Totalitarian Democracy and After - International Colloquium in Memory of Jacob L. Talmon 9652080640

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TOTALITARIAN DEMOCRACY AND AFTER

INTERNATIONAL COLLOQUIUM

IN MEMORY OF JACOB L. TALMON JERUSALEM, 21-24 JUNE 1982

THE ISRAEL ACADEMY OF SCIENCES AND I-IUMANITIES THE MAGNES PRESS., THE HEBREW UNIVERSITY JERUSALEM 1984

ISBN 965-208-064-0 © 1984 The IsraPl Academy of Sciences and Humanities The Magnes Press, The Hebrew University Printed in Israel at Alpha Press Ltd., Jerusalem

PREFACE

T H E co N c E PT o F To TALI TAR I AN n EM o c RA c Y gained widespread currency among students of modern history largely after the publication of Jacob L. Talmon's first book and his analysis there. In this colloquium, dedicated to his memory, the organizers decided to investigate further the meaning of this formulation as well as to explore its repercussions on contemporary historical and literary trends and its relevance to the political traditions and dynamics of countries and continents today. Talmon's passionate interest in the Jewish situation and its expressions in various ideologies, mainly their culmination in Zionism, have been given attention in a special section of the colloquium. Talmon served as Professor of Modern History at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and was a long-time member of the Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities, until his untimely death in June 1980. The colloquium is sponsored by these two institutions. The present volume contains the major papers presented at the colloquium, as well as those of the commentators who were invited to participate in the discussions. We hope that this forum of distin­ guished contributors will serve its purpose in commemorating Jacob Talmon's opus and will elicit a response of continuous interest in the challenges of this subject. On behalf of the I-Iebrew University and the Israel Academy of Sciences and I-Iumanities we wish to thank the organizing committee for pre­ paring the programme of the colloquium, and Professor Yehoshua Arieli who, as chairman of the Professor Talmon Memorial Foundation, took part in all the arrangements. We wish to express our gratitude to the participants who prepared their papers for publication as well as to Mrs Yvonne Glikson who took care of the volume for press.

Nathan Rotenstreich

V

C ONTENTS

PREFACE

V

Yehoshua Arieli: Jacob Talman - An Intellectual Portrait

1

PART I : THE HISTORIOGRAPHY AND PHILOSOPHY OF HISTORY IN RELATION TO HISTORICAL REAL­ ITY IN TER11S OF TOTALITARIAN DEMOCRACY John Dunn:

Totalitarian Democracy and the Legacy of Modern

Revolutions - Explanation or Indictment?

37

James H. Billington: Rival Revolutionary Ideals

56

Karl Dietrich Bracher: Turn of the Century and Totalitarian Ideology

70

PART II : TOTALITARIAN DEMOCRACY - CUL­ TURAL TRADITIONS AND MODERNIZATION S. N. Eisenstadt: Totalitarian Democracy - Cultural Traditions and 83

Modernization. Introductory Remarks

Michael Heyd:

Christian

Antecedents

to

Totalitarian

Democratic

86

Ideologies in the Early Modern Period

Shlomo Avincri:

Different

Visions of Political Messianism

zn the

96

Marxist European Tradition

Michael Confino: Russian and Western European Roots of Soviet 104

Totalitarianism,

Moshe Zimmermann: The Historical Setting of German Totalitarianism

118

Hava Lazarus-Yafeh: Political Traditions and Responses in Islam

128

Uriel Tal: Totalitarian Democratic Herrneneutics and Policies in Modern

13 7

]ewish Religious Nationalism

Ben-Ami Shillony: Traditional Constraints on Totalitarianism in Japan

158

PART III: THE VARIETIES AND TRANSFORMA­ TIONS OF TOTALITARIAN DEMOCRACY IN DIF­ FERENT COUNTRIES AND UNDER DIFFERENT REGIMES George L. Mosse: Political Style and Political Theory - Totalitarian

167

Democracy Revisited

Yaron Ezrahi: Political Style and Political Theory - Totalitarian Democ­ racy Revisited. Comrnents on George L. kl osse's PajJer

..

Vll

177

183

Michael Walzer: Totalitarianism and Tyranny Yirmiahu Yovcl: Totalitarianism and Totality. A Response to Afichael

193

JYalzer

Zcev Stcrnhcll: Aux sources de l'ideologie fasciste: La revolte socialiste

197

contre le matcrialisme

Baruch Knci-Paz: /deas, Political Intentions and Historical Consequences

232

- The Case of the Russian Revolution

Richard Lowenthal: Totalitarianism and After in Communist Party

262

Reginics

Harold Z. Schiffrin: Totalitarianism and After zn Conununist Party

323

Regimes. Comments on Richard Lowenthal's Paper

PART IV: THE IMPACT OF TOTALITARIAN DEMOC­ RACY ON THE JEWISH SITUATION Jonathan Frankel:

Democracy and Its Negations - On Polarity in

329

Jewish Socialism

342

Israel Kolatt: Zionism and Political Messianism Anita Shapira: Zionism and Political Messianism. Comments on Israel

354

Kolatt's Paper

Erik

Cohen:

The Israeli Kibbutz - The

Dynamics

of

Pragmatic

Utopianism

Menachem Rosner: The Israeli Kibbutz - The Dynamics of Pragmatic Utopianism. Comments on Erik Cohen's Paj1er

377

Ben Halpern: The Context of Hannah Arendt's Concept of Total­

386

itarianism

Ephraim E. Urbach: Between Rulers and Ruled- Some Aspects of

399

the ] ewish Tradition

Vlll

Jacob Talman - An Intellectual Portrait by YEHOSI-IUA ARIEL! The Hebrew University) Jerusalem

I AM A \VAR E of the honour and responsibility in being asked to open this colloquium ,vith an evocation of the men1ory of the man in whose honour we have convened and to dra,v for you here the image of Jacob Talmon that will do justice to his personality and his work. Let me remind you of some of the features familiar to all ,,vho kne\v him : his emotional intensity and elan ; the sensitivity and generosity of his mind and heart ; the never stilled thirst for knowledge and experience ; his curiosity and open-mindedness concerning people and the affairs of n1en ; his passjonate participation in the affairs of his country and his times ; his moral seriousness and sense of responsibility as a citizen of his country and the world ; his need to give testimony to his convictions, and his courage to do so in the face of a hostile public. Such a man could not and ,vould not be a secluded scholar, an intel­ lectual who kept aloof frorn the rough and tumble of events, people, causes and issues. On the contrary, though the centre of his life and mind lay in his intellectual work, this was inseparably bound up with the world in which he lived and ,vith the predicaments of his times. Talmon was possessed by a never-ceasing urge to size up intellectually, to penetrate e1npathically the world of man, to capture its spirit and aspirations and understand its dilemmas and perplexities. He did so in order to recreate his insights as powerful works of historical critique on the character and course of the modern world. The life of Talmon was encompassed by the violent, chaotic and revolutionary period of post-World-War I, first in his native Poland, then in Mandatory Palestine, in France and England during ,iVorld War II, and eventually in the State of Israel from 1949. It \vas the overwhelming power of the events of these times which deterrnined his choice of work as a historian and writer. [1]

Totalitarian Deniocracy and A/ter At first sight Tahnon seen1ed to be one of the many Jewish intellectuals of our age \vho devoted themselves to the study and interpretation of their times because of their basic insecurity and alienation and because they were endowed with a rare sensitivity and almost prophetic capacity of divination and insight into the great currents and undercurrents of contemporary society. Like many of them he \Vas a man vvhose pro­ vince \Vas the whole \Vorld and \vho thought in terms of universal history, in terms of the great movements which have shaped the fate of man in our age. 1'here is little doubt that the unique position which Talmon held as a historian and intellectual in Israel was due to his wider role as an interpreter of the n1odern world and of its ideological and spiritual forces, as an observer and a critic of the fundamental trends and attitudes which characterize the entire human condition in our time. Yet this was not the co1nplete picture. Talmon was ahvays part, and, more to the point, felt hi1nself always part, of an intensely experienced community of belonging and aspirations. To him the Jewish world of Eastern Europe with its life-style, passions, and visions, the Zionist movement with its aspirations and loyalties and the new Jewish society of Palestine and the State of Israel were his true home. Despite growing alienation towards certain trends in Israel after 1967 Talmon re1nained totally committed, in loyalty and involve1nent, to Israel as an idea and as a reality, its development and survival. This feeling of rootedness and belonging gave Talmon a base of security and self-assurance in relation to his own society as well as to that of the wider world ; a sense of measure and balance as well as criteria of reasonableness and reality in his approach toward events, ideas, policies and people. Jerusalem and the Hebre\v University, its faculty and student body, were integral to Tahnon's sense of partnership and community. rfalmon spent most of his life in the city of Jerusalem. He made his home and' brought up his fa1nily there, becoming a member of the community of scholars, public servants and intellectuals. When he first ca1ne to the I-Iebrew University Talmon \Vas part of a srnall body of students \vho had only recently arrived from Central and Eastern Europe. All of them \Vere deeply a,,,vare of the unique significance of the Hebrew University for the renascence of the Jewish people in its ancient homeland and in its eternal city. From the university on Mount Scopus, \vith its vistas over the Judacan Desert, the Jordan valley and the mountains of Moab, in sight of the