Nietzsche's Tragic Realism

Bibliographic Data

ID6402320
AuthorsPaul E Kirkland (0000-0002-7538-1536, Carthage College, corresponding author)
Year2010
Volume72
Issue1
Pages55-78
Publication date2010-01-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueThe Review of Politics (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0034-6705 • E-ISSN: 1748-6858
PublisherCambridge University Press (CUP) (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1017/s0034670509990969
OpenAlexW2035417705
LanguageEN
Citations received4
References cited15

Whether in the service of aristocratic radicalism or radical democracy, Nietzsche's political thought has most often been associated with transformation rather than limitations. This paper argues that Nietzsche offers a realism that presents politics as driven by grand aspirations and bound by tragic limitations. Nietzsche draws on Thucydides as a source for a realism that is neither reductionist nor transformative, but rather looks to the grandest of human aspirations and the limits to those aspirations. The paper analyzes Nietzsche's treatment of the character of modern idealism, the source of conflicting values, the effects of liberalism, and the consequences of democratic modernity in order to flesh out his tragic realism. Rather than advocating the tyrannical decay he expects in the short term, Nietzsche points the way to a new politics shaped by grander goals and more moderate expectations than the idealistic leveling of modernity

Aesthetics · Democracy · Epistemology · Idealism · Liberalism · Modernity · Political radicalism · Political science · Politics · Realism · Critical Theory and Philosophy · Law · Nietzsche, Schopenhauer, and Hegel · Philosophy · Philosophy, Ethics, and Existentialism

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