The Iuzhinskii Circle

Far-Right Metaphysics in the Soviet Underground and Its Legacy Today

Bibliographic Data

ID3952205
AuthorsMarlène Laruelle (0000-0001-8289-2695, George Washington University, corresponding author)
Year2015
Volume74
Issue4
Pages563-580
Publication date2015-10-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueThe Russian Review (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0036-0341 • E-ISSN: 1467-9434
PublisherWiley (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1111/russ.12048
OpenAlexW2168788286
LanguageEN
Citations received12

This paper explores an unknown page of Russia's intellectual history, the trajectory of the Iuzhinskii or Golovin Circle. This underground circle was a key actor of the Moscow Boheme and shaped the underground intellectual life from the 1960s to the 1980s. The circle considered that replying to the Soviet regime was to be found not in a rival political ideology, but in metaphysics and search for another level or reality. This esoteric quest contributed to the discovery of Western far right ideological precepts and their introduction in the Soviet and then Russian environments. This group seeks to move beyond classical discourse on Russia's unique and specific path by counterbalancing (but not denying) it with broader references borrowed from what is called esoteric Fascism. In three decades, the Iuzhinskii Circle evolved from Mamleev's understanding of an alternate metaphysics to Golovin's discovery of a provocative counterpolitics, to Dugin's revisiting of Nazi mysticism

Epistemology · Ideology · Key (lock) · Metaphysics · Mysticism · Nazism · Political science · Politics · Eastern European Communism and Reforms · Law · Philosophy · Religious Studies and Spiritual Practices · Soviet and Russian History

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