of the Italian Social Republic, the Germans did not trust the fascists in their handling of the Jewish question and remained very suspicious of the Italians.

The conservative revolutionaries in Germany called themselves ‘conservative revolutionaries’ to distinguish themselves from the national socialists and fascists. Where did the paths of conservative revolutionarism, fascism and national socialism intersect and diverge?

The Conservative Revolution movement was officially born in Germany with the spread of the ideas of the writer Arthur Moeller van den Bruck. It was he who first translated all of Dostoevsky’s works into German. His most important work was ‘Das Dritte Reich’ in which he made a radical critique of liberal democratic principles, calling for the birth of a new imperial Germany. In reality, Moeller van den Bruck, who remains the leading exponent of the movement, did no more than pick up what had already been elaborated in the second half of the 19th century by thinkers such as Paul de Lagarde and Julius Langbehn, what had been enunciated by Arthur de Gobineau and Richard Wagner with his Bayreuth circle, by Stefan George and other nationalist intellectuals. The Conservative Revolution, as Armin Mohler has well observed in his essay entitled ‘Die Konservative Revolution in Deutschland’, in fact brought together many similar yet different intellectual movements, including in particular the ‘Völkische’, the ‘Bündische’, the national-conservatives, the federalists, the monarchists, the national revolutionaries, the national Bolsheviks, but also the esotericists and the extreme anti-Semites. The Conservative Revolution spread not only in Germany but also in Austria and Switzerland and was represented by such high-calibre thinkers as Carl Schmitt, Oswald Spengler, the Jünger brothers, but also Max Weber, Max Scheler, Ludwig Klages and Hugo von Hofmannsthal. The movement counted historians, geographers, art history scholars, storytellers, poets and all sorts of intellectuals in its ranks, and was supported by numerous cultural magazines and the collaboration of various publishing houses. The conservative revolutionaries, while anticipating the demands of National Socialism – this was also the time of the Franconian Corps, the Stahlhelm and other paramilitary organisations that fought to prevent Germany from losing further territories after the Versailles ‘Diktat’ – with their focus on the rediscovery of the Germanic spirit with its peasant culture, linked to the ‘Blut und Boden’, stood apart or even contrasted with it as time went on. To some extent perhaps the conservative revolutionaries expressed more pronounced positions than National Socialism on the subject of roots, but at the same time, while rejecting liberal democratic principles, they did not entirely sympathise with Hitler considering the figure of the Führer a replaceable function in a new political system. This idea could not fail to generate tensions. Equally they were often attentive to mystical-esoteric instances that clashed with the political pragmatism of the NSDAP. This also separated them from Italian Fascism, which was more attentive to social and popular needs.

The Right is growing in Europe. If we look closer, we see that they are liberal conservatives. Is it really the ‘right’ that is growing in Europe or are these movements integrated into the world system?

True, the right is growing in Europe but sometimes it appears as an invertebrate right, to use the words of Spanish thinker Miguel de Unamuno. A Right that is weak in its content and outdated in its very name. Today, right and left in fact mean almost nothing and no longer correctly express the forces on the political scene. The current world is characterised by the clash between liberals and anti-liberals, between the defenders of the old unipolar world, consolidated after the fall of the Berlin Wall, and those who have instead understood the need to open up to a new multipolar dimension that sets aside US supremacism and creates new world balances. The world is changing and the birth of the BRICS is proof of this. The dollar is in crisis but the Right has not understood this. So is the support for Israel and the criminal genocide of the Palestinian people a scandal. The right does not stigmatise enough the inadequacy of the European Union and support for Zelenski is just a favour for the ‘proxy war’ wanted by the Americans to keep Europe on a leash. NATO is a destabilising factor in the world and in Italy, for example, the Meloni government acts as a plenipotentiary of the United States, putting the nation’s security at serious risk. Italy hosts around 120 American bases over which the government has no jurisdiction. In the event of a world conflict, we would be the first to suffer the harmful consequences. The Meloni government is therefore not at all sovereignist as some, mistakenly, continue to think. The only one who saves himself is Victor Orban, who is surely the most intelligent and shrewd of European leaders. In Europe, there is a need for forces that fight against the old world order and show sensitivity to new geopolitical horizons, for example the Eurasia project that calls for new alliances and new pacts starting with a Mediterranean Union in which Turkey, for example, could play an absolutely important role.